ACTION! is a project by artist Holly Graham that makes public anti-racist community led actions in Thamesmead and the surrounding area in the early 1990s.  The project considers how we attended to anti racism, trauma and care, collective memory, and demands for social justice.



The period of the early 1990’s saw a rise in racial tensions within SE London and Thamesmead, but there is currently minimal public documentation reflecting these rifts and the important community led responses to counteract them.  

In 1991 a racist gang of young white men murdered a young black boy Rolan Adams. He was 15. This event took place within a climate of fear and tension provoked by the BNP. The murder received little media attention at the time. However there was a community led responce throughout this period that included a 1500 strong 6 mile walking march on the BNP’s offices in Welling, Bexley.  Over the subsequant 2 years there was continued tension, but also strong community action and organising that culminated eventually in the 1993 Welling Riot and the clousure of the BNP Offices.

Film stills from ITN documentry, 1992

In this project Holly seeks to address this gap in story-telling; speaking with local people and groups to collect information and material about how the racism and division at this time was responded to by members of the local community.

Through a series of interviews and collection of materials, Holly documents the social actions taken by local people and groups in responce to divison.

The project memoralizes collective actions undertaken between 1991 and 1993 culminating with the Welling Riots.
It make this work visible so that It can viewed and understood in a wider historical context of activism and the tumultuous history of race relations throughout the UK more broadly, as well as outline practices of community organising that might be drawn upon today by others  in light of the ongoing social justice demands of the BLM movement.


Holly’s project will culminate in a large scale sited public artwork that consists of a series of installed Bronze plauqes along a 7km protest march route from Thamesead to Welling. This was the first march undertaken by the Rolan Adams Campaign in 1991.

Each plauqe is based on cast replica of an orginal made by the family of Rolan Adams.  This plauqe was installed in Rolan’s school but later removed and never reinstated.  

Holly Graham working on a cast of the orginal plauqe

A symposium-A Day of Action, exploring Anti Racism Community led action past and present was held on 11th June 2022.  Speakers included Richard Adams, Dev Barrah, Giles Gabbon, Ann-Marie Cousins, Hannah Ismael and Aleema Gray.
 


Holly graduated from MA Printmaking at the Royal College of Art in 2014. Recent exhibitions and projects include: To Us It Just Looks Like A Lemon: Bothy Residency, Southwark Park Galleries (2019); On Board II, Art Licks & Espacio Vista, Madrid; BOUNDS, Skelf, Online (2019); The Oval Window, Gerald Moore Gallery, London (2019); The Romance of Flowers, Kingsgate Projects, London (2018); Common Third, Copperfield, London (2018); Carefully Cleansed of Labour and Softened by Cooking, Compressor, London (2018); and Sweet Swollen, Jerwood Visual Arts: Project Space, London (2018). Holly is Head of Artist Development at Turf Projects, Croydon, and is Co-Founder of Cypher BILLBOARD, London.