#RDG City of Culture. An open letter to Reading 2016.
I've never been one to trample all over someone's ambitions, but when it directly affects me and it's done so badly, I can't help but get involved. I love the arts and culture. It saddens me that budget cuts are at the expense of South Street and Reading Library. I think cultural events serve to promote their importance and help educate people in a vast array of topics, outside of the arts.
When Reading announced it wanted to organise a Year of Culture in 2016, I was sceptical. How could this cultural wasteland ever pull something like this out of the bag. Yesterday, they announced their plans and I was proved... right.
It's lame. Who thought, "Reading and reading are spelt the same, we should do a Reading in Reading month". Wow, top marks. So much creative thinking here?! June ties into existing event Eat Reading and they've piggy-backed onto the town's biggest event, Reading Festival in August *slow claps*.
There's no diversity, there's no fun, there's no education and there's absolutely no innovation.
Instead of defining culture and creating a month to facilitate it, why not use Reading's rich heritage and cultural diversity.
March is Holi - the biggest Hindu festival. Reading has a massive Asian community. Why not close off the main artery across Reading from Whitley to Caversham for a huge Holi parade of colour. The streets could be lined with street food sold by many of the Indian restaurants in Reading. Talks by Indian writers, like Hanif Kureishi and Monica Ali at Shehnai. Exhibit Indian artists or curate Indian art. Professors from the university could talk about British Raj, India's state of emergency and the Mughal empire. Bollywood movies could be played at Caversham Court and local MP Alok Sharma could get involved.
Why aren't there music walking tours to show off Reading's links to Pink Floyd, Bloc Party, The Cure, Jimi Page and Laura Marling. All of Reading's studios could have open days for people to see what the inside is like, get a taster of sound, light and mixing engineering. Plus opening all venues for unsigned live music events. Invite Stuart Price, Chris Cunningham, Ricky Gervais and Charlie Brooker to curate days.
Reading is home to the UK's first black church and we have the mural on the Central Club wall. You can bet your arse William Wilberforce came here with all the money and industry to drum up support for the abolition of slavery and Malcolm X came to the UK. Why not tag onto Black History Month, which is a bona fide national event to celebrate this. It could be a month of black writers, poets, politicians, playwrights, musicians, chefs, singers and thinkers doing what they do best all over Reading, like rap battles on Broad Street, The Colour Purple at Progress Theatre, Tutu's Ethiopian Kitchen and Perry's selling street food at Market Place, talks by Lemn Sissay and Benjamin Zephaniah, Zadie Smith, Idris Elba and Chuka Umunna in Reading Library or Concert Hall.
A huge coup, given the current climate, could be a Middle-Eastern month, where classics professors talk about the region's rich ancient history. Three of the world's biggest religions come from this area. Tap into Reading's greatest asset, the university, and get theology, philosophy, history and politics scholars to do Lost Lectures. You could even try and get Tony Blair in. All the Lebanese, Persian and Hebrew food that could be sold. The poetry of Rumi or passages from George Gurdjieff could be read by local drama groups at Forbury Square. There could be talks, plays, exhibitions and films about the birth of Israel and ancient Egypt utilising the space at Jackson's and RISC.
Magna Carta turned 800 this year and was signed just down the road, civil war battles happened around here, think about the county's Royal/reformation connections, Oscar Wilde was banged up in Reading for being gay, why not do Pride events (again thinking about the current climate), Jane Austen is relatively local, run feminist events and the Thames, imagine the flotillas - you've got the blueprint of a pretty awesome year. Maybe even a benchmark.
And all that is just off the top of my head!
C'mon Reading. Must try harder.
When Reading announced it wanted to organise a Year of Culture in 2016, I was sceptical. How could this cultural wasteland ever pull something like this out of the bag. Yesterday, they announced their plans and I was proved... right.
It's lame. Who thought, "Reading and reading are spelt the same, we should do a Reading in Reading month". Wow, top marks. So much creative thinking here?! June ties into existing event Eat Reading and they've piggy-backed onto the town's biggest event, Reading Festival in August *slow claps*.
There's no diversity, there's no fun, there's no education and there's absolutely no innovation.
Instead of defining culture and creating a month to facilitate it, why not use Reading's rich heritage and cultural diversity.
March is Holi - the biggest Hindu festival. Reading has a massive Asian community. Why not close off the main artery across Reading from Whitley to Caversham for a huge Holi parade of colour. The streets could be lined with street food sold by many of the Indian restaurants in Reading. Talks by Indian writers, like Hanif Kureishi and Monica Ali at Shehnai. Exhibit Indian artists or curate Indian art. Professors from the university could talk about British Raj, India's state of emergency and the Mughal empire. Bollywood movies could be played at Caversham Court and local MP Alok Sharma could get involved.
Why aren't there music walking tours to show off Reading's links to Pink Floyd, Bloc Party, The Cure, Jimi Page and Laura Marling. All of Reading's studios could have open days for people to see what the inside is like, get a taster of sound, light and mixing engineering. Plus opening all venues for unsigned live music events. Invite Stuart Price, Chris Cunningham, Ricky Gervais and Charlie Brooker to curate days.
Reading is home to the UK's first black church and we have the mural on the Central Club wall. You can bet your arse William Wilberforce came here with all the money and industry to drum up support for the abolition of slavery and Malcolm X came to the UK. Why not tag onto Black History Month, which is a bona fide national event to celebrate this. It could be a month of black writers, poets, politicians, playwrights, musicians, chefs, singers and thinkers doing what they do best all over Reading, like rap battles on Broad Street, The Colour Purple at Progress Theatre, Tutu's Ethiopian Kitchen and Perry's selling street food at Market Place, talks by Lemn Sissay and Benjamin Zephaniah, Zadie Smith, Idris Elba and Chuka Umunna in Reading Library or Concert Hall.
A huge coup, given the current climate, could be a Middle-Eastern month, where classics professors talk about the region's rich ancient history. Three of the world's biggest religions come from this area. Tap into Reading's greatest asset, the university, and get theology, philosophy, history and politics scholars to do Lost Lectures. You could even try and get Tony Blair in. All the Lebanese, Persian and Hebrew food that could be sold. The poetry of Rumi or passages from George Gurdjieff could be read by local drama groups at Forbury Square. There could be talks, plays, exhibitions and films about the birth of Israel and ancient Egypt utilising the space at Jackson's and RISC.
Magna Carta turned 800 this year and was signed just down the road, civil war battles happened around here, think about the county's Royal/reformation connections, Oscar Wilde was banged up in Reading for being gay, why not do Pride events (again thinking about the current climate), Jane Austen is relatively local, run feminist events and the Thames, imagine the flotillas - you've got the blueprint of a pretty awesome year. Maybe even a benchmark.
And all that is just off the top of my head!
C'mon Reading. Must try harder.
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