Posts by Sarah Birch
The Roles We Play, Sabba Khan, book review: ‘Laden with paradox and rich in nuance’
This genre-defying volume by an East London architect is a ‘meditation on the collective trauma of immigration’
Read MoreHyangmok Baik: Forgotten By Us, Beers Gallery, exhibition review: ‘The more one looks, the more one sees’
The Korean painter’s solo show is ‘full of colour and off-beat imagery’
Read MoreCommon Ground, Naomi Ishiguro, book review: ‘A modern-day Howards End’
The Stoke Newington novelist’s ‘highly readable’ debut is ‘destined to challenge not a few facile assumptions’
Read More‘Phantasmagoric imagery’ on show at Royal Drawing School’s annual student exhibition
Over 550 drawings are on display at the school in Shoreditch
Read MoreDesde el Salón, Whitechapel Gallery: ‘A welcome antidote to the anxiety of variants’
Artist Sol Colero’s curation of works usually confined to the offices of an insurance company makes you think again about the world of corporate art
Read MoreOne Hundred Years, Jenny Lewis, book review: ‘Life going by in a richly textured community’
The photographer’s portraits of unique local characters cover a century of Hackney’s ‘passion and fortitude’
Read MoreJean Dubuffet: Brutal Beauty, Barbican, exhibition review: ‘Art of the people, not the academy’
The French painter’s ‘anarchic rage against the establishment’ will touch a chord with many’
Read MoreNational turbulence, local tranquility: Decoding Hackney’s by-election results
An analysis of the borough’s political landscape following 6 May polls in four wards
Read MoreThrough the Looking Glasses, Travis Elborough, book review: ‘A great way to put your own eyewear to use’
The local author turns his lens to the instruments that help him and an estimated four billion others navigate the world
Read MoreAnne Hardy: Rising Heat, Maureen Paley: ‘A piece of waste becomes a diaphanous pink ghost’
The first show at the gallery’s new Studio M is ‘well worth a visit’
Read MorePeterdown, David Annand, book review: ‘Captivating parable about how we understand place’
The local author’s 600-page debut novel elevates the abstruse business of council planning into an ‘engrossing’ prod at life’s big questions
Read MorePhotographs by young refugees light up Shoreditch for month-long exhibition
Autograph gallery repurposes electronic billboard on Old Street for illuminating #HackneyIsHome project
Read MoreWomen from Hackney’s History, Hackney Society, book review: ‘Testimony to how high women can rise’
This celebration for the upcoming Women’s History Month delves into the achievements of 113 women with connections to the borough
Read MoreInvisible Ink: A Family Memoir, Martha Leigh, book review: ‘Part love story, part history, part meditation’
The Hackney GP’s journey into the lives of her parents ‘probes with admirable delicacy some of the most pressing questions of our era’
Read MoreHomecoming, Luan Goldie, book review: ‘A subtle and engrossing story’
The Stoke Newington-based author explores, in ‘lyrical prose’, the ‘tangle of contemporary identity’
Read MorePrecious You, Helen Monks Takhar, book review: ‘A great lockdown read to gobble up and ponder’
The Stoke Newington author’s first novel is a ‘gloriously dark parable of envy between generations’
Read MoreSnow White in the Seven Months of Lockdown, Charles Court Opera online, stage review: ‘Classic tale with added spice’
The company’s 14th annual panto goes online this year, but still ‘sets you on a path to feeling festive’
Read MoreErin O’Keefe: Certain Things, Seventeen Gallery, exhibition review: ‘Clean in form but subtle in composition’
The New York-based artist’s first solo show on these shores features ‘beguiling tableaux which repay close attention’
Read MoreEat Hackney Vegan Cookbook, Helena Smith: ‘A smorgasbord of food ideas suitable for everyone’
Try your hand at recipes donated by chefs across the borough in support of local causes
Read MoreYushi Li: Women Act, Men Appear, Union Gallery, exhibition review: ‘Nude men and naked female desire’
The photographer’s reversal of gendered power roles is ‘stimulating and thought-provoking’
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