The four short­list­ed de­signs for the new UK Win­drush mon­u­ment have been re­vealed. Artists Basil Wat­son, Jean­nette Ehlers, Thomas J Price and Val­da Jack­son have un­veiled their de­signs for the na­tion­al Win­drush Mon­u­ment at Lon­don Wa­ter­loo sta­tion.

The artists, all of Caribbean de­scent, were short­list­ed ear­li­er this year to de­sign a per­ma­nent trib­ute to the Win­drush gen­er­a­tion to ho­n­our how they have en­riched our na­tion’s his­to­ry.

The mon­u­ment will recog­nise how the Win­drush Gen­er­a­tion have en­riched the UK’s his­to­ry and will be a per­ma­nent trib­ute to a gen­er­a­tion of ar­rivals from the Caribbean to the UK—from the ar­rival of MV Em­pire Win­drush in 1948 and in the decades that fol­lowed.

It is ex­pect­ed to be un­veiled on Win­drush Day—June 22, 2022.

Each of the artists has cre­at­ed a video un­veil­ing their de­sign for the Mon­u­ment, which will be lo­cat­ed on the sta­tion’s up­per con­course, and ex­plain­ing more about their artis­tic prac­tice.

Roar Studio, Milan

The pub­lic are now be­ing in­vit­ed to have their say on the artists’ pro­pos­als through an on­line sur­vey. The UK gov­ern­ment is par­tic­u­lar­ly en­cour­ag­ing those of Caribbean de­scent to take part and share their views on the de­signs.

The fi­nal artist de­sign will be cho­sen in Sep­tem­ber by the Win­drush Com­mem­o­ra­tion Com­mit­tee, con­sid­er­ing views from the gen­er­al pub­lic, and will be an­nounced in Oc­to­ber dur­ing Black His­to­ry Month.

Chair of the Win­drush Com­mem­o­ra­tion Com­mit­tee, Baroness Floel­la Ben­jamin DBE said:

“It is so ex­cit­ing to fi­nal­ly see the de­signs our tal­ent­ed short­list­ed artists have put for­ward for the na­tion­al Win­drush Mon­u­ment in Lon­don Wa­ter­loo sta­tion.

“The Mon­u­ment will ed­u­cate and in­spire the next gen­er­a­tion through the Win­drush sto­ry. For that rea­son, it is in­cred­i­bly im­por­tant to my­self, and the Win­drush Com­mem­o­ra­tion Com­mit­tee, to hear from young peo­ple on what they think of the four de­signs.

“The mon­u­ment will be a place that peo­ple can vis­it from far and wide with their chil­dren and fam­i­lies to learn and re­flect on the last­ing lega­cy of our Win­drush gen­er­a­tion.”

Courtesy Basil Watson

Com­mu­ni­ties Min­is­ter Lord Green­hal­gh said:

“Mil­lions of peo­ple vis­it Wa­ter­loo sta­tion every year and this mon­u­ment will al­ways be a re­minder to them of the in­cred­i­ble im­pact the Win­drush gen­er­a­tion has had—and con­tin­ue to have—on the UK and our his­to­ry.

“I en­cour­age every­one to take part in the sur­vey and share their views ahead of the fi­nal de­sign be­ing re­vealed lat­er this year.”

The Win­drush Gen­er­a­tion has come to be de­fined as those peo­ple who em­i­grat­ed from the Caribbean to Britain be­tween the ar­rival of the MV Em­pire Win­drush on June 22, 1948 and the Im­mi­gra­tion Act 1971.

The mon­u­ment will be a trib­ute to them, their de­scen­dants, and the wider British Caribbean com­mu­ni­ty.

Lon­don Wa­ter­loo Sta­tion is strong­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with the sto­ries of many mem­bers of the Win­drush Gen­er­a­tion. It stands at a point where thou­sands of Win­drush pi­o­neers first ar­rived in Lon­don be­fore start­ing new lives across the UK.

The mon­u­ment will be an am­bi­tious pub­lic art­work that stands as a tes­ta­ment to the con­tri­bu­tion of Caribbean pi­o­neers in com­mu­ni­ties across the Unit­ed King­dom. It will cre­ate a per­ma­nent place of re­flec­tion and in­spi­ra­tion and be a vis­i­ble state­ment of our shared his­to­ry and her­itage.

The short­list­ed arists are:

Basil Wat­son—Sculp­tor and painter Basil Wat­son has de­signed pub­lic sculp­tures and mon­u­ments across the world in­clud­ing stat­ues of Mar­tin Luther King, Us­ain Bolt and Mer­lene Ottey. He was award­ed the Or­der of Dis­tinc­tion (Com­man­der Class) in 2016 by the Ja­maican gov­ern­ment in recog­ni­tion of his artis­tic ac­com­plish­ments. His fam­i­ly is part of the Win­drush Gen­er­a­tion.

Courtesy TJ Price

Jean­nette Ehlers—T&T born, Jean­nette Ehlers us­es a mix­ture of pho­tog­ra­phy, video, in­stal­la­tion, sculp­ture and per­for­mance in her work. Her work ad­dress­es com­plex ques­tions about mem­o­ry, race and colo­nial­ism, in­flu­enced by her Dan­ish Trinida­di­an her­itage. In 2018 Ehlers was the co-cre­ator of a sig­nif­i­cant pub­lic memo­r­i­al in Copen­hagen to Mary Thomas (a 19th cen­tu­ry slav­ery free­dom fight­er), in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Cru­cian artist La Vaughn Belle.

Thomas J Price—Re­cent­ly com­mis­sioned by Hack­ney Coun­cil to cre­ate a per­ma­nent sculp­ture ho­n­our­ing Hack­ney’s Win­drush Gen­er­a­tion, Thomas J Price has sig­nif­i­cant ex­pe­ri­ence of cre­at­ing pub­lic art­work. The British-Ja­maican artist works across sculp­ture, film and pho­tog­ra­phy fo­cussing on rep­re­sen­ta­tion and per­cep­tion in so­ci­ety.

Val­da Jack­son—The daugh­ter of Win­drush gen­er­a­tion pi­o­neers, Val­da Jack­son works in sculp­ture, paint­ing, print­mak­ing and mov­ing im­age cre­at­ing com­plex nar­ra­tives that re­flect and ques­tion our past and present with in­tent on in­flu­enc­ing our fu­ture. In 2017, her col­lab­o­ra­tive pub­lic art prac­tice ‘Jack­son and Har­ris’ won the Marsh Award for ex­cel­lence in Pub­lic Sculp­ture from the Pub­lic Mon­u­ments and Sculp­ture As­so­ci­a­tion.