Bash Khan
You need to invest in people. If you design it from the community, if anyone else who comes in parachutes in, that never ever works.
Niall Murphy
No. It never works. It’s gotta be grassroots.
Bash Khan
It’s always got to be connected to grassroots. But also to recognize that there are skills within that community. Uh-huh. Because I think sometimes what happens is people expect people to do that for for free as well. And I also think that’s slightly unfair.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. It is.
Bash Khan
If the planners are getting paid, if the designers are getting paid, if the architects are getting paid, if the builders are getting paid, then someone who is qualified should be, you know and I said that I put this word of value again down. Value those people’s time and expertise, but and also value that something good might come out of it.
Niall Murphy
Hello, everyone, and welcome to If Glasgow’s Walls Good Talk. I’m Niall Murphy.
Fay Young
And I’m Fay Young.
Niall Murphy
In today’s episode, we’re meeting Basharat Khan, Bash for short, a Glasgow based filmmaker and visual artist with a real passion for bringing public spaces to life. He is telling the stories of real people in new ways and often unexpected places.
Fay Young
Yes. And his larger than life images are quite literally eye opening. During the pandemic, Bash’s live film portraits celebrated the more usually invisible people who kept, they still keep, our vital services going. He projected them telling their stories onto familiar buildings at a scale normally reserved for celebrities. The impact was astonishing.
Niall Murphy
Yes. That really was eye opening. We’ve all grown used to seeing faces no bigger than our thumbs on mobile screens. And there they were, ordinary people being celebrated for the extraordinary work like hero;s. Work like this challenges the way we see the world. Bash let’s start with you telling us what you’re working on right now.
Bash Khan
Thank you very much, for that introduction. You just touched upon on the Edge project, which was well, I really exploration of looking at, you know, the value of people and the value of who actually makes our society run. And, of course, this is very much on the, kind of, the backdrop to the conversation coming from our political classes, you know, who are questioning the value of people in our communities, the value of arts, the value of teachers, the value of nurses. So, really, I think it was a real response to that narrative that was going around about the working class, people from migrant communities. And as I said, these are the people who actually make our societies run.
Absolutely. But, of course, the second thing that I was also looking at was how the places where the key workers were staying in were literally on the edge of Glasgow’s boundary. Mhmm. Now my experience goes back 20 odd years, and I first started working in the Red Road Flats, up in Springburn.
Niall Murphy
Yes.
Bash Khan
Working with Street Level Photo Works. We were exploring the the new communities that were coming in, from, you know, all different parts of the world and being housed in these high rise flats. And even at that stage, it struck me about the extreme extreme lack of facilities, everyday facilities that people require to, you know, live, you know, what you consider to be, you know, happy, comfortable lives. So the only shop that that a place all had is one shop, I believe, and one pharmacy.
Niall Murphy
Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s that Billy Connolly quote, deserts with windaes.
Bash Khan
Yeah. And I think since that time, that’s really been at the forefront of my kind of thinking about how places have they been designed for communities? Mhmm. You know, what what are the processes that have led to, you know, our built environment? There are so called consultations that happen, but in reality, how many of those suggestions that people ask for, how many of them were actually implemented, into planning, for healthy, vibrant communities.
And, yeah, and going back from Springburn, you know, 20 odd years to even now working in in the Gorbals, which is Mhmm. How it has gone through, regenerations every 15, 20 years, I think.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. The Gorbals me as one of the most interesting parts of the cities precisely because of that.
Bash Khan
One of the participants I was working with last year, a lovely woman called Mary, and, you know, and her joke always was, she goes she goes, all these planners and set designers, they all got bored and said, you know what? Let’s tear down the garbles and start again. And and that’s how the community sees it. That’s how people see it on the ground that it’s been designed not for people in mind. Sure.
Niall Murphy
Okay. No. I can I can completely understand that? And, yeah, I mean, areas like the global sample happened to Springburn are hugely frustrating. And particularly when you look at the city now, you think you just can’t afford to, like, constantly be demolishing, starting again.
It’s such a waste of resources, but it’s also what it does to the community at the same time, that kind of fracturing of the community, the kind of loss of all of the kind of the the the places where them they they associate memories with. Things like that to me, that’s that’s one of the tragedies of Glasgow, that people lose kind of once you obliterate things like that, they people kind of it it’s it’s, you know, I think it’s one of the issues that causes the Glasgow effect. And I’m kind of with Sir Harry Burns on that. I think that’s a that’s a major issue for me.
Bash Khan
Mhmm. Yeah.
Fay Young: Yeah. Could I ask you both what you what you think makes a good public place? What what helps people to feel like they belong and to to have the confidence to make friends, actually, you know, to feel part of a community?
Bash Khan
Yeah. I think I’ve got one suggestion. I was like, benches.
Fay Young
Somewhere to sit.
Bash Khan
Somewhere to sit. Somewhere to take a a moment. Somewhere just to be present in a place rather than just passing through it. You know? And I think if you look at you know, we’ve all been to different places around the world, and we’ve seen some amazing parks and where the seating has been designed in very specific ways where it kind of encourages, you know maybe you may have a chance with a conversation to the person next to you or you might play chess or backgammon out in the park, you know, that, you know, that I’ve seen in other places.
You have to create those spaces and those, yeah, those benches and seats. And if you think about it, whenever you walk in certain community areas, how often do you find a place to sit?
