‘We want to be known as somewhere that welcomes people’
SAM HOLLAND set up the Migration Matters Festival in Sheffield in 2016 because he was concerned by the growing anti-refugee rhetoric in the media.
“When I was about eight or nine I remember people in the city helping Kosovan refugees and giving them accommodation. A football match was held in support of them and I remember thinking how welcoming and friendly Sheffield was towards refugees. But that attitude seems to have changed in this country over the last 20 years,” he says.
And, having worked as a volunteer when Sheffield became the first City of Sanctuary – which aims to change attitudes and foster a culture of hospitality for refugees and asylumseekers coming to the UK – he wanted to do more, which is how the festival came about.
“It was a reaction to the growing crisis surrounding refugees and the way they’re portrayed in the media,” says Sam.
“We all know Sheffield is the Steel City, the place of Hendo’s, hills, Pulp, grit, soul and chip butties, but it is also a place of welcome, a city of sanctuary where you’re a Sheffielder no matter your race, language, faith or passport,” he adds.
This year’s festival, which starts today and runs until Saturday, takes place across several locations, going beyond the city centre, and features an array of theatre, music, dance, spoken word, film, food and fashion.
Both universities are involved in the festival as well as the Showroom Cinema and Sheffield theatres and Sam, the festival’s director, believes it is an example of the city pulling together.
“Sheffield was the first ‘City of Sanctuary’ and this is what we want the city to be.
“We don’t want to be known as the city that chops down trees. We want to be known as somewhere that welcomes people who are disenfranchised and traumatised, and that’s the idea behind this festival.”
As well as celebrating, and involving, refugees in this country, the festival has a number of artists taking part with Kuo-Shin Chuang Pangcah Dance Theatre travelling all the way from Taiwan, while up-and-coming band The Turbans are among the music acts playing at the festival hub, Theatre Deli.
This year’s line-up also includes the Ubuntu fashion show and food event, at Norfolk Park, the award-winning father of ‘dub poetry’ Linton Kwesi Johnson, and groundbreaking theatre from the Arab Puppet Theatre Foundation, from Lebanon.
Six exhibitions run throughout the festival and workshops are taking place on everything from activism to storytelling. Among them is a photographic display featuring pictures taken by Abdulazez Dukan, a 19-yearold from Syria, which tells the stories of people living in refugee camps in Europe.
Abdulazez spent much of his teenage life in refugee camps after the conflict erupted in Syria in 2011. “In February 2016 I left Turkey and headed to Europe. As the borders were closed at that time, I had to stay in Idomeni and Eko station refugee camps for five months. That is where my story began. I started photography while I was living in the refugee camp to tell stories of the people who were there, the real stories,” he says.
“In the future, I will definitely be doing more photography and telling more stories from faceless people – just like me when I got into Greece.
“Photography isn’t just a hobby for me, photography is a way to break walls between people.”