Innholdsfortegnelse for 9/15/2025 i The Big Issue

The fall of Angela Rayner took me by surprise. Over such a thing as tax on a second home. Isn’t it interesting that if most of the middle classes, and those who have joined them from the working class, ever get their hands on serious dosh it is because of the buying and selling of property. The UK’s family silver is property. It lifts people who could work all their lives and never accumulate any wealth beyond the property they purchased. For a considerable period of time people bought buy-to-lets, let their tenants pay their mortgage, and could then use the money accrued through the increase in house prices to play at the bank of mum and dad. Perhaps getting their kids on the property ladder, or paying for them…

I see the art world as playground. To explore and try new stuff. Graffiti looks best outside illegally. When you put time and effort into making this thing, whether it’s a tag or a piece, that’s where it looks best. I think it’s hard to create that energy inside, because there’s no risk, which adds flavour. You have to be extremely confident and comfortable in yourself and your beliefs to write what you think high up on the wall for the whole city to see. The things that I share are a combination between stuff I’ve heard and stuff I’ve seen, encounters that made me think of certain things, and rap lyrics, trap, a lot of UK, lot of Atlanta trap. I like the wordplay. I like things that have…

When I was 16 there were David Bowie and Talking Heads posters on my wall. There were lots of film posters too. Me and Joe Cornish, my comedy wife, used to hang around on the London Underground and, to my shame, steal film posters. They used to be glued on with really bad glue, so we used to go around and either pick up the ones that had fallen off or tease the ones that were half falling off and roll them up and run away with them. This was until we got caught one day by the police, and we just had to talk our way out of it by being as posh as we possibly could, relying on the innate class prejudice of the cops. That’s not a…

An education comes at a cost The motorways of Britain are packed at present with sad-looking middle-aged people, many biting their lips and trying not to cry. They may be on their own, they may be a couple. It’ll be mostly, though not exclusively, during weekends you’ll spy them, staring ahead, lost in memories, the car empty, except for racing thoughts. They have just dropped their child at their new home. Chances are it’s in a hall of residence at a university many miles from home. It’s the first time the child has lived away and the parent, or parents, are as uncertain about the future as their first born (by the time it goes beyond the first, there is a much more casual approach – as in all of…

Once upon a time there was a Nigerian scammer and a crackhead… ...they met and created a monster. But before that moment, way before that moment, was me, aged six, trying to figure out life making an ashtray out of clay in my art class at school. Under my chicken-shaped cigarette extinguisher lay a copy of Big Issue. Wallace & Gromit: The Wrong Trousers had been released with a full interview, taking about how fucking patient you really have to be to make real art. I ‘read’ the article, looked at the cover, skimmed the bit about music and thought, one day I’m going to be in this magazine, something I never really believed would be a reality. In fairness I was sure I would be dead by 25 (I’m…

Charlotte Rose welcomes Big Issue to her studio in Archway, North London and it’s quite an assault on the senses. The walls, the floors, the tables and chairs are covered in her artworks. This is unabashed pop art, full of bold imagery – nostalgic, but with a literary twist. Playful, colourful and smart, her iconic large-scale screen prints of Marlboro cigarette packaging – reworked and re-presented to feature references to Shakespeare, Cormac McCarthy or Kurt Vonnegut – certainly pop. If happiness, as per the famous adverts, was once a cigar called Hamlet, for Rose it is a cigarette called Macbeth. But it’s not just about the striking image for the artist, born in Aberdeen, who studied literature and creative writing at university. “I did an exhibition called the Shakespeare Tobacco…

How do you solve a problem like Ruth? She isn’t flighty, she isn’t a moonbeam you cannot hold in your hand and you actually can find a word that means Ruth: unremarkable. But even in the closed world of Christian communism, into which Ruth was born, they cannot seem to place her. Kate Riley’s debut novel follows the titular character from childhood to her adult life in a closed community where property and labour are equally shared. Ruth’s story is one of mundanity, even in this unique community that refuses to progress in the way the modern world around it demands. There are greater tales to be told of those in this community than Ruth’s. There are those that join her world later in life of their own volition and…

When Hayley Morris joins our Zoom call, she’s camera-ready, as though stepping into one of her social media sketches. We meet after she’s just come off a podcast recording. “It was really fun,” she grins. “It was My Mate Bought a Toaster, where you go through your purchase history list.” The weirdest thing on her list? “So many props from sketches I’ve done on Instagram and TikTok. A hula hoop to make a menstrual cup, air suits to dress as a fart… really casual everyday things.” Her costume cupboard could kit out an entire fancy dress party. This kind of silliness has made Morris one of the most successful young comedians online. Her sketch series Hotel Vagina personifies body parts as chaotic hotel guests, while Me vs Brain tackles intrusive…

Get in touch The Big Issue, 2nd floor, 43 Bath Street, Glasgow G2 1HW letters@bigissue.com @bigissueuk @bigissue.com @bigissue /bigissueUK @thebigissue Look beyond Saw the article [on bigissue.com] about relationships and the horrible fact that two-thirds of people with disabilities are lonely. This issue strikes at the core of how disability is seen by society, if we don’t see someone as a human being that is capable of love, it won’t be just relationships you will be denying but the ingredients that makes a life worthy and dignified. Being seen as not human or as ‘different’ is horrible and painful and it puts you at higher risk of experiencing neglect and deprivation. It is one of the most difficult things to cope with as I’m currently off work and not being…

Grinding out, working, hyper focusing on something – that’s massively part of my mental health routine I feel like I’ve always existed on the edge. I’ve always just been a get my head down and work person. I’ve never worked with anyone big. The times I’ve had opportunities to, I’ve immediately not liked the lack of control. In 2012 I did a little local show in Brighton and people really liked it. So I just carried on with the skeletons. I’d done masses and masses before that which no one gave a shit about and that was the first time I was like, oh, fucking hell, people like me. I’m on to something, I want to keep doing this. The few years, I hit a bit of a rhythm. Showing…

My younger sister is a television director. I’m very proud of her. One of the shows she makes happens to be a favourite of my son’s. I can’t tell you the name of the show in case I get her in trouble with her bosses by writing about it. But it’s a good show. She recently invited my son along to the set to work as an extra in a crowd scene. I accompanied him to the set because he needed a lift. When I got there, they assumed I would also be working as an extra, so I got herded into the crowd scene with him. It was fascinating to see how a big-budget telly programme got put together. Mind you, it’s pretty boring being an extra. We just…