Fay Young
Yeah. Yes. In fact, sometimes they’ve taken the seats away. You know, I’d I lived in Edinburgh for a long time and they actually removed a bench because they felt it was encouraging, the wrong kind of people to sit there.
Niall Murphy
That’s so so depressing. I remember at the Glasgow and, obviously, this has been subject of huge debate, the concert hall steps. Ah, yeah. This is when this was first mooted getting rid of the steps back in 2006. And there’s a police representative, and this was, you know, pre Scottish police, or Police Scotland.
And the police representative I always got quite well with suddenly said, no. You don’t want that space. People loiter there, and they eat sandwiches there. And you’re like, my goodness. A crime.
And everybody else was, no. No. No. That’s a good thing. Like, that means you’re encouraging socialisation.
And there was a the police’s attitude was, no. It’s all now to us. You don’t want them. And it was like, but the but they used used for graduation ceremonies and take people taking photographs. What’s wrong with It was it was completely different ethos.
And, yeah, you have you have to create those spaces around the city where you can get spontaneity and, you know, people interacting with each other. That’s what makes a city fun and makes you wanna live in it.
Bash Khan
You know, on on that note, just to connect connect it up, on one of my projects, I actually took a red bench for a walk around the east end of Glasgow.
Fay Young
Oh, wow.
Bash Khan
So that’s, you know and as as part of the two processes, one is, of course, is the bench itself. The second process is the camera. And the camera then, I encourage people to sit sit on the bench and talk about this idea, about the lack of public spaces and setting. So then those those two kind of those two things at play create the image at the end. And, you know, and that created a whole range.
And one, you know, over a few weekends, that created a whole range of conversations. Allowed me to meet all the different business owners. I met to meet some people who live in that in that area. And that only happens at the city within maybe 4 or 5 hours.
Niall Murphy
Yes.
Bash Khan
And how much connectivity you can actually get within that short space time is remarkable. But if you create the the space for it, the sculpture or the environment for that Yeah. And I think this is something that we still haven’t really done in in communities, because you have to instigate these things. You have to create interventions, I think, which, you know, used to happen through fiestas, for example. Yeah?
People would decide, okay. I can get I can get involved now in this. Okay? Yeah. Of course, Christmas does at at times.
You know, people, okay. I can get involved in this now. I can sing in a choir in a public space.
Fay Young
Yeah. And what you’re describing doesn’t take a huge amount of money, does it? I mean, you can you can create a welcoming environment by putting a bench down as you’re describing, but also just those gentle interventions that require some human skills, I guess, and an open mindedness.
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Fay Young
Bash, you do seem to have a natural talent for bringing people together, and and perhaps as you’ve described and and Niall has been saying an interest in people who live on the edge. Is that right? And how did you become a filmmaker? What brought you into this?
Bash Khan
The idea of representation has always been very interesting for me. As someone coming from, a diverse background, growing up in Scotland, it’s something you become very aware of growing up as a, you know, as a young child, even in your in your professional life, about the lack of representation of people of color, people from diverse backgrounds. But also for me, that also goes into the said even into the working class which, you know, really covers a whole range of people. That really does cover everyone. So that thing’s always been very important for me.
The I did reps how to represent, people that may not be given the that I feel that they should have in society. And and, yeah, and fair, you were alluding to how that kinda came to be, about seeing the value in others. My kind of journey in this started in a very different way. I was I was on the road to become a mechanical engineer, an extremely bored mechanical engineer, if if I if I had gone gone through with it. So I’ve kind of got a course in my kind of, education and where I was gonna go next.
And and interesting enough, I studied two things at that time. I did a part time course in psychology for six months, and then I did a part time course in photography. And I was gonna I was gonna choose between the two. And then the summer before I was gonna start the course, I had the chance to go to to France for the World Cup. France 98.
Is that right?
Niall Murphy
Yes.
Bash Khan
Oh my god. That’s so Yep. Yep.
Fay Young
Okay. Oh, no.
Bash Khan
So anyway, going to France, I actually borrowed my one of my, you know, best friends from school. I borrowed his camera to say, like, I wanna go and try taking some photos and photographs. It was the first time I’d kinda gone with that kind of process in the mind that I want to, yeah, just document this time, this moment. What that was, I wasn’t aware of what what was what was going to be. And then the excitement of having the camera and having, you know, being in Paris on, I believe, the first day or the second day, we were going out to the, the main square to watch the match.
And so we took the metro and lo and behold, by the time we turned up to the square, the camera was gone. No. I had left it on the train, in some in some process. I don’t know if I left it or it was taken for me. I’m not sure.
Niall Murphy
Easy done. Yeah, especially in Paris.
Bash Khan
So the the dreams of documenting all this kind of, can evap evaporated. But then a week later, we were camping in Leon, for sorry. We were in a week later for the next round, of the following the Tartan army round. And on the night after the game, on the way back to the campsite, I found another camera lying around.
Niall Murphy
How how how handy?
Bash Khan
You know. This was a well, my friend’s was quite a nice expensive kind of proper thing with the lens and everything. This is a plastic thing, and it was a kind of a point and shoot, but no one no one claimed it. So then I had this camera for the last seven days of of the journey. And then I suppose the pivotal moment became one night I end up actually kind of, somehow being completely losing my friends one night.
It’s just the crowds were just so huge. So I ended up this one one evening in Paris, just myself and the camera walking around. And because of the camera, I managed to connect. And this is important as well. If I was with my friends, this would not happen.
