3 April 2020
Mary Woodin's 10 simple steps to drawing nature.
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19 July 2023
‘England Took Us In…’ Aurelia Lange Illustrates Experiences of Rough Sleeping
Posted in: Artists, Collaboration, Design, Illustration, Special projects
Words by Aurelia Lange
”England took us in…’ Polish rough sleepers speak back’ is a 64-page dialogue between five Polish men with a history of rough sleeping in London. The five – Albert, Andrzej (‘Bieszczady’), Eugeniusz, Eryk (‘Fragles’) and Radek (‘Fontanna’) – were members of a Polish-language coffee morning group run by Kasia Makowska in 2021 and 2022. It was a space where Polish speakers who were or had been homeless could come together to share experiences and talk about issues that affected them.
Kasia first met most members of the group at Akwaaba, a social centre for migrants, which Benjamin Morgan helped set up in 2015 and where she has been volunteering since 2017. I have memories of attending Akwaaba’s chaotic and beautiful Sunday mornings at the Princess May Primary School in Hackney in 2017. In a classroom normally full of 4 yr olds, I was amazed to see a ‘Know your rights workshop’ for Polish construction workers taking place; reactive to an increasingly hostile government – pre-Brexit and the pandemic.
This idea that every homeless person has to be unshaven and hairy! Smelly and dirty… I’ve got somewhere to go and wash my clothes. Others might not want to, they’d rather lie down in the bushes or on a bench. Drink and take drugs… There’s homelessness and then there’s homelessness, you know?
Eryk - contributor
This project has also been close to my heart as some of the drawings included in the booklet are drawn from life, around Dalston at that time, and it feels really great to have them included in the telling of these stories from the same time period.
Printed copies of the booklet will be available through Public Interest Law Centre this September at a launch event in London, available in English and Polish. A free digital download of the book is available here complete with 16 illustrations:
