The rukus! Federation is the longest running Black LGBTQ+ arts project in the UK. Co-founded by artist and filmmaker Topher Campbell and photographer Ajamu X, rukus! Federation has been a space for Black Queer expression and creativity since 2000. Exhibitions, social events and workshops have all shed a light on the groundbreaking work of the community. Five years later, Campbell and Ajamu X launched the rukus! archive, which collects the material objects – letters, magazines, films, club flyers and more – that recognise the artistic, social and cultural histories of Black Queer people in the UK. This expansive collection forms the basis of a new exhibition at Somerset House, titled Making a Rukus! Black Queer Histories Through Love and Resistance. Curated by Campbell, this show celebrates Black LGBTQ+ pioneers since the 1970s. On display are 200 objects, including contemporary artworks from Evan Ifekoya, Rotimi Fani-Kayode and Jacob V Joyce. In this interview, Campbell shares with us the origins of rukus! Federation, the concept of a living archive and the significance of the Black Queer clubbing scene.
A: Could you take us back to the early days of the rukus! archive, when you were setting it up with Ajamu X, and share what sparked the idea for this project?
TC: The rukus! Archive evolved from rukus! Federation, which came about through conversations between myself and Ajamu X when we became friends in the 1990s. We’ve always been very excited about sharing our experiences and ideas as young Queer people. For instance, my presence was always being contested when I was working across film, theatre and modelling. Wherever I showed up, people would ask: “Why are you here?” “What are you doing?” “Where are you from?” This desire for veracity was sometimes kind and inquisitive and, at other times, prohibitive. For example, not being allowed to get into clubs or being questioned with “do you know this is a Black club?” “Do you know this is a gay, queer club?” When I worked as a director, I got asked: “are you the choreographer?” “Are you the dancer?” Police officers would challenge me with: “why are you standing on the street corner?” “Why are you driving that car?” “Why are you in first class?” Just – why are you being Black? In that environment, we were always reacting to the world around us. However, we were also part of a vibrant scene of artists. So, we wanted to reflect our reality and witness to who we were.
A: How did rukus! Federation come about?
TC: We started rukus! Federation on 23 June 2000 with £1,000 given to us by author Valerie “Queenie” Mason-John. The name is a nod to cheeky British seaside humour, African American porn star “Ruckus” and the Jamaican idea of “causing a ruckus,” which means to make noise and also reflects James Baldwin’s (1924-1987) notion that artists must disturb the peace. Federation – in addition to me being a Trekkie – came from my idea of creating a movement, like the 20th century Vorticists or the Futurists. rukus! Federation brought together our humor, our sexuality and our Britishness. Under this title, we curated a programme of artists that premiered at the London ICA’s Pride Arts Festival. Around 2004, we began talking about an exhibition – to be titled Family Treasures – that would showcase all the creativity we knew and admired in South London. It flopped because nobody responded to our call out. People couldn’t get their heads around the cultural and historical significance of what we were doing. We tried again in 2005 by physically going round to people’s houses to ask for creative contributions and put everything together in a landmark show called The Queen’s Jewels. After that, we put on more exhibitions with the epherema given to us. By the late 1990s, we had collected a lot of stuff that we wanted to keep safe. At the time, Ajamu X was building a relationship with the London Metropolitan Archives, run by pioneering archivists Jan Pimlott and Richard Wiltshire, who were excited by the prospect of turning this collection into an archive. It took three years and 30 volunteers to bring the rukus! archive to life.
A: How has the archive evolved since its inception?
TC: The archive has only evolved in terms of its public outing. For instance, in 2008, Ajamu X created the Outside Edge exhibition. There’s also the addition of Sharing Tongues, which was an archive that profiled Black LGBTQ people over 35 from London, Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham. We’ve done talks, lectures and workshops. It also grew through a conversation we had with scholar Dr Mary Stevens, who wrote an article called Love and Lubrication in the Archives, or rukus!: A Black Queer Archive for the United Kingdom. It’s an article that is still going viral and publicizing the project internationally.
The key thing about rukus! Federation and the archive is that it’s an art project. That’s what we’ve always emphasized: it’s by two artists. We were trying to create a space that spoke to the reality, imagination, play and joy that we experienced in our lives. It’s a celebration of the things that we experience as people. Its evolution is not only about presence but also absence. We did an event called In This Our Lives in 2007. It was a reunion that celebrated the 20th anniversary of the 1987 Black Gay Men’s conference, the first and only of its kind in the UK. I like to think of rukus! Federation as a comedy duo or a band, where Ajamu X and I come together when we want to make something happen. On a wider level, it’s a project that traces our continually evolving friendship.