Being on your own, I had to connect with someone again and say, how do I make that kind of connection? And for me, the camera became this really kind of universal language. So I didn’t have to speak that person’s language, but putting the camera and making a suggestion with your head saying, like, saying, can I take a picture? Everyone everyone understood that language. Yes.
And it was through that process. You know, I still remember that night very clearly. I know I met Mhmm. People from from Chile, from Morocco, from Argentina, from Senegal, Iran. You know, it was just a huge night.
Niall Murphy
God, that’d be such a such an amazing experience.
Bash Khan
And then I realized at that moment that actually the camera was a tool to connect. The act of making an image or even the act of asking someone for the image was maybe an act of saying, I recognize you. I feel that you are worth representing.
So I think those things at that point became quite a powerful powerful thing for me. And when I came back from Paris, I started doing photography, and photography then became that was my first love. Mhmm.
Niall Murphy
So what was it like coming back home then?
Bash Khan
I think that that was a a new journey then, taking a start on something new. You know, being involved in the in the arts was something I’d never ever considered. It was wasn’t something that, you know, culturally growing up that you think might be a feasible career option. You do wonder, but that even that case as well of representation and and even now, we are still we are still getting there, but we haven’t, you know, rectified those issues. So going back 20 odd years, if you can imagine the landscape was even different back then where the lack of representation was very, very low.
So it’s about finding that space for yourself and finding that, yeah, space and avenue where your work connects, where your work can fit in.
Fay Young
And you’ve branched out considerably with your work, working not just in Scotland. You’ve worked across the world, haven’t you, as far, from Spain to to Pakistan. Are you seeing I mean, the the stories you tell, the stories you record, and they’re available for people to see on your website, very interesting website. Are there common themes that you you find, you know, when when people are telling their stories about maybe often disrupted lives?
Bash Khan
If you touch upon the the documentary that I made in Pakistan, and I said it’s always a bit challenging. It’s all about challenging perceptions. I think this is always a key, the key theme that runs through a lot of my work. Now that was made just about, oh, maybe about over 10 years ago. Now when I and this is how the the media and even now, we have got huge question marks, and people are now beginning to realize, you know, the impact that the media has on swaying and forming and sculpting public opinion is powerful.
It’s hugely powerful. So myself as, you know, first generation, Scotch Pakistani, you know, I have connections to Pakistan. I’ve got cousins there. I’ve been over, you know, many times. I know the place well.
And even when when I was going to go across and said to him, I’m gonna go across. I’m gonna be there for two months and I want to work on something. I want to explore. And I said the camera gives you that excuse to do this. So this is why I became very conscious that, you know, the camera is powerful and I need to to use it to tell stories.
So I was kind of thinking what what should I focus on? What are the themes that I should focus on if I’m going to go to Pakistan to make a documentary? Now the first things that came to my head when I was making some notes and ideas was terrorism, poverty, environmental issues, human rights. Everything I initially thought of was ideas that had been kind of almost been shaped in my head by what I’ve what I’ve been exposed to by the media over the last ten years prior to that.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. There’s not not a lot of joy there.
Bash Khan
No. And if that’s someone like myself who knows the place, who comes from Pakistani heritage, those are some of my thoughts about that place. How is someone else going to react to that place if they’ve got no exposure to it whatsoever? So at that point, I became you know, I had to kinda slap myself in the head and said, right, why are you having these thoughts first? Because there’s much more to a place than what these things, you know, are laid out by by the the mainstream media.
So I kinda went with a very different approach to say, well, I the idea I said, how do I represent people honestly? Do I go with my take on it of what should talk about? So should I go and force them to talk about terrorism and poverty or whatever? Or would the act of representation actually be to ask them what’s important to them? Yeah.
I see. So in that case, they set the agenda of what they wanna talk about.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Yeah. So voices that are important in this.
Bash Khan
Yeah. So if if they wanna talk about something that’s heavy and intense, then fair enough. That’s absolutely fine. But if something else that they wanna talk about, then let’s try to kind of follow, follow that process. And so again, I used it over a process called of serendipity where I allowed kind of one main character who was a taxi driver who’d written his book about his experiences of working in a taxi, and he has some lovely kind of thoughts and ideas which also reflected some of my approach about finding the other side of the story.
Mhmm. So one person led me on to another person about who I should speak to next, and they said, well, we should go and speak to this person. This is gonna be quite interesting. So I kinda allowed that process to kind of connect the dots, and, yeah, just turn into a very kind of, I call it, vignettes of different different lives, and different short stories at play.
Fay Young
It sounds fascinating. You can see it being a great documentary. And you could do the same in Glasgow, of course.
Niall Murphy
Certainly, you could.
Bash Khan
This is the thing where, you know, I don’t even a lot of my, you know, part of my process involves media education as well. And Mhmm. And one of the key things that that I look at, especially with lots of young people, to say we can’t just be consumers of stories. Okay? And I’ve become quite conscious now so that after COVID, how much stuff we consumed and how much more films can you consume.
But also getting young people to think about not just being consumers, but creators of stories as well because you’ve got the tool in your hand. It’s such a powerful tool at the moment. And of course, young people are doing that through TikTok and Instagram, finding all these different, models. And I think we are telling more stories than ever before. There’s no doubt about that.
Niall Murphy
True. But then there’s some of the formats of things I’ve I’ve ended up being quite divisive, which I think is really weird. And, you know, I thought I thought things like Twitter would be great for, like, finding out about aspects of the world. And, yeah, some of it ends up in the sewer all the time, and you’re like, it’s quite depressing because it doesn’t have to be like that. You have a choice.
