Shahid Mahmood
Audio PlayerINT: Interviewer
SM – Shahid Mahmood
SM: Ok, my name is Shahid Mahmood and currently, I am working for an organisation, or have my
own organisation, called ‘Blossom’.
INT: Could you please tell me about the history of yourself and how you got working with Blossom
and Rosetta?
SM: Yeah, em, back in 2016, I was working in Minhaj ul Quran Mosque and we were working on
projects with diverse communities and one of those projects was English as a second language.
Within that group of students, we had 60 people. That rose to 400 over time. A Lot of the students
wanted to find out if there were any arts organisations who could come down and teach them about
something. This is because we were in a mosque and we had people that were very interested in
calligraphy. So, I looked on Google, we also had these thigs called A-Zs and I rang up and spoke to
Sanaz, and I said, why don’t you come and see. She came down, looked at the mosque and was
fascinated by the building because its eh, it goes back to 1890, it used to be known as The Odeon
Cinema. I spoke to Sanaz about the building and we started running courses about calligraphy,
Islamic calligraphy, run by a young lady called Aisha, one of your teachers. So, she started the
courses and meanwhile, at the same time, I was running a programme called South Asian
Contributions to the Second World War. We were working with the Imperial War Museum, it was a
heritage programme and we would have an exhibition, the first one ever, inside the Mosque for 12
weeks. So, during that programme, this tied up with the work of Rosetta, so from that fantastic
footing. So, Aisha would come and teach some of the ESOL students and then she started teaching
the smaller group of people who were more interested in calligraphy. It was fascinating because the
first group of people we had for calligraph, the vast majority of those people, were was from the
Jewish faith, ok, So, they would come in, to a mosque, something that is quite alien to them, and
they really loved it! They started to learn how to do calligraphy. That was our first venture, then I
had many meetings and discussions with Sanaz. She invited me to many of her programmes, I even
invited her to come to parliament as we were doing some work around English as a second
language, and also working on a project called ‘Shape’ – working with young people.
So, she came to the ending of that when we giving out certificates and our relationship has just been
fantastic! Em, what I found particularly with Sanaz and Rosetta is that it wanted to reach, what we
call, ‘hard to reach’ communities. This misnomer about ‘hard to reach” is about ’ reaching those
communities, but they’re not hard to reach. Sanaz proved that because she went out of her way to
come to us in a mosque. I then introduced her to some other organisations such as Faith Friends
where she was linking up with bigger organisations and more diverse organisations like the churches
and the gurdwaras, I have a lot of experience with those fields as well, and gave her the opportunity to
come. The fact is that it was her endeavour, to work with us and she proved a point that we were
not ‘hard to reach’. And over a period of time, we’ve become very good friends. I’ve moved over to
Waltham Forest and I’ve asked her to come over there to work out some new projects. But we do go
back a bit and have had some wonderful experiences, we worked on a project in Newham and we
went to the Arts Council, as a conglomerate to ask for funding, unfortunately, that was not given,
but I don’t think it was anyone’s fault. I don’t think the Arts Council had the capacity to understand
the great work we could have done together, but is something we can do in the future, that’s
something we could develop as I have a lot of love and respect for this organisation to the extent
that I introduced my son to this organisation. His name is Ismael Mahmood and he started delivering
Raga classes, that’s traditional Indian music. He would deliver those at the weekend at Rosetta
where people from diverse communities could come and learn. So, we, as a family, have a lot of
trust and love for Rosetta. We wish it would come out more and have more discussions – we are
ready for that. I think Rosetta epitomises what should be done in local communities. Obviously, lots
more could be done as we have built a great foundation and we are really looking forward for the
future. Obviously, it’s gonna be difficult without Sanaz because if she’s not there, I dunno how its
gonna work. I’m sure together we can do this. I know Sanaz is not leaving permanently she is still
with us and will support us.
INT: Going back to those workshops in the mosque and these ‘hard to reach’ communities’, can you
tell me how they reacted to those art classes?
SM: They were very surprised! As normally, when we run art classes, it would be someone who has
an interest in art who would come and teach and a number of people who would come and learn
and love it. I think there is a big yearning in communities to not only to bring art, but for people to
show their skills, and I think that is the forgotten talent within communities in these places of
worship. So, when Rosetta Arts and particularly Aisha was sent, came along and people were quite
shocked as they had never seen and artist come in to teach within a mosque and that was quite
unique, even to teach calligraphy. Normally, you would think that’s normal, as it’s an Islamic centre
and they teach calligraphy and it’s in a mosque. But going around the country, and looking at all the
mosques, and I study this stuff, you won’t find any mosque that teaches calligraphy at a professional
level. That had never been done and will never be done in the future unless Rosetta do something
about it. It’s important because it’s a diverse community in Newham, and particularly from the
Jewish community. You have to remember with the Jewish community, even though they are in
Newham, em, lots of the Jewish community are more predominant in North London. So, they came
because they saw some poster and learned that there is something at the dhajal mosque. So, most
people wouldn’t think, is it safe to go there – preconceptions that they have. But they forgot that and
they came to a mosque and they thoroughly enjoyed it! Testimony to the teacher, testimony to the
organisation, always this wonderful thing people in these communities thought is this happening,
but they got used to it. Normally they would expect someone within the organisation to run it, but
this was very powerful! It bodes well for the future if we can build something together for the
future.
INT: And what would you like to see for the future relationship between Blossom and Rosetta Arts?
SM: Rosetta Art and Blossom, the name in itself is like a marriage in heaven! It would cause bloom
and lots of art in the communities. What you would find is that if we worked together, we would go
into the communities, very very important, deliver the work Rosetta is doing in the community. So
this thing about reaching ‘hard to reach communities’, would stop, because what would then
happen as the communities are co-producing something with Rosetta so that Rosetta is taking a
back seat, it would mean that arts in the community is taking the front seat and Rosetta is playing a
very very big part in that because, I personally think that there is so much talent that is unexplored
in our local communities, and we know that Newham is one of the most diverse communities in
Europe, and maybe in the world, but it’s so untapped. The future looks very positive and we need to
make a lot of it. I’m also very very critical because as an organisation, including ourselves and
Rosetta, sometimes, we could have done much more and we should do much more because I think
the communities are crying out for these sorts of things because these are the things that will
actually empower people, and also ensure that people don’t become divided and working in their
own groups. What should happen is that we should bring all these people together. Different
communities together. Blossom does that well, Rosetta does that really well, but the marriage would
make that even better because it doesn’t matter where you are from, what you been in, doesn’tmatter what differences you have, the commonalities are so much more than that as, including the
other partners that we have, and the other privileged people that we have, you know who have
been selected by Rosetta for this particular project. I think all of us together can bring something
really really valuable.
