EUCHAR
GRAVINA

Euchar was appointed Artistic Director at Waterloo Festival in 2018 and St John's Waterloo in 2019. 

Waterloo Festival is an annual celebration of art, music, hertiage and ideas on the South Bank fringe. It is a showcase for fresh and emerging talent from Waterloo and all over the world as well as a platform for effective discussion and healthy debates.

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St John's Waterloo is an arts-community venue on the South Bank, hosting a variety of creative happenings, social justice campaigns and community events. It is also home to Southbank Sinfonia and several other ensembles and arts organisations. Through 'Re-Ignite', the venue is undergoing redevelopment, transforming it into an accessible, open and contemporary state-of-the-art space working with and for professional and amateur artists and the community of Lambeth and London. 

Photo: St John's Waterloo, London | Eleanor Bentall for St John's Waterloo

On Tuesday 27th June, 'Banned by Beijing', an exhibition curated by Euchar Gravina, was launched at the Old Crypt.

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The Chinese Communist Party’s repression of human rights has been widely documented, from the Tiananmen Square Massacre to the Uyghur genocide in Xinjiang. But few realise that the CCP’s repression extends far beyond its borders, including into Europe. Banned by Beijing, a partnership between Index on Censorship and St John's Waterloo, highlighted the CCP’s transnational repression in Europe by and through the works and stories of dissident artists.

The exhibition, featuring works by Lumli Lumlong, vawongsir and Badiucao, aimed to not only warn but also to celebrate those who, whilst in forced exile, keep facing down the long arm of censorship with the vigour of artistic expression. It was launched with a concert by the Uyghur musician and human rights activist Rahima Mahmut and the London Silk Road Collective at St John's Waterloo.

Poster below features 'Apple Man' by Lumli Lumlong

At the heart of this project are students from Accumulate, the art school for the homeless, who are engaged in designing and constructing a model of their perfect world. Utopia: a new world for everyone is a residency at St John's based around a series of creative workshops covering architecture, textiles, music making and voice training, now running and due to culminate in a final showcase in the newly refurbished St John’s when the church reopens in summer 2022. The workshops are supported by architecture firm Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, and supported by the Foyle Foundation and Arts Council England.

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Photo: Chez Chrisss

Euchar is the Director of The Daphne Festival, happening in October 2022 in London.

The Daphne Festival, happening in London, Malta and online, makrs the fifth anniversary since the assassination of Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. It brings together human rights and press freedom organisations as well as journalists, artists, activists and campaigners from around the world to remember Daphne, celebrate the legacy of her work and highlight the ongoing campaign for justice.

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The festival reflects on women journalists from across the globe who face threats because of their work, the growing momentum for introducing anti-SLAPP legislation in the UK and Europe as well as the creative legacy and expression of the past five years, inspired by Daphne and her story.

The aim of this festival is to join in the rallying chorus for justice for Daphne and other journalists around the world who have suffered harassment, imprisonment and even death for their work.

Photo: Bay Leaf, logo for The Daphne Festival by Sebastian Tanti Burlò

A series of five articles celebrating World Press Freedom Day published in 2020. This series, written for the online COVID edition of Waterloo Festival, features interviews with Alessandra Galloni (Reuters), Rebecca Vincent (Reporters Without Borders), James Hatts (SE1 News) and former journalist Shanon Shah.

Between 2016 and 2022, Euchar was Music Director at St John's Waterloo, overseeing the music and  leading and preparing the choir for liturgical services and other events.

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Photo: St John's Waterloo, London | Dirk Lindner for Eric Parry Architects

An audio-tour of the South Bank site as it looked at the Festival of Britain of 1951. Led by Alan Powers and Elain Harwood, of the Twentieth Century Society, and accompanied by Nick Rampley, former Vice-Principal at Morley College, and Euchar Gravina, Artistic Director at Waterloo Festival. Sound engineered by Morley Radio. This is part of a series of podcast episodes around Waterloo Festival.

L-Investigaturi tal-Muzika, part of the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra's continuous efforts to bring music closer to younger audiences, is an edutainment series of 15-minutes episodes delving into aspects of orchestral music. Euchar was featured in Episode 7.