Freetown after Ebola

This exhibition features a series of photographs (Tom Martin) and poems (Tim Lavis) created shortly after the deadly Ebola epidemic of 2014-16 on a visit to Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. Freetwon was founded in 1787 as a settlement for freed enslaved people, today it is a bustling city. The images and poems were taken and written on a series of long walks, exploring the rich cultural heritage of Freetown and its staple foods while meeting and photographing people.

Tom Martin, Coreset Resident, is a photographer, participatory practitioner and academic, specialising in creating meaningful images about humanitarian and environmental issues through photography and video. In the conversations he had in Freetown the people he met often talked about their sister city, Kingston upon Hull, pointing out streets and neighbourhoods named after William Wilberforce. In Europe it's easy to dismiss or ignore the impact of the transatlantic slave trade. Tom Lavis is a writer and humanities scholar who lives in Upstate New York. His teaching and research focuses on poetry and poetics, student-centred pedagogy, and critical information literacy. He works at Cornell University and holds a doctorate from Binhamton University and master's degrees from the University of Buffalo and St. Bonaventure University.