In Conversation with Tom Hunter and Leonie Rousham

Drawing on their own experiences of photographing 1990s squatting communities, and housing campaigns today, photographer Tom Hunter and filmmaker-archivist Leonie Rousham join us to consider the role of artists in documenting housing activism, and the use of film and photography to support alternative ownership structures.
Tom Hunter lived in squats off London Fields on Ellingfort Road and London Lane from 1985 until 2000. His photography documented the community he lived with and championed the fight against eviction and the destruction of his squatting community. His work ’The Ghetto’, a photographic model of the squatted streets, went into the Museum of London and was on display for 30 years. He was part of the squatting community that saved their homes and the houses they lived in, forming a housing co-op where the community still lives and thrives in the heart of Hackney.

Leonie Rousham works across film, installation, sound, printmaking, and media distribution. She’s the co-founder of collaborative practice Kneed, with Ishwari Balherao, which is centered in building systems of care, support and resistance where external pressures are causing these to be exhausted or lacking. She was Assistant Director and Impact Producer of the documentary POWER STATION, a ‘show-and-do’ project and feature documentary building community organised energy commons in North London. She is also a tenants union organiser, a Civic Futures Fellow, and co-organiser of alternative education project Antiuniversity Now.

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