Yeah. You know? You don’t have to be that way.
Bash Khan
In a couple of my films and actually, I also in terms of some of my style of because of my own personal work, has been quite slow, you know. I working in in in the media sector, everyone’s like, can you make it quick? Can we make it short? Can we make it one minute? Can we make it small, wee and twee and quick?
And I was like, of course, we can do that. But I said, if a person’s interested, they’ll watch that thing. Yeah. I know I know you are, you know, jostling for people’s time and attention, But I think there has to be space for something that’s slow and considered at times.
Niall Murphy
Absolutely. I mean, it’s like it’s like with reading, you know, and people’s attention spans has gotten much shorter because of what the media has done and the mechanisms that we’re using to convey things. Whereas the pleasure of being able to read something, that’s that seems to have been lost to a degree to to to a degree now. Mhmm. Yep.
Fay Young
And it brings us back to what Niall was describing at the beginning of of how you turned people into well, well, actually, and, instead of being tiny figures on a on a TikTok screen or whatever, you see these magnificent large scale images that you were projecting. That’s a really interesting turnaround. And I suppose going back to what you were saying about slowing things down, You have to take more time to look at a bigger image and
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Fay Young
In in around you in this space. How do do you want to tell us a bit more about how you created that and set it up and how it was received as well?
Bash Khan
Do you remember at the start when I said I was gonna choose between two2 things, and it was going to be either psychology or photography? What was really interesting was over, you know, over, you know, over my my practice, so far. Of course, a lot of psychology has come out from the, you know, the the visual, medium. There’s a lot of psychology involved in how how we see ourselves, how we read stories, how we feel about things, And one of my earliest projections so as part of my process, I started looking at the using video projections as the outside gallery. Okay.
Looking at ways of using the public realm to tell stories that took place in those environments. So if the story is about the high rise flats and Gorbals in Norfolk Court, then that story should be told outside Norfolk Court rather than Yeah. Another location in the centre of town or somewhere else.
Niall Murphy
Yes.
Bash Khan
So connecting, you know, the story to place is really important. So some of these early projections that I kind of did in these environments involves two things. One is video portraits. So the way I take the images is they are taken in the style of a traditional photographic portrait, but they’re done in video. Now when I ask people to do this, I said, listen.
All I’m gonna do is I’m gonna record you for about a minute, minute 30. Sometimes it’ll be 2 minutes max. And all I need you to do is just to just to be present. That’s all. Just to be present.
And what that process allows is everyone starts off being maybe a little bit tense or putting on their photographic face. But after 15 or 20 seconds, that breaks. And what I can feel is a real humanity comes out. And I described it as living, breathing portrait. So you see the person breathing, smiling, blinking.
And eventually, I said they they reveal something about themselves. And for me, it’s humanity. It’s beauty in that element. And when I asked someone at this point, I said, how does that feel to be part of that process, you know, to be photographed in that way? And I said, you know what?
Actually, it was the first time where I didn’t have to think about anything. Mhmm. I was just I was just being present. I was just here for 2 minutes in this experience. So even that act, when people are getting photographed, there’s something there that comes through.
But, again, slowing things down, it’s not quite a photograph that happens in 5 seconds, especially we we are here. But also the psychology as when I’m looking at your eye Mhmm. When I look at your eye for a few seconds or for 5 seconds or 20 seconds or 30 seconds, the longer I look at that connection, because as I said your eyes are alive Mhmm. You build those connections. You build that empathy with Yeah.
Niall Murphy: Yeah.
Bash Khan
So that is the experience that the the audience gets, or I hope the audience gets by looking at this work. The second thing was a mother came came round, and she said, oh, my daughter got involved in this project. I heard her photographs are gonna get projected onto this, big screen. Can you can you tell me hurry up and tell me when it’s gonna happen? I have to go soon, you know.
Can you come on? I have to go soon. And I think this would be about it’d be half 5 at night. And I said, look, we’re gonna be ready in, yeah, 15, 20 minutes, and we’ll be right, you know. We will get started.
And of course, when I’m presenting this kind of work, I do look at the audience. I’m always interested to see how an audience is engaging with the work, you know, if it’s making the connections, if they’re, you know and I looked around, and this time it was about 6:45, and an hour later, the woman was still there looking at her daughter on on on the screen. And and this is where and I said, you realise these things by doing these things, by testing these things. And at that moment, I thought, wow. I said she’s never seen her daughter at that scale before, you know, at that size before.
She’s larger than life. And, of course, when you’re that large, you’re seeing someone. I think you’re important enough to be that scale. Mhmm. So I think at that moment, I’ve realised that there’s a real interest in psychology within this play as well.
And I think in Scotland, we need that anyway. I think we need to be a bit more confident about ourselves as a nation. So I think all these things are kind of designed to, you know, yeah, see if we can make those small changes. Mhmm.
Fay Young
Yeah. That’s that’s really that’s very touching, actually. And the relationship that that, comes about. Yeah.
Bash Khan
And of course, yeah, you know, so this is then being replicated with On the Edge. The 4 areas we worked on for On the Edge project, was, Dumbarton, Milton, Easterhouse , and Castlemilk . And again, literally, I said four areas right on Glasgow’s, boundary. And again and I think this is where the the idea of looking at the public realm came into play after COVID. So following on from conversation about lack of benches but also the lack of gathering spaces in our communities.
