From the Editor

* Ali Abu Yasin, Palestinian playwright, actor, and theatre director, has been named PEN Pinter Prize Writer of Courage 2026, awarded annually to an author who is active in defence of freedom of expression, often at great risk to their own safety and liberty.

Daniel Nelson london.globalevents@gmail.com‍

TALKS AND DISCUSSIONS

* Lau China Institute’s China Week, King’s College, until 23 October)

* National Week of Solidarity to End Immigration Detention, until 25 October. Info: Right To Remain

* London Literature Festival, includes 22 Oct, Kwame Dawes: Afro-Style School & Kinships, Jamaica’s Poet Laureate celebrates the influential poetry programmes and collectives that have fought against literature and publishing’s lack of diversity; 23 Oct, readings and conversation about books that defy the ordinary, hosted by Okechukwu Nzelu and Eliza Clark; 24 Oct, A Celebration of British Somali Poetry, Somali poets rework an ancient tradition through readings and conversation with award-winning poets; 28 Oct, Malorie Blackman: Noughts & Crosses at 25;  31 Oct, Real-life stories from journalists, writers and activists, readings and discussion confronting rising threats to expression; Wasafiri: New Writing Prize 2026, the magazine announce the winners. Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road until 1 November. Info: Festival

Wednesday 21 October

* Ta-Nehisi Coates & Tareq Baconi: On Freedom, the struggle for justice in Palestine, with Nesrine Malik, 7.30pm, from £47, Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road. Info: Southbank Centre

* China and the changing geopolitics of global communication, Daya Thussu, 5 - 7pm, City University, Northampton Square, EC1V 0HB. Info: City University

* China in BRICS+: Multilateralism and Intra-BRICS Contestation, Zeno Leoni,  Soumya Mishra, Rishika Chauhan, Maria (Mary) Papageorgiou, Mauro Bonavita, 1-2pm, King’s College, Room: KIN 227 Strand Campus, Strand, London, WC2R 2LS

* Only Daughters - Women and China’s One Child Policy, Ye Liu examines how talent, virtue and gendered expectations are negotiated in post-reform China, 3 - 4pm, King’s College, King’s Building, Strand campus

* Black History as Therapeutic Practice: Part Two. Rashid Nix, 6.30 - 8.30pm, £6 - £10, Black Cultural Archives, 1 Windrush Square SW2 1EF. Info: BCA

* The 2026 Emissions Gap Report launch, Inger Anderson, Katie White, Anne Olhoff, 10 - 11.30am, livestream. Info: Overseas Development Institute

Thursday 22 October

* An Evening with Pachinko author Min Jin Lee: American Hagwon, the author on her new novel. Set during the 1997 Asian financial crisis, it explores family, sacrifice and ambition through the story of the Koh family, 7.30pm, King’s Place, 90 York Way N1 9AG. Info: King’s Place

EXHIBITIONS

* Frida: The Making of an Icon, how Frida Kahlo became one of the most influential artists of all time, from her political activism to global Fridamania, £25, Tate Modern, Bankside SE1 9TC, until 3 January. Info: Tate

+ How the zeitgeist helped create Fridamania

* Rising Voices, Contemporary Arts From Asia, Australia and the Pacific, work by more than 40 artists from 25 countries, £17, V&A Museum, Cromwell Road SW7 until 10 January. Info: V&A

+ Arresting voices of the Asia-Pacific

* Moved to Care: Stories of Health and Migration, explores the contributions of migrants from across the globe to healthcare over the last 150 years, from the 19th century colonial legacy of missionary nurses to the Windrush Generation, free, 20 Cavendish Square, W1G OR until 2 November. Info: Royal College of  Nursing

+ Migrant nurses: Looking after Britain’s health

* The Music is Black: A British Story, how Black British music has shaped British culture from 1900 to today through objects like Joan Armatrading’s childhood guitar, Littler Simz fashion and photographs, £22.50 weekdays, £24.40, V&A East, Queen Elizabeth Park, Olympic Park. Info: V&A East Museu

* When words fall silent, cinema speaks: Zineb Sedira’s installation on Algeria’s key role in African cinema in the 1960s and ‘70s, Tate Britain, Millbank, SW1P 4RG until 17 January. Info: Tate

* When Third Cinema was a power in the land 

* Hybrid forms and live realities: the sculpture of Bharti Kher, the British Indian artist explores the body, womanhood, mythology and cultural identity, V&A Museum, Cromwell Road, until 24 January. Info: Exhibition

* Childhood in War, the UK’s first dedicated exhibition exploring how war affects and shapes young lives, UK-oriented but including contemporary stories and quotes from Afghanistan, Sudan and Ukraine, Imperial War Museums, Lambeth Road, SE1 6HZ. until 28 February. Info: War Museum

* 100 Years of the Slavery Convention, exploring the links between historical and modern forms of exploitation in slavery, Friends House, 173 Euston Road, NW1 2AE until 2 November. Info: Exhibition

* Rudy Loewe: Intimacies of Care – Spaces of Grief and Possibility, the lived experience of Black people whose mental healthcare in the UK is shaped by racist discrimination, free, Wellcome Collection, 183 Euston Road, NW1 2BE until 7 February. Info: Wellcome

