Elisha Tawe is an audiovisual artist, co-founder of GRAY417c and Black Culture Editor at Trippin. His work attempts to interrogate the ways in which several disenfranchised groups and subcultures have and continue to be portrayed across various forms of media. Through this process he has embarked on several journeys, creating pieces of art that pull from the long and storied histories of African people and their diaspora, attempting to re-imagine the positionality of Blackness in art and media. He is currently based in London, UK.

Elisha Tawe

and Nike Swims ‘Deep Is The Water' is a collection of beautifully shot photographs of aquatic joy that paint bodies of water as sites of communion and healing. The images feature Black and mixed-race men of varying ages interacting with water in one way or another. However, to Tayler Deep Is The Water is more than a Black swimming campaign. In conversation with Trippin, he emphasises “to label it that would defeat the purpose of the project, which is to normalise a more diverse representation of swimmers.”

Tayler, the co-founder of the creative agency

and a multi-hyphenate artist whose clients include Nike, Dr Martens to name a few, learnt to swim early on in his life but shares with us that he still has a fear of water he “can't see the bottom of”. However, he continues to swim because “it's good low-impact exercise on joints. I think that there is real peace to be found in just floating. Sometimes I’ll just swim to the bottom of a pool and just like sit there for a minute. It’s just quiet. And it's peaceful.” he says.

Inspired by a news story about three Black people losing their lives due to their inability to swim, Tayler began his artistic interrogation of swim culture in the United Kingdom. In 2021 he wrote and directed a short film titled 

. Across its minute-and-a-half run time, the film explores the social and cultural barriers Black people in the U.K. face in relation to swimming. The mesmerising short follows a young Black boy who faces his fear of water by undertaking swimming classes. Following its release, it caught the eyes of the team over at Nike Swim which resulted in their aptly titled collaboration Deep Is The Water.

The collection of images on exhibition at Black and White gallery from the 6th to the 8th of October 2022 takes Tayler's exploration of swimming a step further, tunnelling deeper. Research released by sports England states: 95 percent of Black adults and 80 percent of Black children in the UK do not know how to swim despite there being a palpable desire to learn. The photographs eschew these usual talking points of accessibility around swimming for Black folk opting instead to highlight existing Black swimmers and focus on the joys of swimming in hopes to spark interest and open the doors for more Black people to partake in the activity. Through this project, Tayler hopes to ask what we as Black people can do to increase accessibility and what ways we as a community can begin to rethink and reattribute value to this vital skill.

United Kingdom

London

Nike

Still Waters Run Deep with Tayler Prince-Fraser

The Dakar Biennale, also known as Dak'Art, is the longest-running biannual art festival in Africa. The Senegalese art fair is imbued with a seductive air of jouissance as local artists put together temporary gallery spaces and institutions create one-off experiences.

Chosen for: Driving Diversity and Preserving Culture.

Dak’Art’s roots can be traced back to 1966’s First World Festival of Black Arts, hosted in the city by cultural theorist, poet and then president of Senegal Léopold Sédar Senghor. Situated on the west coast of Africa, the city of Dakar encapsulates an array of possibilities. Its vibrant and bustling atmosphere, lively markets, rich musical culture and art scene primed it as the ideal location for this ambitious undertaking.


The first iteration of Dak’Art as we now know it was held in 1990 and focused mainly on African literature. Today, Dak’Art features a variety of exhibitions, performances, lectures and workshops showcasing the musings of artists from around the world. It has grown beyond the city’s limits with events taking place at galleries outside the capital like​​ 

Les Manufactures Sénégalaises des Arts Décoratifs

 in Thiès, a town 35 miles west of Dakar. African art and the works of those from its diaspora remain central to the fair. Teraanga, which translates from the Senegalese language Wolof to hospitality, is the philosophy not only at the heart of this fair but which permeates all aspects of Senegalese life. Through its showcases, the biennale provides a platform for Black artists to share their ideas and engage with diverse audiences, promoting cultural exchange and dialogue between disparate artistic communities. An invigorating mix of history, culture and art.

The Dakar Biennale

“Globally there's an issue with fear of water, whether it be folklore or something else. That for me was the stem of what I wanted to work on in teaching people to swim."

“It's amazing how quickly my body gets used to that cold water.” Nigerian-born British-raised TV presenter Ayo Akinwolere tells Trippin, his face lighting up as he ardently discusses his record-breaking swim. Akinwolere took an unconventional route to become a world record holder. The Broadcaster of 15 years first began his journey in the water in 2011 at age 28. That same year he swam five miles across the deepest part of the ocean known to man, the Palau Trench, an 8000-metre deep section of the Pacific Ocean, earning him the world record title for the deepest location for an open water swim. Over the course of the three-and-a-half-hour endeavour, Akinwolere disproved popular myths in the west about Black people and our apparent inability to swim.

