Ever wanted to craft your own mini-zines? Curious about stepping into a live performance? Eager to collaborate with fellow creatives but never found the right moment?

This is your chance to experiment, play, and discover new creative possibilities. Led by UAL students, staff, and alumni, these workshops will guide you through hands-on activities, including zine-making, collective painting, body movement, creative writing, and more.

Open and free to all UAL students, staff, and the public—come join us and explore the unexpected!

If you have any questions about the programme, please contact: ccwpeckhamlevels@arts.ac.uk

Organised by UAL-wide Academic Support, Intercultural Communication (Student Engagement) and UAL Peckham Levels Professional Development Studios, this festival invites you to immerse yourself in a dynamic series of creative workshops this May at Peckham Levels!

About the exhibition:

Echoes of Presence is an exhibition rooted in the shared exploration of traces: the subtle, often overlooked marks that shape our understanding of space, memory, and presence. 

As Spatial Design practitioners, our collective research centres on the palimpsest, space as layered, lived-in, and rewritten. Through a workshop with students and tutors, both intentional and unconscious marks were made visible. 

This exhibition becomes both an archive and a collaborative reflection, inviting you into our thought process as we interpret hidden stories and consider how time and touch shape the spaces we inhabit, and how we shape them in return.

Echoes of Presence is the outcome of a collaboration between MA students in Interior and Spatial Design at UAL. Brought together through shared themes in their research, they come from varied creative fields, including architecture, sculpture, product, and interior design each offering different approaches and sensibilities to the exploration of presence and trace.

Contributors:
Amal Chehade, Antonia Fischer, Min Jeong Park, Nutsa Museridze, Sama Al Hamdan

About the exhibition:

A colourful celebration of identity, creativity, and self-expression, this exhibition showcases a dynamic group of young artists who aren’t afraid to get personal.

The exhibition celebrates queerness, feminism, cultural heritage, neurodivergence, and the richly textured layers of psychological portraiture through reflections and playful explorations.

Using painting, sculpture, video and digital media, these rising voices present a dynamic combination of vulnerability and courage— defying societal norms, amplifying difference and asking the audience to experience the world through a more expansive and expressive lens.

About the exhibition:

“What Does Justice Look Like Through a Child’s Eyes?" 

Opening on March 25-28th, the Seed of Change exhibition invites you to explore justice from a child's unique perspective. 

Curated by Vivi Gao and Kulsoma Khatun, this free exhibition is part of their Diploma of Professional Studies (DPS) Self-Initiated Project at UAL, in collaboration with Never Such Innocence. The exhibition showcases the power of creative expression and highlights the partnership between UAL and Never Such Innocence in amplifying young voices. 

Join us for the Private View, where you can enjoy complimentary drinks and snacks while engaging with the thought-provoking works on display. We can’t wait to welcome you!

Private View: 24th March 3pm - 6pm.

Admission is free - come and be part of the conversation.

Artists include:

• Amber X., 9-11, USA

• Yuxuan T., 16-18, China

• Yutong G., 9-11, China

• Jessica K., 11-14, USA

• Rihana K., 16-18, Germany 

• Yeon J., 11-14, USA

• Quan Y. 11-14, China

• Mariam K., 16-18, Nigeria

• Yejin S., 14-16, USA

• Jimmy Q., 14-16, China

• Katelyn K., 14-16, USA

• Younwoo C., 14-16, South Korea

• Victoria L., 14-16, USA

• Alex M., 16-18, USA

• Rihana K., 16-18, Germany

• Matias K., 16-18, Canada

All artworks are provided by Never Such Innocence.

Organised by UAL-wide Academic Support, Intercultural Communication (Student Engagement ) and UAL Peckham Levels Professional Development Studios, this festival invites you to immerse yourself in a dynamic series of creative workshops this February at Peckham Levels.

Ever wanted to craft your own sketch(y) book? Curious about stepping into a live performance? Eager to collaborate with fellow creatives but never found the right moment?

This is your chance to experiment, play and discover new creative possibilities. Led by UAL students, staff and alumni, these workshops will guide you through hands-on activities, including zine-making, deep listening, poetry, sonic objects and more.

Open to all UAL students, staff, and the public - come join us and explore the unexpected! Tickets are free, all welcome.

If you have any questions about the programme, please contact: ccwpeckhamlevels@arts.ac.uk

About the exhibition:

Step into a collaborative, multidisciplinary exhibition that shines a light on working-class experiences and creativity. Featuring the work of ten artists across a range of mediums, this powerful showcase brings voices and perspectives too often ignored into the spotlight. In an art industry that frequently sidelines discussions of class, this exhibition boldly confronts that silence, reclaiming space for stories that deserve to be seen and heard.

From bold visual art to thought-provoking installations, each piece reflects the realities, struggles, and triumphs of class and community. Join us in breaking barriers and sparking conversation.

Admission is free - come and be part of the conversation.