I was conscious of it before COVID, but I think after COVID, it became a huge, huge thing to say, well, where can we gather outdoors safely? Yeah. It’s okay. So you can’t be okay. But, you know, surely there could have been ways that we could have rectified that and encouraged people to be outdoors and still not feel so alone, so isolated.
So on the Edge Project, worked kind of with local communities, worked with local, community organisations to identify locations which in themselves were meant to be a conversation about, well, can this place be used for something else? Can this place be utilised for the community’s usage? So all the four sites that we we saw were kind of semi derelict kind of places, places that have been kinda shut down, but also fantastic open green spaces, which, you know, are not used for anything at all. So it’s also about reactivating and thinking about those places and how you know, I I think we’ve got huge issue around accessing our public spaces, you know. How much you know, without having to go through lots of kind of red tape and jumping through lots of hoops.
But how can we get small allotments out there? How can we get benches and seating areas that are covered? You know, we have to work with the weather, but Mhmm. There’s ways to do that. So, yeah, it’s just really looking at when we’re designing these places, when we’re looking at building new houses in the Gorbals and we had a chance, I feel, in the Gorbals as an example, to look at examples from around the world where you create hubs right in the heart of all these houses.
Because even now with all the beautiful houses being made, I’m looking at where are the coffee shops? Where are the the the kind of the small kind of drop in commute community centers? Where are the decent parks?
Niall Murphy
Yeah.
Bash Khan
They’re right there. Yep. So, yeah, I think there’s still issues around that that need to be looked at. Mhmm.
Niall Murphy
That’s it has has been a failing. I mean, you’ve got Crown Street as as the retail hub for, the Gorbals. But the problem is when you begin to look at places like Goebbels Plus, it just doesn’t work. It’s you know, there there is no proper active frontage onto it. You know, the north side is is the back of the the the the supermarket.
And then on the south side, you’ve got the health centre and then the new Gorbal Housing Association offices. But neither of them are genuinely active because they can’t be active because those are you know, you have to have private conversations and things in those particular buildings, and they’re they’re they’re, you know, they’re business conversations. They’re not designed to connect into the public realm. You know, what it needs is a cafe. What it needs is proper cover.
What it needs is interesting shops. And it needs, as you’ve said, kind of benches or seating that people can spill out onto and actually have a conversation about.
Bash Khan
Nialll, have you seen have you been have you been inside the the health center?
Niall Murphy
Not the health centre, but I have been in New Gorbal Housing Association’s offices, which are lovely offices. They’re just they’re not, you know, they don’t engage with that space. So what’s the what’s the health center like inside?
Bash Khan:
Well, if you get a chance to go inside, I also created some of these about over 200 portraits of, the local community.
Niall Murphy
Right.
Bash Khan
So you’ll find you’ll actually find those, video portraits inside the health centre. Mhmm. And that, again, that was done as a project to allow people from the area themselves Mhmm. Mhmm. To see themselves reflected in the places that in their communities.
Niall Murphy
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. The NHS, they have a really good program of doing things like that, which is really exciting and innovative. So I’ve been involved in some of those before in East Pollock Shields.
Bash Khan
Yeah. And, of course, when we were working in the Gorbal’s, we invited people following the Gorbal’s to say, like, well, me and Garbal’s, Plaza, The Gorbal’s Piazza. And then they’re like, where’s that?
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Good luck.
Fay Young
That’s a way.
Niall Murphy
It’s interesting, isn’t it? It’s it’s more of a kind of pedestrian corridor with a bit of car parking thrown in. It’s not a genuine public space. It just doesn’t work. And it’s it’s funny because there’s a lot lot of talent involved in it, and they just didn’t get what public space was.
Fay Young
Yeah. Well, I was just wondering, who makes the decisions about, you know, planning the the public space? Is is it a planning issue? Is it the consultations that you referred to Bas? I’ve been involved in consultations and you know, what happens to them?
What happens to the the people’s thoughts that are gathered? I I wonder where they end up. But, yeah, Niall, do you is is it a planning issue?
Niall Murphy
I I suspect so. I think probably because it was too detached from people. I mean, I don’t I don’t actually know the background to how the space came about, but it does feel awfully disconnected. I’ve been involved in I helped set up a charrette in East Pollock Shields. This is back in 2016.
And the whole the whole thrust of that was it had to be people from the neighbourhood who were leading on it, and it had to be a grassroots initiative. And even as the person who helped set up, it was myself and the chair of the local community council. We stepped out of it because we wanted, you know, we’d had our say. We’d set the thing up. But we wanted local people to come forward and to actually lead in it and get their say because otherwise, I’d be sitting going, no.
You got that wrong and you got this wrong. And and that wasn’t the right thing to do. I had I had to it’s like, you know, letting your child loose into the the world. You have to let them learn to make their own mistakes and kind of they have to have genuine ownership and authorship of something.
Fay Young
Uh-huh.
Niall Murphy
So I think that’s kinda key.
Fay Young
Yeah. And that ownership is something you’re really interested in, isn’t it, Bash?
Bash Khan
Yeah. I think, you know, I I always look at culture in a very interesting way where culture and heritage, of course, are really important for communities, really important for society. But I also wonder, for example, culture and heritage is also evolving as well. And if you allow people those spaces to create so for example, in Govanhill , Govanhill has created some new cultural events over the last, 5, 10 years with the festivals and such like. Yes.