A decade later he is a board member of the Swimming Teachers Association and runs projects to get more people of colour in the water. In conversation, Akinwolere explains that “like anything you roll out in society, there needs to be a holistic nature to it. You need to educate yourself on culture. And this is what I want to try to get into the Swimming Teachers Association.” His culture-centric approach to swimming education feels like a breath of fresh air for an industry that often ignores the social factors that could affect individuals' dispositions towards bodies of water. “Globally there's an issue with fear of water, whether it be folklore or something else. That for me was the stem of what I wanted to work on in teaching people to swim. Get rid of the fear and then we can move forward”.

That fear is often what keeps us trudging one foot after the other inside our bubbles, our social confines, our carefully crafted sanctuaries. To Akinwolere the act of swimming is a necessary form of escapism from the mundane lives we often become accustomed to in adulthood. As he puts it “open water swims are a spiritual experience” there are noticeable improvements in people's lives “when they see they can exist in that space”. From his accounts, taking first-timers out to the open waters unlocks a deep and profound sense of freedom within them “They look back at their life in the city and think, oh my God, actually this is quite restricting. Even though I feel like I'm offered every freedom in the world, nature offers me the greatest freedom for free.” he tells us.

Though enthusiastic about the water, Akinwolere makes it a point to remind us of the dangers of open water swimming to novices. The history of segregation and the socio-economic restrictions created by racism and the climbing prices of pool memberships are not lost on him, he often speaks out against his local pool charging £11 a session. However, he encourages newcomers to begin training within the confines of a pool if they can. “It's harder to swim in a pool because there is no salt. So you're actually learning the hard way, but also in a much more manageable way,” he says.

In the end, the open waters are where Akinwolere’s heart remains, where he believes the real magic exists and he hopes to push more people to experience it. “It's about you understanding your body. Never push yourself beyond what you feel you can achieve. Like if you're ‘cold water swimming’ is literally just dipping your waist in and getting out, do it. It's a gradual progression. Don't just shove yourself in it, but once you do taste that Nirvana, I swear to God it's insane.”

From Rookie to Record Holder: Ayo Akinwolere on the Virtues of Open Water

Stills from the film Manngamizi: The Ancient One

It’s bright and I’m scrolling again, on Twitter this time. Bitcoin and NFT prices are crashing, discourse around the overturning of Roe V. Wade dominates our digital town square. From tech to biology people all around the world seem to be trying to decipher what’s real, to uncover the truth. Is a foetus a real human? Are NFTs real art? Can a decentralised digital currency succeed? It’s hard to read with UV rays bouncing off your screen. Nature is calling me back to it. The only thing I know for sure right now is that the sun is real. There’s no disputing it, it exists outside of the pantomime. It rises and sets regardless of human activity and will likely follow this cycle for a couple billion more years after all of us are long gone. It doesn’t need us like London needs us. Not to rehash 

 “return to nature” sentiments, but take the night bus across the city, and pay attention to what's happening outside your window. Hopefully, you’ll see what I mean.

I happen to have started believing in demons on one of those rides. Maybe as a means to cope with the schizophrenic nature of the city and its ability to fluctuate between polished glass skyscrapers and dystopian-esque landscapes in the blink of an eye, or maybe because they are actually real. According to the Bible, they are. According to the Bible, there are also several types of angels yet only a few happen to have taken a stronghold in our collective consciousness. How did we determine which angels were the most real?

The sun stops blaring in through my window. I google what the other angels look like and some are not too far off from how we’d typically depict demons. One takes shape as a pair of interconnected burning rings with multiple eyes, another a large singular eye with wings. The most intriguing of them all, to me, the archangels, supposedly emerge as sunbeams. Currently cancelled artist Kanye West once tweeted: ‘Iterations of ideas are how cultures evolve’. So why do we shy away from these iterations of angels, are they not our ticket to infinity? Isn’t knowing things that may appear frightening, foreign or pernicious could be pure, holy and loving a lesson we want to pass down?

. I click on it. An hour, eight minutes and thirty-six seconds of scripture from the University of Ghana’s former Associate Professor of religion and ethics Kofi Asare Opoku:

TRUTH IS LIKE A BAOBAB TREE, NO ONE PERSON HAS ARMS LONG ENOUGH TO EMBRACE IT.

THERE IS NO SINGLE CULTURE THAT HAS ALL KNOWLEDGE, ALL TRUTH IN ITS EMBRACE. IF WE WERE TO SURROUND THE BAOBAB TREE WE’D VIRTUALLY HAVE TO HOLD HANDS BEFORE WE CAN SURROUND IT.