Artists featured:

• Jamie Holman

• Sara Prinsloo

• Hayley Jay 

• koolkatwarner

• Gemma Tucker

• Eliza Wright

• Eleanor McLean

• Jim Brook

• VTS.euromaster

• Jenny Mckimm

About the exhibition:

Narisara Jirojananukun is delighted to present Supermodern Romance at the UAL Space in Peckham Levels. Open from 27 to 29 November, her first solo exhibition consists of new and existing works blending illustration, fine art and photography. 

In Supermodern Romance, Thai artist Narisara Jirojananukun presents her interrogation of ‘non-places’ through the lens of an investigator at Waterloo Station, London. The exhibition title references French anthropologist Marc Augé’s text ‘Non-places: An Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity’ (1992). Augé posits that non-places, such as train stations, are transient spaces designed to lack specificity in our supermodern landscape, characterised by overabundance and excess. These are spaces where people remain anonymous and lonely. 

Jirojananukun’s work critically inquiries about the extent to which non-places lack connection and collective meaning. Through a series of investigative photography, moving image, etching and painting, she reveals and reconnects with brief moments of intimacy. Such scenes include waiting for a loved one with two coffees in hand, the shared anticipation and anxiety of watching train departure boards in a crowd and weaving towards the same direction as a stranger. Her work captures a train station’s gentle possessiveness in holding us in ephemeral moments of connection in our everyday lives. Even though we move apart, we still move towards each other. (Text by Charmaine Wah)

Free, open to all.

Curated by Charmaine Wah 

Artist and Curator Talk: Supermodern Romance

Date: Friday 29 November

Time: 1pm - 2pm

Venue: UAL Space, Level 6

Come join us at the UAL Space at Peckham Levels for an informal tour of the exhibition, Supermodern Romance. This exhibition was born from a collaboration between University of the Arts London (UAL) MA Illustration student, Narisara Jirojananukun, and MA Curating and Collections student, Charmaine Wah.

In this in-person talk, get an exclusive insight into the artistic and curatorial processes behind the exhibition, our experience navigating artist-curator collaboration, and an open discussion on the exhibition themes in the cosy pantry of the UAL Space. See you there!

About the exhibition:

Unfolding Cultural Heritage Echoes is a solo exhibition featuring work by illustration artist Wing Sze Kung. The exhibition explores the preservation and transformation of cultural heritage in the dynamic contexts of Hong Kong and London. In the face of rapid social and economic change, the exhibition showcases a collection of spatial design, illustration and animation works. Together, they explore how culture and craftsmanship can persevere and transform, inspiring new connections to our shared past, present and future.

Through the lens of collective memory and sense of place, the exhibition explores the multi-layered dimensions of community, traditional practices and cultural environments, highlighting how these elements bridge generations, time and place. Celebrating the spirit of Hong Kong's bamboo crafts and London's Chinese New Year parade, the exhibition invites viewers to interact through narrative illustration and animation, facilitating public awareness and appreciation of cultural preservation. 

More about the artist:

Website: www.wincykung.com

Instagram: wincy_szee

Colours is an installation by Margaux Carpentier created especially for this summer at Peckham Levels and revolving around four main artworks: Fish, Egg, Magma and Cloud.

Margaux Carpentier is an artist born in France and based in London. Her work ranges from illustrations to mural & fine art painting, printmaking and ceramics. She is interested in representing the human figure to tell stories and express feelings.

From the artist:

Starting from the title “colours”, an aspect of our world dear to me and my work, I first wanted to channel a feeling of joy and lightness to celebrate the summer in a small act of rebellion against a creeping darkness in which the world we know seems to plunge headfirst.   

Colours can uplift us and change our mood – think about waking up to a perfect blue sky or spotting that impossibly bright yellow flower, lost amidst a shabby patch of grass. However, colours are not the whole inspiration behind this series of drawings, but merely the spark which got me started. 

To tell stories through my work I use unapologetic human figures and a combination of symbols plucked from the air. Here is a little bit about the inspiration which helped me to create the scenes presented here. Please treat this as my interpretation, which is by no means exhaustive. Feel free to imagine new meanings that suit your story and sensibility, to create your own tales. 

The fish has sneaked into my drawings for a few years now. Born from a distant memory of fish-shaped French Easter chocolate or the feeling of gutting a mackerel at age 9, it is to me a multifaceted symbol. Its slimy and scaly body can represent the ultimate strangeness of emotions which pierce us and come swimming inside us from time to time. 

The egg was encountered on a stormy autumn evening, when I sat on a brick wall bordering an old cemetery only to discover a row of perfectly aligned eggs someone had placed on top of the bricks. This mystery brought the egg to my work, perhaps a symbol of treasure, enigma but also something fragile we must care for. The egg here is spotted and giant; maybe some fantastical creature is about to hatch.

My Flowers have human faces, hidden in their core. The hybrid being is held here, or even pulled out, acting as a mirror, a fragrant interlocutor to some inner discussion. These strange flowers can illustrate the myriads of voices and people who live inside us. 

The cloud is new to me and formed by being part of the audience at a talk between two writers (Shon Faye & Maggie Nelson), in which they described the exchange that was happening as “holding a cloud together”. 

The cloud here is held by two people with a dose of struggle and is dissolving into rain. It is something evanescent, bringing precious water to the earth but also conversely acting as an odd symbol of gloom in western iconography.  