Those things weren’t always there. Those things were created because people were almost given a bit of, authority, given a bit of respect, given a bit of, money probably. It always helps. Right. Yeah.
But you need to invest in people that really, you know if you design it from the community, if anyone else who comes in parachutes in, that never ever works.
Niall Murphy
And no. Never works. It’s gotta be grassroots.
Bash Khan
It’s always got to be connected to grassroots, but also to recognize that there are skills within that community. Uh-huh. Because I think sometimes what happens is people expect people to do that for free as well. Yeah. And I also think that’s slightly unfair.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. It is.
Bash Khan
If if the planners are getting paid, if the designers are getting paid, if the architects are getting paid, if the builders are getting paid, then someone who is qualified should be, you know and I said that puts word of value again down.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. It does.
Bash Khan
Value value those people’s time and expertise, but and also value that something good might come out of it. Yeah. Yeah. And I’ve been involved luckily in a whole and this is one of the beautiful things about being involved in film. You get to get involved in a whole range of different kind of sectors and, you know, exposure to different, things.
I’ve been involved with, architecture and design there for the last 5 years. I worked in the Scotland and Venice project, for on 2 occasions. I’ve worked in various Charettes in the past as well, Niall, you know, being around, gathering people’s thoughts. So I’ve I’ve seen that combination of people’s thoughts being gathered. Yeah.
And to tell you the truth, have I have I really seen a visible visual outcome of those and all that time, I would have to honestly, I’d I’d struggle to and maybe something small was done, small or twee. Gosh. But honestly and and do you know what? Sometimes to build something like, even a really nice, beautiful, I don’t know, garden office cost £20K. Right?
Mhmm. Okay. Now I’m not a mathematician or someone who’s doing budgets, but when people are spending 2, 3,000,000 plus, if not 5,000,000, 10,000,000 on building projects. If someone said told me there’s not enough 20,000, 50,000 to actually build something, then I I would I would question that.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Yeah. I I find the whole process quite frustrating. I mean, we that was the first, community led Charette in Glasgow that we did in in East Pollockshields But see, getting even though we got funding from, the council and we got funding from the Scottish government.
We could not get the planners to adopt it.
Bash Khan
Oh.
Niall Murphy
And that that it was it was really we were in this weird position that there were a lot of brownfield sites, just to the east of East Pollokshields. And all the developers were talking to us about what we’re trying to do. We’re kind of buying into what we’re trying to do. Couldn’t get the planners to to to buy into it. And I think that was that was in kind of the early days of kind of mainstreaming of charrettes.
And I think they were just frightened that was by the loss of control. And, and we were trying to say, no. This is about empowering communities and
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Niall Murphy
You know, getting communities to buy into this kind of stuff and shape their own vision for their own place. But, yeah, it’s it’s it’s it was it was a diff it was a change of mindset. And being able to step away from control over that, I think, is very difficult for some people.
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Fay Young
Yes. We haven’t got there yet, have we? We could learn a lot from, Paris and the participative budgeting that they do. Yes. We have I know, Edinburgh has the Leith chooses and things like that, but there’s such tiny sums of money and people have to compete with one another.
You know, groups doing really terrific work have to compete with another group doing terrific work and, I think the the Paris scheme encourages collaboration and, so people put in joint bids and they get serious money. But it encourages a really, well informed grassroots shaping of the city.
Niall Murphy
Absolutely. Yep. It’s a it’s a great idea. It’s a really good idea.
Bash Khan
I mean,
Niall Murphy
There was a bit of participatory above budgeting, and I don’t know whether that’s continued or not because I stepped away from the community council. But we did and we did kind of this must have been back in 2017, 2018. And there was supposed to be a £1,000,000 per ward to kind of work with.
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Niall Murphy
And, and it was interesting to see the proposals people came forward for for that. Uh-huh.
Bash Khan
But it
Niall Murphy
was again, there was this process. You all had to bid against each other rather than
Fay Young
be collaborative,
Niall Murphy
which is Yes. A bit frustrating.
Fay Young
Uh-huh. So, Bash was saying about the Gorbal’s cinema, project that you’re working on. That sounds
Niall Murphy
Really exciting.
Fay Young
A good one.
Bash Khan
I suppose I’m trying to kind of now think about, you know, this conversation that we’ve had about, kind of, communities feeling confident, you know, to have a voice or to feel that their voice is going to be listened to. I would say maybe that’s one of the pressing potential thoughts going through many people at the moment, you know, in our kind of current political climate, that, you know, are we being listened to? I suppose this idea of being listened to or the idea of stories has always been important to me as well. And one of the saddest things that I suppose I could have discovered during, you know, the time of working in the Gorbals was 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. You know, at one point within within maybe about 7 or 8 blocks, there was about 9 or 10 cinemas in the Gorbals.
You know, right in the heart of all of with some fantastic kind of names, you know.
Niall Murphy
It’s amazing.
Bash Khan
Wellington Palace, the Colosseum Theatre, the Empress Empress Picture Hall, the Hippodrome Cyn Hippodrome Cinema, the the Paragon and the Crown Picture House, Bedford Cinema, and Eglinton Electrium.
Niall Murphy
But Bedford, of course, is is that’s go to ABC now, isn’t it? The Bedford?
Fay Young
Yeah. Yes. Yeah.