Arched over my screen I begin to tunnel through the crevices of my mind. Submerged in its vast interconnected canals I attempt to create meaning from all this. Then, without warning, memories begin to flow, appearing in strange syncopated bursts from various phases of my life. Mediated encounters with artefacts linked to the spiritual traditions of tribes from Cameroon and Tanzania, the countries I spent a significant portion of my formative years in. Most of them, shrouded in negativity and the dismissal of said objects as evil, primitive or idolatrous by the people around me, a perspective I naturally adopted myself. However, Opoku’s lecture offers an alternative take on African spiritual traditions. He reminds us some of the oldest civilizations known to man existed on the African continent and the knowledge and practices of these people allowed them to function prosperously. In the lecture, Opoku shares a story of a faction of a European construction company on a mission to build a harbour in Ghana held up by their failed attempts to remove an ancient tree with heavy machinery. Following several failed attempts they turn to a spiritual leader of a nearby community who touches and speaks to the tree after which it is uprooted by a few men and some rope, or so the story goes.

The metaphysical aspects of this anecdote are difficult to blindly accept but aren’t what strikes me about the story. I think what's important here is how the narrative juxtaposes two understandings of the world. Opoku’s story reminds us of the existence of valid alternative modes of being, operating and understanding outside of the traditional frameworks of Western knowledge. Rarely do we encounter media that not only places distinctly African modalities in proximity to western ones but also allows them to triumph. There may be reasons linked to force, angulation and the structure of the tree which explain why the spiritual leader and his men's methods were better suited for its uprooting. However, these do not undermine the understanding and connection the people have to the land. A knowledge that may exist outside of the western view of the world. Something akin to what American ethnobotanist 

 often refers to as ‘the mystery’: strange inexplicable things we experience, unknown knowings we tend to write off as deja-vu or coincidence. I find traces of it when I think back to the feelings that arose from my aforementioned ride on the night bus. A trip I have taken a hundred times before, through streets I spent the better part of the last decade on, but hadn’t taken the time closely examine.

I look up from my screen and catch the sun disappearing behind Canary Wharf’s monuments to capitalism, HSBC, Barclays, Citi Bank and the iridescent lights of the city take its place. It’s almost like nothing has changed. The city still bursts with life, the stars erased from the sky by its glow.

Bleak Sunsets & African Spiritual Technology 

As a travel platform, we at Trippin are enthralled by the beauty and nuances of physical locations and cultures. However, as the world evolves, the digital realm has opened up new virtual terrains for us to explore. Over the course of this piece, our Black Culture Editor takes a look at these digital locations and their zeitgeist.

If you're searching for the truth it’s likely you won't find it on your feed.Your notes app and social media post drafts are where the magic exists, it’s in the thoughts you consider just a little too perverse to share with the rest of us. With a quick scroll through mine, you’ll uncover gems like “

, but all the sex scenes happen in the metaverse” or “the smallest distance in the world is the one between cringe and post-cringe”. Both of those statements feel far more honest and true to where I am as a person than anything I have shared online in the past few months. Something strange happens when our digital personas take the wheel. It’s as though the masks we wear in our physical lives to conceal ourselves from the world rapidly expand into full-body gimp suits revealing only what we perceive to be the most enticing segments of our psyche.

I’m just old enough to remember what the internet felt like in the late noughties and early tweens, the moments just before we did away with virtual anonymity and digital footprints weren’t as bound to personal brand-building projects. I remember LimeWire where everything was free. I remember rushing home after school to read Carles from Hipster Runoff satirically lamente about everything from Lana Del Ray to Slutwave. I remember Napster, Omegle, Pirate Bay and playing chess on MSN with my crush. I remember when digital artefacts had a neo-surrealist aura and cyberspace felt like a realm of infinite possibility.

Stuck in an eternal doomscroll, haunted by the memories of my early days online, it's clear its landscape's drastically changed. Enclosed by borders erected in service of capital, the internet's magic has receded. LimeWire, following a litigation-induced decade-long hiatus, now exists as an NFT platform championing the financial security at the forefront of the push for artificial scarcity through the restriction of reproduction. Tumblr, a graveyard for pillaged aesthetics. SoundCloud, a vessel for labels to plant and promote artists and the democratic ideology behind many of the aforementioned decentralised peer-to-peer platforms has been reconstructed by tech oligarch Peter Thiel-backed platform 

, who promises its users ownership of ‘digital planets’. Today every tweet, TikTok, reel and image is carefully crafted with monetisation in mind. The gamification of discourse is in overdrive, bolstered by the public display of numeric value signifiers such as ‘likes’, ‘shares’ and ‘comments’ subconsciously restricting what we upload. ‘Anti-capitalism’ is delivered to you in soft pastel gaussian blurred infographics, sandwiched between images of this season's e-girl promoting her latest NFT and reels from grindset guru Gary Vee coercing you into sacrificing your soul at the altar of capital.