* Amar Kanwar, the India-based artist’s film trilogy investigates legacies of decolonisation and the 1947 Partition, free, Serpentine North Gallery, West Carriage Drive W2 2AR until 31 January. Info: Serpentine

* The Unclassified, group exhibition of four leading contemporary Korean and Korean-heritage artists: Meekyoung Shin, Ayoung Kim, siren eun young jung, and Gala Porras-Kim, Korean Cultural Centre, Grand Buildings, 1-4 Strand  WC2N 5BW until 31 December. Info: KCX

* Korea, exploring over two millennia of Korean art and culture, £18, British Museum, Great Russell Street WC1B 3DG until 31 January. Info: Korea

+ Two millennia of K-history: hard to remember, hard to forget

* Salman Toor: Someone Like You, born in Lahore and currently living in the US, his work “depicts queer and immigrant lives that straddle different cultures and inhabit the tension between intimacy and exposure, belonging and estrangement. What it means to find a community, but also the daily costs associated with visibility”, £10 - £16, Courtauld Institute, Somerset House, Strand, WC2R 0RN until  10 January. Info; Courtold

* Cecilia Vicuña: Living Threads, one of Latin America’s most internationally renowned artists, poets, and feminist activists, £16.50 concessions £10.45, Whitechapel Gallery, 77-82 Whitechapel High Street E1 7QX until 14 February. Info: Gallery

* Sanle Story: The Colour Years, photographs capturing daily life, youth culture and fashion in Burkina Faso, £7 - £12, Photographers Gallery, Ramillies Street, W1 until 21 February. Info: Gallery

* Reimagining Democracy, exhibition of illustrations by artists from refugee and migrant backgrounds, Kensington Central Library, 12 Phillimore Walk, W8 7RX until 30 October.  Info: Counterpoint Arts

* Our Bodies Have Been Bridges, three feminist artists from the Americas whose work acknowledge how bodies carry memory and ancestry while resisting erasure; Charan Singh: Your Tongue in My Mouth, celebrating the lives and collective resistance of gender fluid communities in India. Both free, Autograph, Rivington Place EC2A 3BA until 13 February. Info: Autograph

* Golden Threads: Dress From Saudi Arabia, luxury garments from the Najd region, free, V&A Museum, Cromwell Road, SW& 2RL until 30 May. Info: V&A

ARTS OPPORTUNITIES
 

* Only people with lived experience of forced displacement are eligible to enter the Food As Home category of the World Food Photography Awards 2027.

●  Applications are open for the 2027 national Young Playwrights Award, for 13–18-year-olds, with submissions closing on 1 April 2027

* An experienced curator is needed by the Migration Museum to help shape its inaugural temporary exhibitions programme. 

* Applications are open for a four-month mentorship and pitch development programme supporting displaced and migrant women filmmakers working on short fiction or documentary projects. It is designed for UK-based women with prior experience in film or media who want to reconnect with the industry after relocating from their home countries. More information here

* The Markaz Review Literary Prizes are open to short stories and literary essay/creative nonfiction by writers from the SWANA region. Submissions deadline: 30 October. 

* Entries for Open City Documentary Festival 2027 are now open.

* LegalAliens Theatre’s is designed for migrants, refugees, people seeking asylum and anyone with English as a second language. All sessions are led by migrant artists from the theatre’s professional team: “an incredible opportunity to learn new skills, express creatively, practice English and build friendships.” Email Nada to register at legalalienstheatre@legalaliens.org.

* The Africa Migration Report Poetry Anthology Series is inviting poems (40 lines or less) and short prose (100 words or less) exploring: African and African diasporic migration and (im)mobility; how African and Asian refugees are being left to drown in the English Channel; and Edward Nkoloso, Afronauts and the 1960s Zambian Space Programme..

* Applications for Projekt Empower’s Practice Lab workshops for  international theatre makers are invited, and a new Immersion Lab aimed at translating documentary material into performance is underway.

* Wanted: poems and short prose on the tragedy of refugee deaths in the Channel.

* The Royal Court Theatre’s Writers’ Card aims to help playwrights through mentoring, networking, funding opportunities, events, subsidised meals and free script printing.

* The Climate Migration Collaborative seeks contributors to its Climate Migration Storytelling initiative.

* Comedian Munya Chawawa has launched Black Boys Theatre Club “to give young men access to a world of theatre”.

* Good Chance, formed in the Calais Jungle refugee camp, is launching Stage Door 10 - a national programme placing 10 creatives from refugee backgrounds in paid roles across 10 UK theatres and arts organisations.

* As Yet Unscene, year-round initiative to find and develop scripts in early stages of development. it includes workshops, rehearsed readings and fully-rehearsed performances of longer extracts. Details here

* The Cockpit Theatre offers classes, workshops, readings, advice sessions, support & performance opportunities.

* Papatango hopes its new Playwrights’ Studio will be a home for playwrights of all levels of experience. Its advantages include digital workshops, lone-to-one, and thousands of pounds in open-access funding.

* If you are a refugee, immigrant or asylum-seeking writer interested in exploring your own poetry and prose, Exiled Writers Ink offers classes.