A: In recent years we have seen more creatives – from Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley to Laura Chen – explore archives and challenge the ways we’re used to preserving histories. What is your archival approach? And, what are your reflections on the relationship between art and archives?
TC: I’ve always believed in the living archive, that they aren’t static or reverential. I’ve learned that archiving isn’t about the objects. It’s about the people and the relationships that create the things that matter. It’s an emotional, spiritual, sexual and intellectual relationship, in addition to our connection with physical materials. Of course, it also revolves around a highly creative and artistic bond. These are the cornerstones of this project, although I don’t necessarily think of my practice as being archival. I’m interested in thinking about who I am and where I am in the world, and sharing that perspective by inviting people into my work. This motivates my art and intersects with rukus! and Ajamu X’s own practice. Artistry, creativity and playfulness are fundamental to rukus! Federation and the rukus! Archive. It doesn’t sit within notions of preservation, but we are custodians of other people’s work, secrets and intimacies. For me, archives are another artistic project. Fundamentally, creatives engage with belonging, memoir, memory, histories, identities, place, geography and notions of home and homelessness. Who am I? Where am I? What am I doing? That is what an archive is for me. It’s a constant question as opposed to an answer. It’s dynamic.
A: Could you spotlight some of the archival materials in the second room that have left the greatest impression on you?
TC: I had to revisit the rukus! Archive a lot over the years. I did a documentary for Paramount BET called Moments That Shaped Queer Black Britain, which took storytelling inspiration from the archival material. Over the last year, I’ve been exploring it for this project and also my installation project at Tate Modern. So, I have been intimately getting to know the archive again. I’m struck by the contrast between the very intimate and the very public. For example, the in memoriam section celebrates those who have passed away. Seeing my ex-lover Roger in that collection was definitley not something I expected or wanted to see when we started the archive. His passing speaks to some of the hidden issues around trauma, substance abuse and the pressure to maintain sanity when you’re different and trying to navigate a society that is just not made for you. Juxtaposed with that very private reflection is the work of people like Valerie Mason-John, who was out, open and an inspiration to me. I was interested in reframing some of my relationships and to other people in the second room of Making a Rukus!. It was an interesting journey of honouring the truth of those bonds as I see them now, which I didn’t necessarily articulate even five years ago.
A: What were your consA: Could you spotlight some of the archival materials in the second room that have left the greatest impression on you?
TC: I had to revisit the rukus! Archive a lot over the years. I did a documentary for Paramount BET called Moments That Shaped Queer Black Britain, which took storytelling inspiration from the archival material. Over the last year, I’ve been exploring it for this project and also my installation project at Tate Modern. So, I have been intimately getting to know the archive again. I’m struck by the contrast between the very intimate and the very public. For example, the in memoriam section celebrates those who have passed away. Seeing my ex-lover Roger there was definitely not something I expected or wanted to see when we started the archive. His passing speaks to some of the hidden issues around trauma, substance abuse and the pressure to maintain sanity when you’re different and trying to navigate a society that is just not made for you. Juxtaposed with that very private reflection is the work of people like Valerie Mason-John, who was out, open and an inspiration to me. I was interested in reframing some of my relationships in the second room of Making a Rukus! It was an interesting journey of honouring the truth of those bonds as I see them now, which I didn’t necessarily articulate five years ago.
A: What were your considerations when it came to the layout of this show? How did you decide the theme for each room?
TC: This whole exhibition is an arts project. One of my hobbies is astrophysics, so I juxtaposed my love and admiration of people there with constellations. I decided which figures corresponded with which interstellar bodies, such as my supernovas, white dwarves and binary star systems. That was my starting point, which is especially evident in Room 2. The first room was about framing the whole project around how love and friendship lead to creativity. There’s this notion of energy and visibility from everyone who chose to contribute to the archive, such as Isaac Julian, Justin Fashion and others.
Room 2 revolves around the invitation we gave to our communities to be part of the rukus! Project. People like Valerie Mason-John, Ted Walker Brown, Dorothea Smart and Dennis Carney have been some of the huge movers and shakers over the last 30 years. They have their own gravitational pull, like supernovas, red dwarves or even black holes. There’s also space for smaller stars, people I know who did one play here or one performance there. Some had projects that were supernovas, such as Big UP or a lot of the HIV and AIDS campaigns. Lastly, in room 3, I wanted to frame the experience of clubbing.
A: Evan Ifekoya is restaging A Score, A Groove, A Phantom, A rukus! is in Room 3 – could you tell us more about this installation?
TC: Evan Ifekoya (b. 1988) is an amazing artist. They were one of the 30 people who helped catalogue the archive originally. Ifekoya’s piece – created 10 years ago – is in fact inspired by the relationship they had built with the rukus! archive all those years ago. A Score, A Groove, A Phantom, A rukus! explores questions around the Black body, space and nightlife.