A prevalent response I've encountered to this shift among fellow terminally online Gen-Zers, is a desire to ‘log off’ and ‘touch grass’, internet terms for retreating to the physical world and searching for the sublime. However, the digital realm is far too prominent and sprawling a landscape for such a simple form of resistance to serve as a panacea. If all the Web3 hype is to be believed, simply logging off feels too much like sticking your head in the sand at a moment when it appears we are rapidly accelerating towards the complete merger of the physical and digital worlds. Ensuring cyberspace is not captured by a techno-capitalist singularity is essential.

I met a girl on a night out in the English countryside who in a conversation around Brexit offhandedly said: “If you force a ball underwater, it’ll bounce back two times harder.” In that conversation, she was referencing 2016’s mass resurgence of British nationalism, but history’s shown you can sub in just about anything and the statement stands. In today's digital landscape, it's the suppression of many aspects of the human condition. However, on the fringes of cyberspace, there appears to be a percolating desire for new modes of digital being, seeing and worldbuilding. It is taking shape in what has been labelled “shitposting”, posts written off as detractions from the main conversation, or “schizoposting” stream of consciousness onslaughts often delivered to your feed in the form of 40 consecutive tweets.

These posting styles, bathed in irony and often categorised as ‘unhinged’, have existed online in a phase of internal negotiation for years but have recently begun finding their footing in mainstream discourse. The often politically incorrect undertones and initial prevalence of ‘shit’ and ‘schizo’ posting on 4Chan, Reddit and more recently with edgelord cryptofascist NFT cults have made them synonymous with alt-right trolls. However, there is nothing innately extremist about the format itself. I would argue these fractured modes of digital being tell us more about where we are as a society, scattered, disjointed and alienated, than the majority of the content we encounter daily.

 run by Indiana-based DJ Alosio Wilmoth, adopts this posting style but with a distinctly leftist slant. Wilmoth's posts are coated in language that may be unintelligible to those not ‘in the know’ but shine a light on the ills of society through personal, ironic, humorous content. They quickly jump from class consciousness to the history of house music, and then to the downtown NY art scene and beyond. In one post Wilmoth writes: "Can’t wait to have a mental breakdown in a room full of white people and call it art" which got me thinking, what if we collectively had tiny ‘mental breakdowns’ on our little corners of the internet? What if we all became ‘

’? In our rapidly evolving digital terrain, longing for a time before the phrase ‘personal brand’ was commonplace in our lexicons is not going to change anything. However, allowing these unfiltered expressions of personhood to occupy the centre of our collective gaze creates room for the possibility of a less personal brand-centric digital landscape.

Much like the submissive states we currently occupy, the libidinal aspect of free expression is not lost on me. I have no illusions that this form of digital resistance is free from potential misuse. Nor do I think it will be our sole saviour in the battle to exist holistically online. However, incorporating these blossoming modes into how we express ourselves and disseminate information on a large scale may be essential in constructing a more accommodating digital realm. They could allow for a degree of vulnerability and openness to emerge freeing us from our tight, little pixel-formed latex suits. Hopefully, with the right amount of revolutionary patience and aesthetic tinkering, these modes of communication could push us past the capital-centric enclosure we are witnessing online.

Malaise and the Metaverse 

Hosted in a one-of-a-kind space surrounded by secret orange and lemon groves, Beneath the Baobabs, formerly known as Kilifi New Year, is an exhilarating event with an environmentally conscious twist.

Chosen for: Preserving Culture and Driving Diversity.

Beneath the Baobabs brings in around 10,000 attendees to the cosmopolitan town of Kilifi each new year. Founded by 

Distant Relative's Ecolodge and Backpackers

 as a small electronic music party on a beach volleyball court in Kenya, the near decade-old festival now stands as one of the premier party destinations in East Africa. This magical three-day event operates with a strict plastic ban and Leave No Trace approach, causing it to be heralded as the first carbon neutral festival of its kind on the African continent. The festival also offers discounted tickets for locals, a strategy that's designed to nourish its surrounding creative community.

Wellness, freedom of expression and the showcasing of burgeoning East African artists and musicians are the central pillars of this affair. Its main stage of vast overhanging decks rests under the shade of a 2,000-year-old Baobab tree, floating over Kilifi and providing festival-goers with a birds-eye view of its sprawling coastline. Through this proudly Kenyan event's unmissable programming, Beneath the Baobabs is quickly growing into an internationally renowned event, and is our top pick for ringing in the new year.

Beneath the Baobabs 

 is an audiovisual artist, co-founder of creative studio GRAY417C and Black culture editor at Trippin. He is currently based in London, UK.