Bash Khan
And I think that’s the last that’s the last one. And even some of the other cinemas, I was trying to do some research around what these cinemas actually look like. And there are some images, not that many. But do you know what? They were they were beautiful buildings.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. They were really
Bash Khan
beautiful buildings, the design. And, of course, as also the place for, again, where people could gather in the Gorbals It was key to that.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Oh, absolutely.
Bash Khan
It was key to the community and the cohesion. It was a great moneymaker. I did well financially for for a for
Niall Murphy
a while. There were warm spaces. Yeah. You know, if that mattered.
Bash Khan
You know, for me, it was really quite sad in that actually the place for stories because this place really inspire, yeah? Films inspire people, inspire young people, inspire communities. A place of storytelling, a place to inspire was taken away from the Gorbals completely.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Yes.
Bash Khan
A place where narratives could have, you know, could have been built, you know, a place where new ideas could have been developed. They were all taken away.
Niall Murphy
Yeah.
Bash Khan
And what did they replace them with?
Niall Murphy
Nothing.
Bash Khan
Nothing really.
Niall Murphy
Yep. And it’s desperately depressing. Yeah. When you look at Norfolk and Stirlingfauld Court and those huge slabs, there was just there was nothing there other than filing cabinets for people. That’s it.
You know? And it’s quite depressing. It was like the all the spaces in between, nobody thought about. And Mhmm. Just, you know, other other amenities actually to have a proper, you know, multilayered functioning community just weren’t there.
And I find that really odd.
Bash Khan
Yep.
Fay Young
Really is, isn’t it?
Bash Khan
And if you look at what what happened, you know, to the Gorbals over the last 50, 60 kind of years, you know, and the kind of the misrepresentation of the area I got, you know, about what the people in place started to represent. I always kind of feel that actually it wasn’t by choice. This was by design. Mhmm. You can build something and, you know, create something in a place, but if you take something away from a place, you’re also designing another kind of narrative.
And this is, of course, not being a very, very positive narrative. Yeah. And even now, it’s one of my kind of, you know, it’s kind of one of my dreams that a place, you know, like, you know I quite like I don’t know why, but I like the the Empress Picture House. You know, it’s a good name. But, you know, a place like that, if think about the heritage of the Gorbals and this is the place where the first talkie film was screened in in Glasgow and most likely in Scotland as well.
Right. There’s heritage there. Mhmm. But we’ve totally kind of let it go in it, You know? And it’d be amazing in some kind of way.
And this is kind of the conversation that we’ve had about how do we bring those places back, you know, those designs of those beautiful buildings back. They’ve now physically gone. But is there a thought there? Is there a process there of, you know, bringing them back in a different format through the digital mapping and projections again?
Fay Young
Mhmm. So is that what you’re working on?
Bash Khan
That’s one of the ideas now that’s kind of being developed since, since the the residency that we had last year. I think I’m much more interested also about how we can have conversations about creating those places with stories again Yeah. In the Gorbals. Yes. You know, and what that place is.
And, you know, local cinemas and projections, whatever format that takes. But again, as you said, it has to come from the community. It has to come from, grassroots. But sometimes you have to also kind of make a case for it as well.
Fay Young
Uh-huh. Uh-huh.
Bash Khan
Yes. Yeah.
Fay Young
Sow some seeds. Yeah. Scatter your seeds on the ground and see what actually sprouts. Yeah.
Bash Khan
Yeah.
Niall Murphy
Awesome. Yeah.
Bash Khan
There’s a really interesting and a remarkable number of people. And I think there’s some sort of, who can either migrated to Australia, Canada, whatever, but there’s a lot of people that still connect back and look for information from the Gorbals Yeah. From abroad. A lot of stuff that kinda comes up, with through the Gorbals, even the Oscar Marzaroli collection of those beautiful photographs that he he took. It draws a huge number of of people and audience to that thing.
And I kinda feel like these people have moved away from the Gorbals, back in the sixties.
Fay Young
Yeah.
Bash Khan
So there’s an audience there, I feel. The Gorbals has got a huge audience. So we need to kinda tap into it and yeah.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. The so, like, Glasgow’s diaspora and, yeah, definitely from from various neighborhoods within Glasgow. Yeah. Very much. But, it’s very interesting.
And I think, you know, I mean, again, with going back to touch on the Glasgow effect, I think that kind of shattering, that did have an impact on the city, and it’s like it because it kinda tells you, you know, your city’s finished. Yeah. You know, because we just wanna bulldoze it.
Fay Young
Yeah. Bulldoze it.
Bash Khan
But but so if I’m just touch upon it, but that you know, exactly so that Glasgow effect that, you know Yeah. That you mentioned. This is what I’ve I’ve been looking at where I can ask people about stories really shape who you end up becoming or thinking who you are as a community, a society, a country, whatever. And I always give us example example to someone to say, you know, what are your thoughts or ideas about Paris? So it’s a question it’s a question to both of you.
What are what are the first ideas that come up when when I mentioned Paris to you?
Niall Murphy
Just kind of a a a fantastic city, but a city that definitely knows its value. So
Bash Khan
Yeah. Yeah.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Just a Yeah. But rich. Rich. Yeah. Yeah. Romance, definitely. It’s a total pleasure to walk around.
Bash Khan
We have romanticism. We have architecture. We have culture. We have arts. We have good food.
