How one Manchester community celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee with a street party, procession and art

A Manchester community put on a spectacular and colourful celebration for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.

Proforma in Longsight marked the milestone anniversary with art, a procession and a street party.

The organisation put on a celebration called Reign which included a procession from Longsight Art Space through Northmoor Road and onto Crowcroft Park.

There a flower mandala sculpture was created for the day, celebrating the national flower of Barbados and traditional henna patterns.

Proforma also celebrated the opening of Longsight Art Space’s new exhibition Fertile Grounds, which explores elements and ideas of the Caribbean Carnival in everyday life and celebrates the concept’s ways of looking to folklore, the ocean, and to nature.

Curated by Nikita Gill and featuring artists Tina Ramos Ekongo, Garth Gratrix, Tulani Hlalo, Isaiah Hull and Nadia Sultana, Fertile Grounds celebrates the descendants and legacies of the Windrush generation and those who moved from the Caribbean to Britain.

Proforma is a non-profit visual arts and performance platform which supports artists and curators by commissioning new work, provides artist exchange opportunities and offers mentoring and talks to help creative talent develop.

It presents work by artists from all over Greater Manchester and aims to commission work to be displayed outside of traditional art galleries.