I’ve experienced various consciousness-shifting, vibe-reorienting, persona-contorting things since the start of 2022. For instance, I recently grabbed coffee with a friend at Close-Up − a small cinema space in Shoreditch − over which we opined about Blackness and the zeitgeist around race relations. 

As I left the space, it occurred to me that we had spent the majority of the last 2 hours discussing American culture in a tiny basement in East London, an area once viewed as one of London’s Black cultural meccas. Making a mental note to actively attempt to introduce topics around other forms of Blackness in whatever conversions I had moving forward, I said my goodbyes and headed home. But the thought lingered, eventually spreading like an incurable virus.

Video artist Nam June Paik says: “The culture that’s going to survive in the future is the culture that you can carry around in your head”. So what ideas around Blackness consume our collective consciousness? When you attempt to envision a Black person what are they wearing? How do they sound? What makes up their habitat? Who is the first Black historical figure that springs to mind?


When covid hit I witnessed a mass exodus of Millennial friends of mine from London, many moving to cities like Berlin, some to the countryside. Gen Zer’s however seemed to channel the angst that came with living through a world-altering event into forming new homes online. Discords, podcasts, subreddits and collective run meme pages popped up across the internet, enclaves dedicated to the exploration of transgressive ideas. One conversation I encountered across several of these destinations centred around the capitalisation of the letter B in Black. Many argued for the limitation of its use strictly to American people of African descent suggesting it served as a marker for their specific identity whilst others (myself included), in line with DuBois' argument from a 1926 letter for the capitalisation of N in Negro, suggested its use across the board. It’s been nearly a century since DuBois wrote his letter, culture has changed in several ways and something about this discourse felt indicative of the hierarchical structures around Blackness formed since then.

It can feel as though we exist in a hyper race-conscious society at times, but for the majority of my tenure on this planet, most of the media I have consumed has been American. 

From literature to film to digital trends, American culture, specifically Black culture from America, has held a firm grip on my media diet. Furthermore, it’s held a grip on my education. I spent my formative years between Tanzania and the United Kingdom and the only times Blackness arose in class, the discussions centred around slavery or the civil rights movement. The history of race in Northern America is an important one of course which deserves to be explored and understood as its repercussions are evident in contemporary life. However, beyond the popular depictions of poverty, beautiful rainforests or beaches, what do the majority of people in the West really know about the vast range of Black cultures across the world?


Around 51% of Brazilians are of African descent. There are an estimated 1500 to 2000 languages spoken in Africa, the Blackest continent, each tied to unique groups of people with vast histories, most of which the majority of us know little of. From speaking to an intergenerational mix of Black people in my immediate circle and the various digital spheres I inhabit, this ignorance of other forms of Blackness (their own included) appears to be a universal experience. In one of such conversations with a friend's 65-year-old uncle about the practices of the Haya people of Northern Tanzania I was told: “I only experienced these traditions as a young boy and cannot really offer explanations for them, in fact, many of them no longer exist.”

So who is carrying these cultures in their heads, who is attempting to breathe life into these dying practices? 

A question raised not in an attempt to undermine the agency of the people living in these areas, but rather as a call to push back against the erosion of indigenous cultures occurring internationally due to our current form of globalisation that favours Western culture. The question of why American culture, even when tied to marginalised groups from the region, dominates the global stage is complex, but when boiled down to its core is directly linked to the propaganda machine upheld by the US of A to further American hegemony through cultural influence.

As a dilettante voyager, travel came to mind as a possible tool against this Americanisation of Blackness. Going to these locations, interacting with the people, soaking up the culture and keeping it alive through the stories we tell or practices we embody. Nothing stimulates the mind quite like an experience. However, fragmented pictures of cultures garnered from short visits to places do little to help combat ignorance unless undertaken with vigour and deep awareness. To truly broaden one's horizons through the act of physical travel requires a degree of dedication, time and financial freedom many of us aren’t afforded under our current capitalist regimes.


In spite of the mind fog brought on by this line of questioning, I attended a screening program of experimental moving image films by contemporary Black artists from across the diaspora at 

. A selection of 12 short films played on loop. Some centred around Blackness in America or the slave trade, but many broke from the confines of this discourse exploring Blackness in Europe, West Asia and Africa. One of these was, Kondo Heller’s 

, a carefully stitched together amalgamation of image and sound, an exploration of language which syphoned many of the ideas bouncing around my head into a singular cohesive digital artefact.

 led me to another form of travel, one made available by means of simulacra − Jean Baudrillard's term for the replacement of reality with its representations −, the digital realm.

 As people drift further away from the real into this digital sphere, the depictions of Blackness we are exposed to here will play an increasingly important role in shaping how Blackness exists as a concept in our minds. 

