Innholdsfortegnelse for 11/14/2022 i The Big Issue

Some weeks ago I went to the Tate Modern – that discarded London power station that has become one of the greatest art attractions in the world – to see the Paul Cézanne exhibition. Twenty or so years ago when asked on its opening night what I thought of the place, I could only say that it was vast, as you would expect from a neglected piece of the national grid. And it didn’t set me alight. I go there reluctantly. It seems as if art has been turned into power. A struggle between galleries and perhaps even artists. The ludicrous prices paid now for art devalue rather than increase its value. That the once simple ‘Tate’, created by money from sugar – one of the worst products to be…

COVER FEATURE It’s got to be the music moment of 2022. After decades in the wilderness, the UK’s Eurovision entry, Space Man, has snuck up the left-hand side of the famous scoreboard. Now we’re head-to-head with Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra for the win. The cameras are trained on Kalush’s hopeful faces and on Sam Ryder’s massive, chill grin. “Listen, I knew they were going to win it,” Ryder says. “And I wanted them to win it. All of us were just smiling because we were like, this is amazing. What an experience we’ve had. They’ve won it and I want them to sing the hell out of their song on that stage. “That’s what was going through my mind. The fact that the camera was on us was a blessing. That…

My cat died last month. His name was Nelson. He was pretty old and had lived a full life, as far as cats’ lives go. I bought him from a woman outside Hammersmith tube station for an extortionate £170. She turned up cupping the tiny creature in her hands, sodden with rain. I pushed the cash into her hand, snatched the furry asset and drove off home in my car where I presented it to my wife as a birthday gift. Nelson was frail and scared; the woman had assured me he was eight weeks old, but the vet said he looked no more than a fortnight. Too young to be taken from his mother. It seemed unlikely he would survive. But my wife and I nursed him diligently for…

HOMELESSNESS The university students facing homelessness after forking out £9k a year to study University is all about new experiences – but for some students higher education is becoming an introduction to homelessness. Swelling student numbers, a lack of accommodation and rising rents have seen students across the UK struggle to find a place to live. Recent research from the Centre for Homelessness Impact has found that homelessness is more prevalent in university towns and cities. That was the case for University of Glasgow student Krishen Chadwick Patel. The 19-year-old business management with politics student has spent most of the autumn term staying in a hotel or relying on friends to offer a sofa or floor to sleep on. That left him with no cooking or laundry facilities. A shortage…

Get in touch The Big Issue, 2nd floor, 43 Bath Street, Glasgow G2 1HW letters@bigissue.com @bigissue /bigissueUK @bigissueuk @thebigissue Fair freeze With regard to the letter from your reader, ‘A landlord speaks’ [Issue 1536, October 24], the landlords who I know have not got a mortgage on the property and so have no reason to increase the rent. Instead they should help the tenants, especially if it is a family who is looking after the house. Andrew Britland Minority rule In response to the letter from Clinton Roddis [Issue 1537, October 31], a majority of voters voted against the Conservative Party in 2019. The only reason the Conservatives got a majority is because of the way in which votes are counted in the UK. When Boris Johnson said he had…

Welcome to the Jungle On the outskirts of Calais, there’s a dead-end road with 24 portable toilets and a large vat of water, representing the entire sum of state-provided provision for hundreds of people sleeping rough in the area. For decades, men, women and children seeking a better life in the UK have passed through this part of France. Until 2016, migrants gathered in what became known as the Calais Jungle. Overcrowding and unsanitary conditions brought about its demolition in 2016. But the problem wasn’t solved, just dispersed. Spread around town are hidden camps in wasteland. Migrants from the same countries tend to congregate together. This area around the Portaloos is the Afghan Jungle. Early in the morning, half-a-dozen volunteers from Care4Calais meet nearby. The UK-based charity was founded in…

By Zakia As a child Zakia was drawn to the shapes and colours of the natural world around her in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where she grew up. It was this passion for the wonders of the landscape that led her to pick up pencils and brushes, playing with colour and shapes to capture moods and express feelings. Recently she began working with mosaic, quickly developing her work from rigid, linear forms, governed by the shape of the tiles, to more expressive shapes, using broken ceramic and found objects. Creative expression brings her a real sense of joy and a deeper attachment to the world and to others. Zakia seeks to challenge herself through the making of complex, thoughtful and unique artworks. Zakia submitted this artwork via the 240 Project, an activity…

PROFILE A different kind of protest singer It’s harder than ever to be an anti-corporate musician, saysEzra Furman. Once, alternative music had a powerful seam of revulsion against ‘selling out’, but that dogged purity has faded as it’s got harder and harder to simply make a living by making art. In a post-pandemic, Spotify, Brexited world, there’s a lot of reluctant pragmatism about. In Furman’s case, the emphasis is very much on reluctant. “I feel an anti-corporate streak flaring up recently,” the 36-year-old Chicago-born singer tells The Big Issue, speaking from her living room via video call. “All my music is protest music. I’ve always had my roots in punk music and trying to live a non-mainstream kind of life.” Furman’s been navigating that non-mainstream world since she formed Ezra…

BIANCA, 28 I’ve been selling The Big Issue for 10 years. I had family members who sold it and they used to tell me how it works, how it helps and how it supports homeless people. The manager who sold the magazines to my family members was always nice to me and would talk to me. One day she asked me if I wanted to become a vendor and I said, “Yes, that would be great.” It wasn’t a serious thing at first, but then things changed in the way that people treated me and talked to me. I started to enjoy and love my job. I have six kids, and for me The Big Issue is amazing because I don’t have a boss to push me around or saying,…

When a protester threw eggs at King Charles in York last week, he missed. The protester clearly was a lousy shot. “About five eggs he’d managed to send,” an eyewitness said, speaking as if they were narrating an 18th century morality tale. There is no great moral to be found. People are affectionate about the King and the royal family. As the protester threw his mis-aimed eggs, he shouted about slavery. The crowd replied with chants of “God save the King”. I find that part odd. It’s a phrase with decreasing literal meaning. It’s a badge, a way of showing you are part of a tribe. But really, it has little to do with a belief that an eternal being will bring protection. Britain is a land of dwindling faith.…

I had no idea what I wanted to do when I was 16. I went to a girls’ boarding school, and we weren’t encouraged to be ambitious or get a job. We were just left to our own devices. And when you’re young without any direction it’s very difficult. You might be influenced by a girl you’ve met, or something you’ve seen other people do, possibly something you see on TV, and it’s not really you, what you really should be pursuing. If I’d got my act together when I was young, I would have tried much harder at school. Then I’d have been able to go to art school, which is what I should have done, which would have been lovely. If I’d learned more when I was young,…

REVIEWS What nature can teach a boy about how to be a man Limberlost begins with a whale, not a marlin: an almost-mythical beast at the mouth of a Tasmanian river, troubling the waves with its fluked tail. But Robbie Arnott’s third novel carries echoes of Ernest Hemingway’s masterpiece. As its hero pits himself against nature to prove himself to older men – his father and his absent brothers – it could be read as a sort of ‘The Young Man and the Sea’: a beautiful, pared-back exploration of masculinity, and the sustaining nature of dreams. Ned West is a motherless boy who lives on an orchard – the Limberlost of the title – with his father William. Once strong and cheerful, William is worn out with anxiety for his…