Speaking Futures x Diasporas Now

Artist Takeover

at Institute of Contemporary Arts

7 March 2026

Marking the culmination of Diasporas Now's yearlong residency at ICA, this artist takeover responded to the live art collective’s notion of 'home'. Bringing back artists who have contributed to the ICA's Speaking Futures programme across 2025–26, the finale gathers the full community for a collective closing chapter.

Exploring home as both a physical space and collective feeling, the programme features short performances from Bullyache, SERAFINE1369, Diasporas Now’s RIEKO, Lulu Wang, and Paola Estrella, with Juliet Lozano, softchaos, Fernanda Muñoz-Newsome, activations by ICA Creatives, screenings from Helen Cammock, Julianknxx, Joshua Woolford, RESOLVE Collective and Ivan Michael Blackstock, an installation by Furmaan Ahmed, round table talks, a live broadcast with Montez Press Radio and DJ sets with Black Obsidian Sound System (B.O.S.S.).

This final event was Diasporas Now’s proposition for how institutions of the future might operate: as incubators for artist-centred collaboration, spaces for grassroots cultural movements, and homes for future artists and thinkers.

For this takeover, Diasporas Now invited their audiences and collaborators home – to gather around artist films shaped within their community, to sit across the table and engage urgent questions, and to pass knowledge along cultural lineages toward new generations. ICA Speaking Futures × Diasporas Now Artist Takeover is an invitation to move and be moved – together, at home, in residence, at the ICA.

Speaking Futures x Diasporas Nowis a year-long cross-cultural programme at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, led by collective-in-residence Diasporas Now, featuring performances, talks and workshops. The programme is co-curated and co-programmed with Hannah Geddes.