Kayd Somali Arts & Culture and Partners Proudly Presents

Somali Week Festival 2021

‘Inspired by the past, inspiring the future’

Tuesday 26th October – Sunday 31st October

In October 2021, during the UK’s Black History Month, Kayd proudly presents the 13th Somali Week Festival titled “Inspire: inspired by the past, inspiring the future” aimed to look beyond the pandemic and imagine what a post Covid-19 world will look like in a carefully curated programme that features inspiring mental health and wellness experts, emerging and established artists as well as the healthcare heroes and frontline fighters over the past year. In doing so, artists, photographers, writers, and musicians are being called upon to help display their appreciation and put a creative spotlight on the efforts of key workers, during this ongoing pandemic. In doing so, SWF 2021 will feature a brand-new Somali-British Play and a new cohort of both established and upcoming. This year’s festival deals with how artists, activists and musicians respond and react to the global covid-19 pandemic 18 months after onset in order to both highlight all the amazing and brave people in the community who stepped forward during this unprecedented time as well as look back on the incredible Somalis lost to the pandemic. We will also look at the larger implications of how the BAME community in the UK has been particularly affected by covid-19.

Kayd Somali Arts & Culture and Partners Proudly Presents: 12th annual Somali Week Festival Online 2020: Culture & Creativity during Covid-19 Friday 23rd October – Sunday 25th October

Friday 30th October – Saturday 31st October

The festival, an integral part of the United Kingdom Black History Month, will run from Friday 23rd October to Saturday 31st October 2020 online.

The theme for this year’s festival deals with how culture informs creative work and how producers and creatives use the concept of heritage in their work during the time of a global pandemic. In our 12th anniversary, the festival, like most artistic events, has been hugely affected by the covid-19 pandemic and this year, we present an online festival that aims to both inform and entertain the community. In doing so, we will aim to celebrate cultural diversity across the Somali region and what role culture plays in inspiring works of art; whether it is poetry, plays, paintings, academic research, and activism. We explore and highlight artistic expression through various mediums by shining a light on the cultural movers and shakers both within our local UK community as well as expanding out to the global Somali diaspora and Somali Horn. This year’s festival is concerned with how customs and traditions influences how Somalis produce works of art in a bid to celebrate Somali diversity within our rich culture.

As the community both locally and internationally begin to navigate in this new normal in what is still an ongoing global pandemic, our festival will carefully curate programs from our intergenerational audience that will explore the very best of both traditional and modern Somali artists.