The red artwork is inspired by the myth of Sisyphus, who, condemned to push a huge boulder uphill sees it roll back to the bottom and is forced to start again for eternity. 

It is an allegory of our human lives in which we struggle to acquire knowledge and become the best version of ourselves only to die in the end and take it all with us. Or else, this is one way to see it. The characters here are not pushing the giant round stone which looks like a ball of magma but resting on it in an act of relaxation, love and care. They are not going anywhere, living in stillness and embracing the heart of the earth.

The framed works are limited edition screen-prints, printed by the artist at Print Club London in Dalston.

About the exhibition:

This free exhibition at Peckham Levels shares a collaborative photographic series shared by Hayley Jay. Her practice is concerned with the aesthetics of youth and the spaces they occupy. During her residency at Millside school in Slough, she captured the character and energy of the everyday whilst sharing her camera with the students. Her exhibition blends the students' imagery and art work with her own in an uplifting showcase, whilst challenging the pervasive negative stigma and complex challenges faced by special needs and provisional schools today. 

On Wednesday 19 June there will be a private view and scanning social hosted by the Museum of Youth Culture where visitors are encouraged to bring photos, objects and ephemera to be scanned into the museum's ever growing archive of public submissions piecing together fascinating stories from people's teenage years.

• Open: Tuesday 18 June - Friday 21 June

• Private View and Museum of Youth Culture Scanning: Wednesday 19 June, 4pm - 8pm

About the exhibition:

Plastic Alchemy reimagines the lifecycle of soft plastics and explores the transformative power of hands-on practices.

In the spirit of alchemy, an ancient practice dedicated to transmuting base materials into valuable substances, this exhibition demonstrates how single-use waste can be reborn as functional and sustainable objects.

The theme of alchemy extends beyond the physical transformation of materials; it symbolises a hands-on approach to solving ecological challenges and extending the life of single-use plastics. By fusing soft plastics into durable, reusable materials, we not only divert waste from landfills but also highlight the endless possibilities of creative recycling.

Alongside installation pieces, we are inviting viewers to join an interactive workshop on Thursday 13 June, an opportunity to gain new upcycling skills and turn daily soft plastics into reusable products.

This free exhibition at Peckham Levels covers the history and culture of Southwark Travellers from the early 1980s when they first settled in the borough. It includes the campaigning work they did to establish the four Traveller sites in Southwark, and the formation of Southwark Travellers Action Group (STAG) as part of this. 

The Exhibition looks at the period from the 1980s to the present, and provides some context on wider Gypsy, Roma and Traveller history and culture. We have historical artefacts from STAG's own archives, photos shared by the National Museum of Ireland showing traditional Irish Traveller crafts and culture, and more recent artwork from STAG and Dolly Romany Arts.

Southwark has a great history of supporting Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, and this is a chance to learn more about their contributions to the borough, some of the difficulties they have faced in the past and how these were overcome by community action. We also highlight some of the problems still faced by these communities and the work STAG and others are doing to address these and celebrate the depth and breadth of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller culture and heritage.

About the exhibition

Moments of Stillness explores an intersection of nature and wellbeing through the paintings of Xuan Hew. Coming from Malaysia, the artist longs for a connection with a climate different from what she’s used to. By collecting landscapes through lived and imagined experiences, Xuan Hew's paintings of mountain peaks and other natural forms propose a moment of break from the rush of everyday life. Just as nature, that grows from inside of Earth to outside, the works bring consciousness to the many layers that we, as humans, are made of. Moments of Stillness then becomes a space to inspire the act of pause and observation, to be able to feel the presence beyond the surface and feel connected to the places that we inhabit.

Curated and written by Júlia Mazzoni.

About the workshop

Welcome to Moments Of Stillness! Join in with a peaceful gathering at the UAL exhibition space on Levels 5 & 6 of Peckham Levels.

Explore Xuan Hew's art through interactive activities like extending the painting and crafting stories. Our aim? Simply to relax and slow down. Join us for mindful creativity and a deeper connection with art.

Take a moment to pause, breathe, and connect with yourself and others. Let's create a space for reflection, mindfulness, and inner peace. We can't wait to share these moments of stillness with you!

Opening hours:

• 8 May(Wed): 10am-6pm + Private view: 5:30pm-7:30pm

• 9 May (Thu): 10am - 6pm

• 10 May (Fri): 10am - 3pm + Workshop: 2pm-3pm

• 11 May (Sat): 12pm-4pm

Join us for a series of creative workshops hosted at Peckham Levels this Spring!

The activities will be led by UAL students, staff and alumni and will explore themes such as art-making, drawing, curating and art-therapy.

Beyond Bodies is a new immersive art installation by Tasia Graham focused around an interpretation of the internal and external experience of women’s self image.

With themes of identity, body dysphoria, and fantasy, Tasia creates a worldly collection formed through surrealist techniques. inspired from the works of Salvador Dali’s ‘Dreams’ series.

Come and experience the work any time during public opening hours from Wednesday 20 December - Friday 22 December. Entry is free and the installation will be inside our Auditorium space on Levels 5 & 6.