events

This month in our gallery: an exhibition about mental illness, masking, talking animals and feeling left behind

Welcome to the last five years of my life. This exhibition brings together work made while recovering from BPD, trying to make sense of paranoia, anxiety, strange thinking, burnout and the feeling of constantly being behind. Through videos, performances, paintings and an ongoing web series, I document the messy reality of living through mental illness and recovery. The work doesn't try to neatly resolve anything - it just pieces together fragments of different versions of myself, finding humour, absurdity and healing within the chaos.

At the centre of the exhibition is a tension between performance and reality. From the absurd sitcom world of my web-series Cats of Tottenham and years of footage filmed inside my flat and around Tottenham, to paintings where I literally insert myself into classical scenes, the work explores masking, identity and the stories we create to survive. The exhibition culminates in Haringey Hamster, my own failed version of Jiminy Cricket: a reluctant moral guide, emotional support animal and artist who, much like me, doesn't really know what she's doing but keeps going anyway.

Come and see Haringey Hamster live on the following dates:

Sat 4th July 1pm to 4pm

Sun 5th July 2pm to 5pm

Sat 11th July 1pm to 4pm

Sun 19th July 12noon to 4pm

Sat 25th July 1pm to 5pm

Sun 26th July 12noon to 4pm

New rumours abound that SEA MANTIS will be making an unprecedented emergence at the All Good Bookshop!

SEA MANTIS is a semi-mythical, many tentacled aquatic being with a seeming tendency to emerge in the combined company of Ed Shipsey, Andrew Ciccone, Adam Kinsey and Stephan Barrett; four active members of London's free improvisation and experimental music scene. Having first surfaced in 2019, there have so far been only 3 confirmed sightings, the latest being at Konsztrukting Soundz in the Essex estuary, alongside sporadic radio transmogrifications on Radiophrenia and Littoral Transmissions' Resonance Extra show.

Reportedly the MANTIS will be joined by an even rarer phenomenon: SEMANTIX – a deep-sea dwelling creature of holobiontic meaning-making that has up to now confounded all attempts at description. Truly a triple word score phenomenon of abyssal proportions hitherto unseen in shallower waters.

As luck would have it, special guests Dominique Golden, Jeff Hilson (more to be announced!) have agreed to join us to help fathom these benthic beings, baleen barnacles and all. 

Now also featuring special guest star storyteller Minnie Wilkinson! 

Join us for another “Meditation with Maryam”. This is a very relaxing and calm session focusing on connecting to Spirit Guides through a guided meditation, then sharing circle and Spirit Guide Talisman making using up-cycled materials.

You don’t need to have any prior experience,  the meditation is about 20 minutes to keep it simple, there will be herbal tea and nibbles provided. 

It’s suitable for anyone interested in meditation and willing to try something new in a calm and friendly environment.

When you feel strongly it is said you wear it on your sleeve; when you are unsure it is said you should follow it. But what happens when you misplace your heart, break it, bury it, remove it and hide it away from the world?

Featuring a troll, many princesses, an equal amount of princes, magical wolves, fearless warriors and hungry skeletons, this show weaves together stories from across the world that all have one thing in common - a lack of heart, but at the same time maybe too much of one.

Francesca Mackenzie is a storyteller and archivist who spreads awareness on behalf of all sorts of monsters, from malignant dirty water to misrepresented vegetables. Regularly appearing at Tales at the Tavern, Elephant Tales and various other open mic nights across London, she loves telling tales that border on the extraordinary.

 The ever-popular Club Verbal Discharge returns. Probably the best spoken word night in North London. - come along to hear super spoken word readings. If you're writing prose, poetry, monologues, plays and want an audience of fellow creatives this is the event for you!