The Keskidee Centre, or Keskidee Arts Centre, was Britain's first arts centre for the Black community, founded in 1971."The Keskidee – a community that discovered itself. Islington Local History Centre celebrates the Keskidee – Britain’s first arts centre for the black community", Islington Local History Centre, 2009. . Located at Gifford Street in Islington, near King's Cross in London, it was a project initiated by Guyanese architect and cultural activist Oscar Abrams (1937–1996)"Oscar Abrams", Diaspora Artists. to provide under one roof self-help and cultural activities for the local West Indian community. Its purpose-built facilities included a library, gallery, studios, theatre and restaurant."King's Cross", KXV-2006-206-01: Errol Lloyd interview. Soundcloud. The Keskidee became a hub for African and Afro-Caribbean politics and arts, and for years was the only place in London that produced black theatre,Pavan Amara, "Cherished King’s Cross black arts Keskidee Centre is latest to get a heritage green plaque", Camden New Journal, 8 April 2011. developing its own vibrant drama company and attracting both a black and white audience.Pavan Amara and Andrew Johnson, "Fire rips through pioneering black arts venue where Bob Marley shot Is This Love video", Islington Tribune, 9 March 2012. .
History
In 1971, Guyanese-born architect and cultural activist Oscar Winston Abrams (1937–1996), who had settled in Britain in 1958, bought a run-down Victorian mission hall"Keskidee Centre, formerly Gifford Hall", The National Archives. Records held at English Heritage Archive. from the Shaftesbury Society for £9000 and transformed it into the Keskidee Centre,"Keskidee Arts Centre — Biography" at Black Plays Archive, Royal National Theatre. which came to provide "a unique and hugely influential cultural and political environment for the black community throughout the 1970s and early-1980s." The community centre's name and logo derived from the keskidee bird native to Guyana and elsewhere in the Caribbean.
The Keskidee Theatre workshop was co-founded by Oscar Abrams and Norma Ashe-Watt in 1971, with a full-time drama company dedicated to black theatre, under the artistic direction of African-American Rufus Collins, who had originally come to Britain on tour with The Living Theatre.Yvonne Brewster, Colin Chambers, "Black theatre", Drama Online. From Colin Chambers (ed.), The Continuum Companion to Twentieth-Century Theatre (London, 2002)."Keskidee Centre", Unfinished Histories – Recording The History of Alternative Theatre. Among other professional actors, directors, and playwrights it attracted were Yvonne Brewster, Anton Phillips, Howard Johnson, Jimi Rand (Say Hallelujah),"Say Hallelujah", Black Plays Archive, Royal National Theatre. Edgar Nkosi White (Lament for Rastafari, 1977; Les Femmes Noires/The Black Women),"Edgar Nkosi White" at Black Plays Archive, Royal National Theatre.Alda Terracciano, "Edgar Nkosi White" , FutureHistories. T-Bone Wilson (Jumbie Street March; Body and Soul, 1974),"Jumbie Street March", Black Plays Archive, Royal National Theatre. Pat Maddy (Gbana Bendu, 1973),"Gbana Bendu", Black Plays Archive, Royal National Theatre. who at one time was Director of Drama,"Yulisa Amadu Maddy", Hans M. Zell, Carol Bundy & Virginia Coulon (eds), A New Reader's Guide to African Literature, Heinemann Educational Books, 1983, pp. 410–11. Yemi Ajibade, and Lindsay Barrett. Staged in the Keskidee Centre were productions of Derek Walcott's Pantomime, Wole Soyinka's The Swamp Dwellers (1975) and Lennox Brown's Throne in an Autumn Room (1973).