The flick of a finger or tap of a button now allows you to travel through space and time from the comfort of your bed. A blue screen lights up in your palm and you’re teleported to 19th century Kenya by means of 

, a space curated by Wairimu Nduba celebrating the nuanced history of Kenyan music, or 

 a Pan-African repository of archival and contemporary material. Carefully curated digital experiments such as 

 present rolodexes of Black artistic expression from across the world, asking questions around new ways to engage or interpret these depictions of Blackness. Here at 

, a global database of cultures is slowly being built in collaboration with locals. A new ‘Library of Alexandria’ is forming, one resistant to the throes of fire, one that can be explored regardless of weather or physical location.

Maybe, the jolts and shifts I’m experiencing are a side effect of spending the last 2 years in front of a screen, then suddenly regaining the ability to interact with people and art again. But regardless of their genesis, I feel different. After the exhibition at Cubitt, I walked to see a group of musician friends perform at a bar in Dalston, thinking of Heller’s film along the way. Sitting in front of that projection in what appeared to be a converted warehouse all the thoughts that arose after my conversation at Close-Up churned inside me. In 

 we hear many languages, simultaneously layered over one another, a transnational symphony of dialects seeping in through the cracks in the walls, a depiction of the scattered states many of us in the diaspora inhabit. One of these languages was Swahili the national language of Heller’s home country of Kenya and of my childhood home of Tanzania. At times this Swahili is muzzled, soft and distant, at others loud and domineering. Walking, I realised I had internalised the fluctuations in the sound of Heller’s mother tongue as the calling we hear within ourselves as members of the diaspora. The gentle whispers or loud pleas of our ancestors to be pulled from oblivion, their practices and traditions carried forward, to live on through us.

Travel as a Radical Tool Against the Americanisation of Blackness

Powered by ideas on community and Blackness, the culinary trio is using food to share their philosophy with the world. With their new book, 

, Ghetto Gastro is taking the art of cooking to new heights.

​​I’m on a video call with Pierre Serrao, one-third of the Bronx-based culinary collective Ghetto Gastro. He’s getting his forearm “blasted” with some tribal tattoos and geometric shapes. We discuss tattoo etiquette and my uninked virgin skin while we wait for his comrades Jon Gray and Lester Walker to join us. He tells me that when it comes to getting inked, there’s “no time like the present” – an ethos of calculated spontaneity that runs through the trio. Ghetto Gastro doesn’t operate within the confines of the traditional modalities of the culinary world, instead tying the art of food with conversations on race and activism. Having made a calculated decision to avoid opening a brick-and-mortar establishment their show goes on the road. Zooming between destinations, they soak up cultures and pick up tips and tricks of the trade as well as share their own with locals. Remixing the lessons they learn, they conjure up new recipes and provide exquisite dining experiences which, like them, are deeply profound and rooted in theories of Blackness. In 2020 they teamed up with Rethink NYC to feed Black Lives Matter protestors in New York, demonstrating how the food industry can show up and help in the fight against racial injustice. With the release of their new cookbook, 

Ghetto Gastro is taking their message to the world and expanding towards new frontiers.

Ten years ago Gray, a former Fashion Institute of Technology student, Serrao and Walker – chefs who have worked in renowned kitchens across the world – founded Ghetto Gastro. Initially bonding over breaking bread the trio went on to “bring the vibes to the world,” declares Gray, whilst celebrating Blackness in all its forms. In the decade following their formation, they quickly grew to become one of the most sought-after culinary arts groups. In 2018 they were tapped by Marvel Studios to produce a dish for the people of Wakanda – a fictional country from the record-breaking film 

. They have catered events for Givenchy's creative director Matthew Williams, fashion label Rick Owens and brought the Bronx to “Pari-ee” with a takeover of the Place Vendôme.

Ideas around Blackness and Black culture take centre stage in the trio’s practice and are the driving force behind the new cookbook. Put together with the assistance of Nigerian writer Osayi Endolyn, 

 doesn’t read like your typical book of recipes but rather like a carefully curated art tome. It places works from renowned painters Kerry James Marshall and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye alongside food and lifestyle photography from Nayquan Shuler and Joshua Woods. Conversations with A$AP Mob’s very own A$AP Ferg are included with original recipes by the collective. It seamlessly manoeuvres from one reference point to another, tightly wound together by a palpable love for Black culture. “We don’t exist in a binary form,” Lester remarks. “We are such a multi-dimensional operation, from art and music to politics. It's part of how we do things.”

