Levenshulme Old Library

Levolution! Community Protest Ten Years On

We’re planning a new exhibition called Levolution! and we need YOUR help to make it happen. We’re looking for donations of artefacts and images from a particular moment in Levenshulme’s history.

Community Protests

In early 2013 it was announced that the library and swimming baths here in Levenshulme would be closed. This resulted in months of widespread direct action involving flash-mob zumba routines, a sit-in at the library, a number of marches and other creative forms of protest.

These protests brought together people from all backgrounds, with everyone united in the defence of their community, and resulted in the existing library and pools remaining open until replacement facilities were built and in the formation of Levenshulme Old Library, keeping a valuable local asset in the hands of the community.

Levolution! will be an exhibition of images and items from those protests. We’ll showcase photographs of the protests alongside placards, banners, t-shirts and other items all sourced from within the community.
The exhibition itself is currently planned for early February 2023 – it will be free to attend and all will be welcome.

So how can you help?

We’re calling for donations from the community for our Levolution! protest exhibition. This could be original placards, banners, t-shirts, masks or indeed any other items which were made and used during the protests, or any photographs and videos of the marches.

No matter how tatty, crude or unlovely you think they are – we want to put them on display to help us tell this story. So please, dig them out, ready for a second life.

Anything donated will be kept safe, credited during the exhibition, and returned once it’s all over.
So if you have any of the pictured items – or anything else which you made and took to the streets of Levenshulme back in 2013 – we want to know about it!

You can email email us to let us know about anything at all you think might be of interest.

We want to ensure the resulting exhibition gives a good cross section of the protests which took place and the diverse community who were involved and ensure the overall quality of the exhibition is as high as possible; therefore, we will need to curate our donations to reflect the spirit of our community.

Here are some photos, most of which were taken by Tony Gribben whose work will form the basis of this exhibition.

Are you in any of these pictures? Are you or someone you know holding or wearing something made for the protests which you know are still in existence somewhere? If so let us know!

Vive La Levolution! ✊