Nigerian artist and sculptor Emmanuel Taiwo Jegede was also an artist-in-residence;"The Keskidee — Music, art and poetry" , Islington Local History Centre, 2009, p. 3. his son Tunde Jegede, born in 1972 and now a composer and virtuoso kora player, has credited the Keskidee Centre with initiating and nurturing his earliest appreciation of African diaspora culture."General Biography" , Tunde Jegede website. Errol Lloyd was also brought in by Abrams to be artist-in-residence (1974–75). As an indication of the significant role played by the Keskidee Centre in nurturing, supporting and celebrating Black visual artists, Diaspora Artists quotes from the Preface to the journal Savacou, issue 9/10, in which John La Rose and Andrew Salkey wrote about a session held at the Keskidee Centre on Friday, 10 March 1972, entitled A Tribute to Ronald Moody, describing it as "a historical exposition, illustrated with slides, of [the] Jamaican sculptor, arranged and presented by Errol Lloyd, the Jamaican painter."
Linton Kwesi Johnson was the Keskidee's first paid library resources and education officer, and his work at the centre featured in Franco Rosso's 45-minute documentary film Dread, Beat an' Blood, produced in 1979."Dread, Beat an' Blood", Learning on Screen, British Universities Film & Video Council. It was at the Keskidee Centre that Johnson developed dub poetry, a staged version of his poem "Voices of the Living and the Dead" being produced by Lindsay Barrett there in 1973, with music by the reggae group Rasta Love. The venue was also used for community meetings and events by the Caribbean Artists Movement. On 10 December 1974, Angela Davis spoke at the Keskidee Centre, while she was in London to attend a rally in support of South African political prisoners."Angela Davis at the Keskidee Centre", George Padmore Institute, 26 February 2013.
Up-and-coming bands such as Misty in Roots and Steel Pulse also played at Keskidee, and in 1978 Bob Marley used the centre to make a video (in which a seven-year-old Naomi Campbell took part along with other children) for his song "Is This Love?"William Perrin, , Kings Cross Environment, 29 September 2011. Includes Bob Marley video filmed at the Keskidee and on Gifford Street."Bob Marley songs: 13 of his greatest ever", Features, Smooth Radio, 5 February 2019.Kathryn Whitbourne, "5 Things You Didn't Know About Bob Marley", 3 February 2017.
The Keskidee centre influenced the lives of many local Black youth including the artist, playwright, curator and educator Michael McMillan who visited the centre often as a child.
The Keskidee Centre ran into financial difficulties in the 1980s, and closed in 1991. The building was subsequently taken over by the Christ Apostolic Church.
Oscar Abrams died on 15 February 1996, aged 58.
Legacy In 2009, The Keskidee was the subject of a BBC Radio 4 programme based on oral history interviews conducted by Alan Dein as part of the King's Cross Voices project."The Keskidee centre on radio 4", Archives and Identities – UCL AHRC Community Archives project 2008–9.The Keskidee, BBC Radio 4.
On 7 April 2011, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the opening of the Keskidee Centre,Martyn Glynn, "Keskidee Centre to celebrate 40th anniversary", Net-Lettings, 30 March 2011. an Islington Council heritage green plaque was unveiled on the building, at the time a church, by David Lammy and former resident artist Emmanuel Jegede.Peter Gruner, "Green plaque honours Keskidee arts centre where Naomi Campbell met Bob Marley" , Camden New Journal, 25 March 2011.Rob Bleaney, "Plaque for Islington arts centre which starred in Bob Marley video", Islington Gazette, 29 March 2011.Pavan Amara, , Islington Tribune, 8 April 2011.Mark Blunden, "Honour for arts centre where Bob Marley danced with Naomi Campbell, 7", London Evening Standard, 21 March 2011.
On the night of 8 March 2012, the building was ravaged by fire."Bob Marley's 'Is This Love church' destroyed by fire", BBC News, 9 March 2012. The police treated the blaze as suspicious, and the investigation was closed a month later after a Scotland Yard spokesman announced that the police had "exhausted all lines of inquiry"., Islington Tribune, 27 April 2012.
References
Further reading Colin Chambers, Black and Asian Theatre in Britain: a history. Routledge, 2011.
External links "Islington Local History Centre celebrates the Keskidee – Britain’s first arts centre for the black community", Islington Local History Centre, 2009. Cllr Claudia Webbe, "Memories of the Keskidee", Islington Labour, 16 March 2012.