Impact of the Geffrye statue on the Stay Home Stories project
27 August 2021
‘Stay Home Stories’ is about the impact of COVID-19 on the home lives of adults, children and young people, including those from different ethnic, faith and/or migration backgrounds. Our focus is on the domestic context of the pandemic and how it has reshaped people’s lives in different and unequal ways. This work has been taking place at the same time as ongoing protests about the presence of the statue of Sir Robert Geffrye at the Museum of the Home, a partner on ‘Stay Home Stories.’
The Museum of the Home is located in almshouses in Hackney, east London, funded by the legacy of Geffrye, a 17th-century merchant who made part of his money from his investment in transatlantic slavery. The statue of Geffrye is located in an elevated position in the centre of the Museum’s buildings on Kingsland Road. This blog post aims to share the impact of the presence of the statue on the ‘Stay Home Stories’ research project; to be transparent about the personal and collective challenges we have faced; and to open up dialogue with others.
In a public consultation carried out by The Museum of the Home completed in July 2020, the majority of 2,000 respondents voted for the removal of the statue. Despite this - and after receiving a strongly worded letter from Oliver Dowden, Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, who warned that publicly funded museums like the Museum of the Home should ‘retain and explain’ controversial statues - the trustees decided against the statue’s removal. In January 2021, the government brought in new laws in England requiring full planning permission to remove ‘all historic statues, plaques and other monuments,’ making it clear that ‘historic monuments should be retained and explained,’ and enabling the Secretary of State to ‘“call in” any application and ensure the law is followed.’ In a view shared by members of the project team, theMuseums Association describes these new planning rules as ‘impractical and unethical.’
A public demonstration was held outside the Museum of the Home upon its re-opening in June 2021, following a three-year development project, with calls from residents, activists and politicians that “Geffrye must fall”. Wide media coverage about the re-opening of the Museum focused on the deeply contested presence of the statue.
Stay Home Stories is based at the Centre for Studies of Home, a partnership between Queen Mary University of London and the Museum of the Home established in 2011. The partnership on Stay Home Stories extends beyond Queen Mary and the Museum of the Home to also include the University of Liverpool, Birkbeck, University of London, National Museums Liverpool, and the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG). Part of the project’s Documenting Home strand analyses material in the Museum’s ‘Stay Home’ rapid response collecting project. The project team is working with artist-in-residence Alaa Alsaraji on a room installation at the Museum (October to December 2021) drawing from this collection and the project’s research. The Practising Home strand focuses on the experiences of people of different faiths, ethnicities and migration histories, recognising that Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, migrants and refugees have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic.
This blog post is based on three zoom discussions with project staff including community researchers employed to engage and interview people for the Practising Home project strand. Colleagues not able to attend the discussions from across the project have also contributed. Community researchers and other project team members also attended a meeting with the Director of the Museum, Sonia Solicari, prior to these discussions and have held meetings with Alaa Alsaraji to discuss how opposition to the statue will be represented in the room installation at the Museum.
The project’s community researchers have been employed part-time at Queen Mary University of London over three months to conduct ten interviews each with people of different faiths, ethnicities and migration histories. They – and other researchers on the team - have been deeply affected by the presence of the Geffrye statue. The community researchers were aware that the project was in partnership with the Museum of the Home. They were not informed about the statue when they were appointed and learned about it when a community researcher forwarded an article in the Hackney Citizen. The contested presence of the statue is in the public domain, including on the Museum of the Home’s website and in newspaper articles, particularly from the time of the trustees’ decision in July 2020 and when the Museum reopened in June 2021. Senior members of the project team have apologized for not drawing attention to the statue at an earlier point and acknowledge that they should have devoted more time to think through the implications for this collaborative project and for the well-being of the community researchers in particular. In the words of one of the community researchers, “It’s not just about people who are walking past [the Museum]. It’s about people working with you [on the project] who [are]… affected by legacies of slavery, like how are you making that inclusive? And how are you allowing us to have agency or be able to have these conversations?”
The pain caused by the statue was clearly expressed by one community researcher. “Even in the other meeting [with the project team and the Director of the Museum] I couldn’t articulate just how I felt because I’m from a Ghanaian background, where a lot of African people were enslaved … So sometimes I go from wanting to advocate and remove all this stuff but other times – it is quite emotional. It’s quite a violent statue and when we went [to the Museum] I felt a bit lost for words.” The presence of the statue and the controversy around it also affected her motivation and ability to recruit people. “I wanted to reach out to more Black African, Caribbean people – a lot of our voices aren’t really heard so I thought it would be really good if people trusted me. But now I’m conflicted... I don’t want to recruit people, especially from a black background, and then them find out later…. because it’s still physically present. It’s a shame because I was so enthusiastic. It’s a good project, really innovative and has a lot of potential.”
One of the community researchers who has worked previously for the Museum felt betrayed by the revelations about the statue. “When Michael McMillan first did the West Indian Front Room [an exhibition held at the museum in 2005 and reworked in the new 1970s room in 2021], it was an amazing piece of work. And the only reason I went into the Geffrye in the first place. So they’ve done really important work to reflect the community they are located in. And, when it [the statue’s connection to slavery] came to light, I felt betrayed… that it hadn’t been shared. Like a lot of this history …. it’s erased.”
The issue was complicated in that the community researchers’ interviews were part of the university-led research, but participants were also encouraged, after the interview, to contribute to the Museum of the Home’s Stay Home collection. The consent form for all participants asks for permission to use material from the interviews in academic outputs. The consent form also has a separate question that asks if they agreed in principle for their material to be deposited at the Museum, explaining that there would be a separate consent process before any deposition took place. Some community researchers found it useful to draw particular attention to this distinction although this may have undermined a project aim to help diversify the Stay Home Collection. “There were points on the consent form where you could give permission to Queen Mary but not Museum of the Home. I tried to give people as much agency as possible rather than saying how I felt. I think it deepened the trust. Some people didn’t care as much but some were like, ‘Thanks for the heads up’.”
