On July 2nd, London-based arts and human rights charity Sandblast will join forces with acclaimed UK music academy Stave House for a multi-arts mid-summer Western Sahara Festival.
The event will highlight the on-going 40-year-long plight of the Saharawi refugees in the Algerian Sahara and present recent efforts to bring early music-learning to the area through project Stave House in the Sahara. The charity will also launch Run the Sahara 2017, known internationally as the SaharaMarathon, which takes place annually in February. UK participants raise funds for Sandblast’s music and youth projects in the refugee camps. The majority of the Saharawis became displaced in harsh desert camps, in SW Algeria, after Morocco forcefully annexed their homeland of Western Sahara in 1975. The territory, a former Spanish colony, is officially recognised by the UN as Africa’s last colony.
Eye-opening film premiers, photography, music and poetry will offer something for every taste in Hoxton’s hipster Hundred Years Gallery. For more info, please check our Press Release.