Ben Uri Research Unit (buru.org.uk) is proud to be the custodian of diaspora-artists.net which is an innovative online research and reference facility centred on visual arts practice by artists from a plurality of diasporic backgrounds. Initiated by Curator/Researcher/Academic/Professor/Eddie Chambers the project was initially developed in collaboration with Watershed and the Digital Cultures Research Centre at the University of the West of England.

Room at the Top. Catalogue relating to an exhibition, 1985

The online material is drawn from a collection held by Eddie Chambers, relating to the visual arts practices of artists from African/African-Caribbean/South Asian and other diasporas. The aim of this website is to preserve and make available to online audiences material of historical and cultural significance, making a marked impact on the ways in which ‘British’ art history is recorded, constructed, disseminated, taught and researched. The data-base is preserved as an archived body of scholarship representing over 15 years’ work led by Eddie Chambers.

Diaspora-artists.net is now part of the growing Ben Uri Research Unit for the study and digital recording of the Jewish, Refugee and Immigrant contribution to British Visual Culture since 1900.

The Research Unit presents its studies through extensive biographies of the individuals selected from across ten different professions within visual arts including artists, photographers, designers, gallerists, dealers, teachers, curators, critics, scholars and publishers. The majority are first generation immigrants to Great Britain and a growing proportion second generation.

Reasons for migration are diverse and the majority were forced journeys triggered by conflict and we have a special focus on the Hitler emigres from 1933-1945.

Currently there are close to 700 different profiles published and a further some 800 under research. Please explore buru.org.uk after your journey through diaspora-artists.net is completed.

Research Unit
Ben Uri Gallery & Museum
108a Boundary Road
London NW8 ORH
Email: admin@benuri.org
URL // www.Buru.org.uk