One of the main difficulties was that the implications of the controversy for the research only became clear mid-way through the interviews. Some researchers decided to check back with people who had already participated. “One person was really upset about it… ‘Thanks so much for telling me. I don’t really feel comfortable sharing my interview with the museum at the moment’ so we changed the form.” In order to be more transparent, the project team has now composed a letter for community and other researchers to send to interviewees. This is important both to sustain the trust of research participants but also to preserve the relationship between them and the researchers. “I’m of Jamaican descent, I’m born here, my parents were from Jamaica, so there couldn’t be a stronger connection, I’ve interviewed people I know very well and most of them, if not all, would have great issue with a guy standing on this plinth outside as a figurehead of someone who destroyed homes in the most barbaric of ways imaginable. It’s just such a contradiction.” But it was not just an issue for those with the strongest connection to slavery or who might not be aware of the controversy. “I feel uncomfortable if I don’t mention it at all. Because it is taking advantage of this person not knowing about this issue.” Trust was important for all the researchers. “It’s not the Queen Mary University [of London] relationships. This is not the Museum of the Home relationships. These are my people that I’ve been working with for …years.’
There were wide-ranging discussions about the statue itself, with some finding its elevated position above the entrance to the Museum of the Home particularly offensive. “It shouldn’t be so high up. Why is it looking down on us as an audience, as visitors?” The explanation on a new plaque was seen as inadequate. “There’s a QR code where you can get the information, but even that is problematic, because you’re assuming that everyone has a smart phone.”Everyone agreed that a slave trader was not the appropriate figurehead for a Museum of the Home. “I feel he should be removed, simply because of what the building represents. [As a slave trader] this man destroyed the home and made a fortune off of it. When he [traded] slaves and they had families, they were separated, not allowed, in most circumstances, to live as a unit, to marry, to raise their own children. The names [Museum of the Home and Geffrye] just don’t go together.”
The Director had explained that because of the new laws, together with the building’s Grade 1 listed status, the Museum would have to apply for full planning permission for the statue to be removed. While permission would likely be refused, some saw this as a way of the local community working with the Museum along the lines of: ‘We support the museum in applying to have it removed’, even setting up a Crowdfunder page to raise the c.£20,000 required to apply: “That sum would most probably be raised overnight.” Others felt that this should not be the responsibility of the local community.
A proposal that the statue could be placed near Geffrye’s grave in the Museum garden received little support as most felt it should be relocated inside the Museum, ‘retained and explained’ as per government guidelines but incorporating a record of the controversy as has happened with the Colston statue. “The Bristol Museum has decided to engage with people in a way to keep that conversation alive. I think that’s something that the Museum of the Home can do.” However, following the legal changes in January 2021, it is unlikely that the Museum would be given permission to move the statue at all.
The Museum of the Home is not the only institution caught up in the ‘culture wars’ which seem only to divide rather than unite people. It is, however, the only museum in the UK with a statue of a merchant involved in the slave trade on its building.
Researchers on the project, as critical scholars, felt a responsibility to point out that many of the injustices and inequities exposed by the pandemic are deeply rooted in legacies of colonialism and slavery. They felt there was an opportunity to not only state a position but to highlight the complexities around the issue. “If we face this head on, it strengthens the project. It gives us more legitimacy. It improves future collaborations. I can’t see any downside if we do it well, and we’re respectful.” There was also the question of credibility: “How do I talk to my third year [student]s on post-colonial geographies…when one of the sessions will be about statues? It puts us in a difficult position.” “It’s all very well us theorizing about it. It’s actually doing something that is important.” Moreover, “It’s affected the methodology. It’s affected the recruitment. It’s affected the experience of the community researchers and participants.”
We have written this blog post to share some of what we have experienced during this controversy and to acknowledge some of what could have been done differently. But most of all it is to open up dialogue with others. As one community researcher who lives locally to the Museum stated, “I feel that the project has had an opportunity to engage with the issue on a personal level but should engage with it on a professional and intellectual level, like we’re doing now. It’s not something we are sweeping under the carpet. It needs to be visible, transparent. We need to show it’s a discussion we’re having and to invite people to be a part of that conversation.”
As a result of the discussions the Stay Home project has drafted a letter to be used by community researchers and academic staff, thanking interviewees for their participation and providing information about the contested presence of the statue. The letter will explain that those who previously gave consent in principle for the transcript of their interview to be deposited at the Museum of the Home can change their mind. It will reiterate that there is a second stage of consent directly with the museum before material is deposited in the collections and that participants can remain anonymous in all academic outputs from the project should they wish to do so.
Project staff will meet with trustees in September 2021 to outline how the decision not to take down the statue has affected the research and the implications this has for future collaborations and the Museum’s commitment to diversifying its staff and audiences. The opposition of project team members to the statue will be made clear in a prominent panel and in other ways in Alaa Alsaraji’s room installation, which, we hope, will prompt discussion and create a space for people to share their thoughts and experiences. The project will fully credit the work of the community researchers and the 100 people they have interviewed in London and Liverpool. These interviews will be key to establishing how Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, migrants and refugees have been adversely impacted by the pandemic. As one community researcher stated, “It’s not just an issue of the statue. It could come down, but we still have issues with racism and structural inequalities.”
Background and present position of the Museum of the Home
Geffrye, his statue and its future (including debate at Department of Culture, Media and Sport).
Museum of the Home webpage
https://www.museumofthehome.org.uk/what-we-do/our-story/the-statue-of-sir-robert-geffrye/