POETRY & SPOKEN WORD
Words are often at the centre of what Rawz creates.
Finding Hip Hop in his early teens, Rawz began using lyric writing as a means of self-expression to bring emotional clarity. His quest to improve his craft soon led him to spoken word, a medium that has become a foundation of his practice over the years.
Rawz is available for commissions, live performances and workshops involving poetry and spoken word.
Get in touch for more info.
He Was Frightened Of The Fish
Rawz wrote this poem in 2016 while working on a project with young people that hadn't been in the UK for long. Many of the children were fleeing from wars in their home countries and quite a few of them couldn’t speak much English. The project was about helping these young people to tell their memories in the form of stories and spoken word.
With a new friend that spoke a bit of his language and a bit of English, a sixteen year old member of the group told a story that went something like this:
"I was in a bad situation at home, so I decided to pay some money to get on a boat to Europe, the boat got in trouble and started to take on water, some people had problems in the water and they drowned, the water was cold and salty, I was frightened of the fish."
The "bad situation" he mentioned was that his friends and family in the next town started sending him videos of people being beheaded in their town square, they told him to run for his life, because his town was next. Can you imagine how terrifying that would have been? For a sixteen year old?
Filmed in the chapel at St John's College, Oxford in front of a beautiful window created by a refugee during World War Two, this performance video was first released on 24th Nov 2022 in solidarity with the vigil being held by Stand Up To Racism UK, Care 4 Calais and Trades Union Congress at Parliament Square, London in memory of those that drowned in the English Channel.
"I hope we can build a world together in which people no longer need to risk their lives to escape a terrifying situation, or at least one in which we are willing and able to give all the help needed to those that live through what must be one of the most difficult ordeals a person can face. Until we do, I’m gonna keep using my English for this." - Rawz
DIGGING CRATES: The Messiah Violin
This short film is based around a live recording made in the Ashmolean Museum's stringed instrument gallery, in the presence of the priceless Stradivari violin known as The Messiah - one of the iconic violin maker's most celebrated masterpieces.
Rawz' poetry questions the use of the violin as a silent collector's piece, played only a handful of times in it’s almost 300 year lifespan; casting the violin as a fairy tale princess, locked away by a possessive and paranoid king, a twisted act of protection preventing her beauty and her song being shared with the world. He performs the poem alongside cellist Lou Lyne and violinist Natalie V who co-composed a string accompaniment based on Vivaldi's Concerto in A Minor. The strings almost "sample" the Vivaldi's classic work, in tune with the Hip Hop sensibilities of Digging Crates, providing a dramatic and achingly compelling backing to Rawz' words. The piece explores notions of beauty, silence, expression and the value and purpose of art and collecting.
In addition to writing and performing the spoken word, and initiating the project, Rawz also directed and edited the film.
SPOKEN WORD FOR SILENT FILMS:
Home & The Kodachrome Elegies
Inspired by the Japanese tradition of Benshi - where live narrators accompanied silent films, providing plot explanations, character voices, and commentary to enhance the audience's cinematic experience. Rawz was invited by Unseen Cinema to respond to two short films made without speech. The pieces he chose - Home by New Zealand film maker Thomas Gleeson, and The Kodachrome Elegies by American Jay Rosenblatt, look at the movement of time and place, taking audience on a journey through visual and spoken word dreamscapes to reside in a comfortable place not quite the same as before.
Both pieces were originally performed live in Stafford's Gatehouse Theatre as part of the Pocket Film Festival.
CONTENT WARNING: The Kodachrome Elegies contains footage of the assassination of U.S.A. President John F Kennedy towards the end of the film.
The Song Of The North Field
Rawz was asked to contribute to We Are Water, a sound collaboration between South African Hip Hop artist Emile Jansen (Emile YX) and British/Nigerian sound artivist Dr. Yewande Okuleye. As part of an Arts in Medicine Fellowship program, they explored water as a metaphor for interconnectedness, resilience, and the flow of human experiences. Through sound and storytelling, this project invites reflection on how each of us, like drops of water, contributes to a larger river of community and shared meaning.
Rawz responded by creating an ode to the little stream that gives the area that he lives in its name. The stream flows from one of England's 0.12% most privileged wards, just outside of Oxford, into Northfield Brook, the area that Rawz lives in, which is one of the 10% most underserved areas in England. He recorded the audio crouched on the banks of the stream just outside the border of Oxford where the stream flows into the city, before making a video of his walk back - crossing the road that separates one of the most privileged areas in the country from one of its most deprived.
RAWZ & Miles Ncube - Recorded Live @ OVADA
A delicately woven combination of Spoken Word and Mbira, this live recording was captured as part of a night of celebration marking the launch of Digging Crates Vol. 1, the show was presented to a capacity crowd at Oxford art gallery OVADA.
After a year working on the groundbreaking project, Inner Peace Records launched Digging Crates Vol. 1 with a live performance of the entire album. Before the main event, the gathered crowd were treated to an energetic performance from veteran African jazz band Wanda-NA-KL, followed by this intimate performance from two artists who struck up a friendship through their work together on the first ever Digging Crates project.
When She Waved Through The Window
Commissioned at the end of 2020, Rawz was asked to respond through lyrics and poetry to a true story captured by a city-wide volunteer programme set up during the first COVID-19 lockdown. Rawz presents the narrative as a fairy tale or fable, using metaphor to represent invisible barriers, the constant streams of information that distract us from the human connections that are often right in front of us waiting to be made. He conceptualised, produced, directed, and edited the video and co-composed the musical accompaniment.
Art Starts A Story
Commissioned by The Old Fire Station, Oxford in 2024, Art Starts A Story traces the winding, confusing, beautiful paths our lives take - and how art connects us along the way. The poem reflects on how our stories inspire others, become part of their journeys, and spark new stories in turn.
This meditation on connection and creativity became the inspiration for Bold Lines, a mural that translates the poem's vision into visual form, enabling the artwork to bring the poem's words to life on the walls of an arts centre in the heart of Oxford. The mural mirrors the poem's journey - lines of text weave through abstract shapes that fit together like a puzzle, echoing the many-sided lives, personalities, and stories that make up a community. Almost a sister piece to Rawz's previous work Dreams Of The Spires, Bold Lines embodies the spirit of the poem by continuing it's story in a visual narrative of its own.
What was once a plain white corridor between the theatre and the toilets is now… as someone put it… "a psychedelic experience" - the poem's message about art's transformative power has itself become a transformative force into art.
