The Foundation have supported an entrepreneur from Coventry, with a grant of £5,000 from the Coventry UK City of Culture Fund, which has helped create a festival celebrating black culture.
The free event is open to all and will be held at Warwick Arts Centre on Saturday 3rd August 2019. It will run between 11am and 11pm.
iDENT Festival is a celebration of the wide breadth of the Black experience and diverse culture. It seeks to challenge stereotypes, dispel unconscious biases and stimulate conversation. The aim is to create a celebration of Black commerce, community, heritage and culture that is distinctly different to the ‘typical’ Carnival type events.
Founder and Coventry resident, Nyasha Pitt, said:
“Coventry is a city of resurgence and resilience; themes that resonate with Black heritage and culture. This is a contemporary approach to the celebration of African and African-Caribbean communities, that everyone will be able to take part in and enjoy.
“That’s incredibly important to me personally. I am proud to be both back and British. I love my culture, both my Caribbean heritage as well as my absolute Britishness. They are both an intrinsic part of me and I wanted to create a celebration that everyone I hold dear to me, regardless of their race, would want to engage in and enjoy.
“I also wanted to deliver something to communities in Coventry and beyond that was different and unique in terms of the Black experience; the sort of event that would be a considered, contemporary undertaking that people expect to take place in London.
“This event is set against the backdrop of divisions created by socio-economic challenges, Brexit ‘blues’, knife crime and an increase of hate crimes. It is an opportunity to set aside differences whilst celebrating diversity.”
iDENT Festival will include a broad range of activities and content including:
- a film festival in partnership with Watch Africa, a notable annual Welsh Film festival;
- a business festival with free workshops from experts providing guidance on personal branding, networking and public speaking;
- a literary festival with local poets and spoken word artists;
- a marketplace with booksellers, hand-crafted stationery and artisan clothing and jewellery;
- and there will also be music punctuating the day provided by a Coventry Gospel choir and the city’s award-winning Steel Pan Band – Phase One.
Free tickets are available via EventBrite and can be found by searching iDENT Festival 2019 or visiting https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/ident-festival-2019-tickets-65579513089