I grew up in the nightlife, in those twilight, dawn hours. I feel strongly about this because we’re seeing the gentrification of these spaces and this culture. These neighbourhoods where Black and Brown Queer people have been able to enjoy are being bought up. There’s also the gentrification of Queer club culture. There is a sense in which the night is seen as a disrespectful place, somewhere noisy and unruly. However, Black Queer people needed those spaces because some of us couldn’t find that acceptance and comfort in our homes, our synagogues, our mosques and family homes. It was important that the nightlife existed for someone like me. It’s somewhere you might meet your love, have your first kiss or sexual experience. Maybe it’s a space where you’ve experimented with drugs, found your tribe or found out about your sexuality in a freeing, non-judgmental way. By closing down those spaces, you’re closing down the possibility for those mavericks and freaks and innovators to emerge – and I think that’s just a tragedy.
In this show, I wanted to pay homage to those who have fallen through the HIV and AIDS virus and celebrate all those of us freaks and misfits who found refuge in the beats and body movements of the nighttime. Ifekoya resonated with that and their installation explores the importance of this scene. In that room, there are club flyers from the 1980s, 1990s and noughties. I wanted to present it in a very alive way. Visitors step into a dance floor, where you get this sense of anticipation. It’s the feeling of ease or excitement when you’re waiting outside the club doors. Then you walk in and there’s the swell of music that welcomes you into the space – it’s just really exciting.
A: Jacob V Joyce has also created a flag specially for Making a rukus! What does the piece look like and how did the idea for it come about?
TC: Jacob is an artist I’ve always admired. They are a part of this intergenerational conversation and also somebody who was inspired by the archive. Back in 2017, the ICA asked rukus! to be part of an alternative United Nations and each guest was asked to produce a flag. Jacob, being an illustrator, was the perfect person for the job. They came up with this beautiful riff on the rukus! sensibility with these dancing figures.
It’s another way in which we’re saying that rukus! is an invitation to artists and welcomes creativity from any and every medium. Evan and Jacob are two important voices in that intergenerational conversation, alongside contributions from Kamari Romeo, Black Obsidian Sound System (B.O.S.S) and Jason Okundaye. This exhibition showcases the rich landscape rukus! has nurtured. There are a lot of Black Queer artists from different generations and nationalities who have been part of the rukus! project, from Dean Atta, Jide McCauley and Sandi Hughes to Phyll Opoku (UK Black Pride) and Andrew Prince (Outburst UK). We’re recognising people who have been part of the longest running Black LGBTQ+ arts project in the country.
A: What would you like visitors to take away after seeing this exhibition?
TC: My hope is that people get to reflect on their own lives. Visitors looking at club flyers, newspaper articles, letters, videos, DVDs and MP3s will get to witness my time in this world. Rukus! is also about helping people think differently about social history and about the importance of the everyday. All our experiences are part of the fabric of our culture. People who are within these communities might also recognize themselves in the exhibition. I’ve already had people come back to me and say “this reminds me of this” or “that reminds me of that.” I want people to have fun, to laugh – there’s a lot of humor. I also want them to feel completely unashamed about sex and sexuality. It’s a celebration, an affirmation that anything’s possible. There are different narratives that aren’t just focused on trauma, marginalization, racism and homophobia. There’s joy, community, friendship, love, mischievousness, unruliness, being unapologetic, being present, being out and being loud. These aspects are really important too.
Could you spotlight any projects you are currently working on – what can we look forward to seeing from you next?
TC: This year has been amazing. I’ve been very blessed to have been commissioned by both Tate Modern and Somerset House. The former exhibition is called My Rukus! Heart and delves more into my personal life and relationships, addressing the themes that are most important to me. It’s a beautiful, joyful, immersive experience made up of three pieces, alongside a sculpture about memoir and the body. I’m very happy to invite people to experience the different modalities and moods there. It’s quite a meditative space, but it changes into something else as well. It’s happening concurrently with Making a Rukus! and runs until the end of January.
Somerset House, Making a Rukus! Black Queer Histories through Love and Resistance | Until 19 January
Words: Topher Campbell and Diana Bestwish Tetteh
Image Credits:
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode, City Gent, 1988. © Rotimi Fani-Kayode. Courtesy of Autograph, London.
- Still from The Homecoming-A Short Film about Ajamu by Topher Campbell.
- Portrait of character from performance of Valerie Mason-John play ‘Brown Girl in the Ring’. Oval House Theatre, 1999.
- Wickers and Bullers Magazine, 1994. Photography by Ajamu.
- Rotimi Fani-Kayode, City Gent, 1988. © Rotimi Fani-Kayode. Courtesy of Autograph, London.
