ABOUT

I’m a historian and artist from Margate UK of mixed (British and Seychelles Creole) heritage. My work focuses on oceanic histories and Indian Ocean Creole heritage. I’m interested in applying ways of knowing from within that heritage, and within my own experiences, to the question of how to hold my own histories and the histories I share with my communities. My practice is a research methodology, a form of community building and a creative expression.

My writing and published research has aimed to advance current knowledge on the early history of the Seychelles and Indian Ocean island networks, to trace diasporic connections and meaning through archives, oral histories and underwater cultural heritage, and to explore creolised understandings of oceanic worlds and origins. 

In my artwork and creative collaborations I try to channel new information/stories/ understandings surrounding these themes through the manipulation of historic material, collecting and sharing of shells, portraiture, creative writing, sculpture, street art, sound and music played on traditional Creole instruments. Some of the organisations I’ve worked with include UNESCO, SLAFNET, the National History Museum and Archives of the Seychelles, the University of Mauritius, the Centre for Research on Slavery and Indenture Mauritius, the University of Kent, Telesesel, the Zanzibar Stone Town Museum, People Dem Collective, Rise Up Residency, and the Turner Contemporary Gallery.