A Town of Immigrants: Histories of Migration

3 December 2019, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art, MIMA.

This slim publication is one of four produced as part of New Mappings of Europe. A partnership between four art and education institutions, New Mappings of Europe charts and brings to attention stories of migration that make up our cities and inform cultural organisations. Through it, MIMA has aimed to embed overlooked narratives and voices into the public spaces and collections of Middlesbrough. The programme at MIMA, through 2018 and 2019, took the shape of an exhibition highlighting the long histories of migration that have formed our context, and a public programme of discussions and workshops through which diverse people found points of commonality.

This book focuses on the importance of migration in Middlesbrough’s recent history. Through an essay by historian Dt Tosh Warwick we discover some of the tragic moments of tension that have arisen locally from national and international contexts of conflict and economic turmoil. The title of this book is a quotation from a timeline of the area’s history made collectively at public events at MIMA in 2015. In 2017, MIMA organised an event of the same title and invited Tosh to develop a paper which formed the foundation for the essay published. This publication was made possible through a fruitful and thoughtful partnership with Akademie der bildenden Künste, Austria; Moderna galerija MG+MSUM, Slovenia and Museum of Yugoslavia, Serbia and with funding from the European Commission. This cross-European endeavour has formed an important intellectual space for us at a time of political change.

As part of the research for ‘A Town of Immigrants: Histories of Migration’, Tosh focused on the experiences of the Italian community in Middlesbrough, including those who lost their lives in the SS Arandora Star tragedy.

SS Arandora Star publication produced for the unveiling of the commemorative plaque in Middlesbrough Town Hall in 2009.

As part of the project, the publication produced for the unveiling of a commemorative plaque in Middlesbrough Town Hall in 2009 has been made available for free download here: https://www.heritageunlocked.com/shop/arandorastar.

For more information on New Mappings of Europe, as part of which the ‘A Town of Immigrants: Histories of Migration’ was published, please visit the project’s website http://www.newmappingsofeurope.si.

Tosh Warwick12 June 2020

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A Town of Immigrants: Histories of Migration