“As Black people, we have a different mission in this country. In our households, we have a more open discourse around the mistreatment of Black bodies”

The trio evokes revolutionaries throughout their book. The Stewy Newton, an homage to the late Black Panther founder Huey Newton, stands out as an example of how the collective effortlessly blends worlds to create new ones. Its recipe is derived from feijoada, a peasant dish conjured up by enslaved Africans in Brazil that requires people to bring together different ingredients from their communities to create a stew-like amalgamation. The dish could only exist with the help of others, highlighting the importance of community – an integral part of Black revolution according to Newton, who assisted in the formation of over 60 community support programmes. “Kwame Ture is from the Bronx. The essence is in the water,” announces Gray. “For me, it started in the home. Some of the first literature my mother gave me was the biographies of Malcolm X and Assata Shakur.” Lester opines, “Inherently, as Black people, we have a different mission in this country. In our households, we have a more open discourse around the mistreatment of Black bodies. So it’s only right we carry those philosophies with us.”

To Ghetto Gastro, food, like Blackness, “is a very political subject,” Serrao says. They share a deep understanding of the role food plays in politics, calling back to the United States of America's former minister of agriculture, Henry Kissinger's, infamous statement: “Who controls the food supply controls the people.” By most accounts, the Black people of the United States have found themselves residing in areas often referred to as ‘food deserts’, but Gray points out, “There's nothing natural about food deserts. It’s definitely engineered. Think about the levels of access based on income, race and class. So that's why we call it a ‘food apartheid’, based on the works of Karen Washington.” Expounding on Gray’s analysis, Lester adds, “At the end of the day it's about understanding why there are more liquor stores in Black communities. It’s easier to access processed foods than it is to access whole foods in the Bronx, even though it is home to the largest whole foods distribution centre of its kind in Hunts Point.”

Community activist and co-founder of Black Urban Growers Karen Washington coined the term ‘food apartheid’ to encapsulate the systems of oppression that segregate areas, providing some with access to nutrient-dense foods whilst denying that same access to others. This is typically carried out across race and class lines. Washington’s works introduce elements of intersectionality to an otherwise whitewashed sustainable food movement which has experienced enormous growth in popularity in recent years.

 “Travel is essential. Through it, we learnt a lot about culture, utensils and ingredients”

Listening to the collective it’s evident their aspirations expand beyond the art of food. They’ve constructed their own world around the culinary arts, blending body politics, human rights and culture into the amalgamation we now know as Ghetto Gastro. They practise what they refer to as Durag Diplomacy, a term they coined and brought to wider audiences by means of Gray’s 

. Made for function, durags are a staple piece in the wardrobes of many Black men; a necessary tool for the protection of Afro hair. Following their ban from the NFL and NBA, discourse around the piece of fabric grew in the United States. In an act of cultural affirmation, the collective has decided to wear their durags in places where subscribers to the mechanics and ideologies of respectability politics would deem them otherwise inappropriate. According to Ghetto Gastro, Durag Diplomacy is about standing up to attempts, from a society that champions whiteness as the golden standard, to assimilate marginalised people and erase their cultures. At its core, it is about highlighting the importance of cultural diversity and living your truth. It’s about bringing what your culture has to offer to the table, educating others on it and growing through diversity of expression and being.

Describing themselves as a “Pan-African pantry”, the collective also credits their travels and interactions with different cultures as touchstones for the message they hope to communicate through their work. “Travel is essential. Through it, we learnt a lot about culture, utensils and ingredients. I can’t imagine Ghetto Gastro without our passports,” Lester says amusedly. “Working in kitchens across New York I was surrounded by immigrants,” contemplates Serrao. “West African and South American influences which gave me the initiative to speak to people from other countries. Learn their lingo and connect to their culture. All this happened through food.” Gray also attributes the expansion of his understanding of the world to a prismatic event they threw in the south of France. “Bringing the Bronx to the south of France allowed me to fall back and travel around Europe. I hit up Lisbon, London, Copenhagen, San Sebastian and Barcelona. My mum’s met me in Barcelona. That trip opened up a lot to me because growing up in the inner city you don’t get the opportunity to see there's other ways to do things, other aesthetic ideas. You don’t get the chance to tap into that gaze and see other vibes. I got to link up with my big bro David Adjaye who introduced me to African architecture and aesthetics, and somehow being in Europe connected me to the African continent. I look forward to getting out there and working.”


The trio has had transformative experiences on the road. Discussing his and Gray’s trip to Thailand Pierre excitedly recalls, “One moment that really stood out was when I went on a journey into the depths of Bangkok and had a meal prepared for me by a woman in her garage over open fire coals. It was a massaman curry dish and honestly, it was one of the most memorable meals of my life. It’s between that and breaking fast out in Senegal and having the maafe.” Interrupting, Serrao says, “Travelling to Hong Kong specifically, dining out there and having General Tso’s chicken and in Tokyo having the karaage – that touched home because growing up we would eat Asian food every day as an essential meal. After school, we’d go to the Chinese spot and order General Tso’s, order orange chicken, order fried chicken with french fries. Just to be out there and see the different techniques they use was very touching and emotional because it brought me back to my childhood. We tried to express that through the book, so now everybody has an opportunity to experience our travels.”

The collective’s distinctly Bronx energy shines through as they bounce off each other, making jokes and quips. As veteran travellers, they provide tips on how to sneak into first class, as well as their favourite in-flight or airport foods, which include the sushi at Newark airports Terminal C, Tiffany Derry’s fried chicken and Mashama Bailey’s dishes on Delta Air Lines’ flights out of Atlanta. However, no matter how far they travel their hearts remain with the people in their community. Back in the Bronx, Lester has been working to fundraise for new equipment for their community gardens – a space which allows people to bond and connect through the one thing we all need: food. Lester exclaims, “We want to continue to be pillars in our community, whether it’s sowing the seeds or bringing the harvest from the soil to the oil.”

Ghetto Gastro's guide to their favourite restaurants in NYC. 

United States

New York City 

Ghetto Gastro Is Shaking Up the Culture of the Bronx and Beyond

It’s the middle of the U.K’s heatwave summer and if you are anything like me then all you want to do is be completely submerged in a body of water somewhere beautiful. But for some, hurling yourself head first into water can be daunting. It can conjure up feelings of stress and anxiety in many of us, emotions that arise from a range of sources, be it inexperience, unpleasant memories or feeling unwelcome.

This is where Swim Dem comes in, a London-based swimming community on a mission to introduce everyone to the world of water. Founded by Nathaniel Cole, Peigh Asante and Emily Deyn the collective is committed to fostering inclusive spaces and improving people's mental health by harnessing the power of water.

The starting point for the project was a personal one. The trio initially met nine years ago at one of Charlie Dark's popular runs through the streets of London hosted by his collective Run Dem Crew, later linking up to go for swims together at local pools. The better part of a decade later they have created and grown their own community switching out pavements for pools.

As the warmer weather pushes us to the banks or beaches looking for relief from our latest bout of sun-drenched days, we sit down with Swim Dem to steal a few tips and tricks for those that aren’t feeling quite ready to take the plunge.

 and Trippin as a part of Open Waters, helping people of all backgrounds and experience levels navigate the waters.

Don’t be afraid of the water, just be smart about it.

Don't try and be brave or cheat the system because the thing is, the elements will always win. So take it slow and build your confidence with experts or a safe pair of hands. At swimdem they go above and beyond by ensuring there are two instructors available at each session.

POC swimmers have ‘been made to believe that the sport of swimming is not for us’ but actually ‘it is for you. And actually, you can’. Swimdem acknowledge the lack of understanding of POC-related obstacles in many swimming spaces saying ‘all those concerns and fears we get it, and whether it's about having more eyes on you or worrying about skin drying out, hair care, like we get it, and we can talk about it with all the members as well’. 

The added layer of freezing waters and only a few days of sun might make swimming in the Uk seem less than tempting. Heated lidos are actually quite a luxury, while London holds a few of them don’t be swayed. ‘We think there’s so much benefits to having a relationship with cold water. The cold water brings a presence of thoughts and strengthens the connection between body and mind through the odd sensations you feel, it’s so hard to describe, that’s why you must try it for yourself!”

So don’t be afraid of the cold and hit up one of their favourite cold water lidos. They recommend heading to south London's Brockwell Lido for a dip that will make you feel truly away, followed by a munch at their amazing cafe. Or Tooting Bec Lido to ‘feel like you are swimming in the sea as the pool is nearly 100 metres long!’ Lastly, one of the most beautiful Lidos in the UK, Parliament Hill Lido with it’s metallic basin (we thought this was done to heat the water up, but it was actually installed to reduce maintenance time as there are no tiles) which also boasts a cafe that has great falafel wraps and traditional breakfast scran.

Don’t underestimate the importance of the people around you, and the power of water to bring you closer. Water is a great communicator and leveler. It requires an open mind and ego to truly be manipulated by your hands, feet and breathing. Although it can be daunting at first, it gets much easier when doing it amongst friendly faces.

“It is something about the kind of space and the community that we've created that makes people feel safe and that's something I'm definitely proud of. People trusted us enough to be like, actually, you know what? I feel comfortable enough to come along with you on this journey.”

In the community, we find strength and safety, particularly for people of colour. With the state of the world as it is and the hardships we all face to one degree or another, we're often pushed to believe that we must tackle certain challenges alone. But the work that Swim Dem does shows us that now is the time to build community and nourish it because whether it's swimming, or navigating life in general, we stand stronger together.