You know, we have walking in the rain, you know. Even that becomes Yes. More sexier in Paris compared to walking in the rain
Niall Murphy
and Very very true. Haven’t done it but
Fay Young
I love Paris. We’ve got friends and go and stay with them and we get to stay in the sort of grittier bits of of Paris. But there is that, wonderful mix of sort of arrogance and and confidence, you know.
Bash Khan
And that’s my point exactly because even if it is you’re right. Once you go outside the centre of Paris, it’s some of the possibly harshest areas and toughest areas you could stay in. But the narrative of Paris through story, through books, through songs has created this image. So when even when we go to Paris, we become cultural. We become romantic.
Niall Murphy
Is is there not a syndrome, with kind of Japanese tourists who arrive in Paris expecting it to be kind of the most beautiful and lovely city in the world, and then they get shocked when they actually meet genuine Parisians who are rude and kind of Yeah. In your face and they don’t know how to react to this when they go to the shop.
Fay Young
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Then they come to Glasgow and and you get somebody who takes you around the city if your lost. I know.
Niall Murphy
And it’s like, yeah. And just starts talking to you at random.
Fay Young
Yeah. Yeah.
Bash Khan
I think you’ve had I think nearly head there. If you think about it, there’s been a certain narrative that’s been created about Glasgow, certain areas of Glasgow, which for me are not always embedded in the complete reality of the truth.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Very much.
Bash Khan
So who’s creating those narratives for us?
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Yeah. Completely. Completely. Yes.
Bash Khan
Yeah. I recognise that thing completely. You said, oh, someone actually took me around and showed me what where I had to kinda yeah. I’ve had various friends saying that thing. So, you know, we asked someone for help, and they were so nice to to do that one.
Yes.
Niall Murphy
Yep. Yep. Yeah. It happens happens a lot. It’s what I love about Glasgow, that people are prepared to do that.
Fay Young
Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. So I was gonna ask we’ve got a couple of key questions that we ask on the podcast, and Niall I know Niall has got the one up his sleeve that will end the show. But the Yes.
The other one is, you know, how optimistic are you? The work that you do and the what we’ve talked about today does inevitably look at the the big challenges and the the depressing truths and realities that are around us, but there are also reasons to be cheerful. Do you find that in your work? I mean, can you give maybe 1 or 2 examples of reasons for hope?
Bash Khan
It’s a very good question. It’s a very tough question, because when we’re talking about optimism and, you know, especially in, the current situation that’s happening, you know, in Palestine and everything else, it’s really hard to think about that. You know, I think myself and and many other people have been really affected, I think, last few months with what’s going on. And I’ve actually worked with students from Gaza, through an on online project many years ago. So, you know, some very and the university that, of course, that they were working from no longer exists. It’s been completely obliterated.
Niall Murphy
That’s shocking.
Bash Khan
So when when you’re asking that question about optimism, it’s it’s very hard. And you really have to fight for it. You have to and I think that’s part of the fight as well, within the whole process. And and the reason why, I suppose, I always go back to this idea that we have to find places to connect because that’s the only place where you’ll find something real. Yeah.
Now, I said, through my process, you know, I get to meet amazing people. So On the Edge was nominated by people in the community. It wasn’t me choosing people. They were nominated by people from their own communities about things that people had done during during COVID and lockdown. And and some beautiful stories all around, you know, too many to talk about now, but one woman that I met, beautiful women.
She worked, in a care home, helping assisted I think assisted living. Is that right? Is that what it’s called? Yeah. Yes.
Yeah. Help people at the end stage of their life. And so I asked someone eventually, okay. Who’s this person? You know, what’s she done?
So one of the main reasons she wanted to nominate this woman was one of the women she cared for was turning a 100. So during COVID, she she got this beautiful big street party organised for her. Got papers down with sure everything was socially kinda destined and, you know, but made sure that that that moment wasn’t messed during COVID. Okay? And then that’s what the people told me.
So, of course, when I go and I meet people before we photograph them, I sit and talk to them for, you know, sometimes half an hour, an hour. An hour and a half is the longest we’ve had a chat. And then you realise that this woman and that was just one thing she’d she’d done for others during COVID. There was a whole range of things that she did, you know, beyond her job remit. Then during COVID, she actually lost her her her own son to suicide.
Now you’re sitting there and you’re talking away to her and the whole place has got photographs of her son on pillowcases and images and everything else, you know, And she’s got such courage. You’re speaking to this woman, and you’re just thinking. It goes, wow.
How would I put myself in her shoes? How would I and, honestly, the courage that women had kind of shown and the words that she’d kinda said just blew me away. I was like, wow, you know, and that was stuff that people not are not even really aware of that what underneath it all, what people are going through. Yeah. So when you’re seeing the optimism, then when you can grasp onto people like this and you realise that people go through huge challenges, and somehow they still manage to stand up and manage to rise up and still look out for others.
That’s the only bit of hope that I, you know, you know, that I see when I get to meet these kind of people. Yeah. So yeah.
Fay Young
Mhmm. Thank you. Yes.
Bash Khan
So there’s people like that, that’s you kind of think there’s still gotta be hope.
Fay Young
Yeah. Yeah. We need a moment after that, I think.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. That’s That’s that’s yeah. Profoundly sad. Okay. Shall I ask the final?
Fay Young
Release the question.
Niall Murphy
This is the this is the, yeah, the the loaded question, Bash. And we ask everybody this who comes on the podcast. And it is, what is your favourite building? Or I suppose if you wanted to, you could, have a public space in Glasgow. And what would it tell you if it’s walls could talk?
Bash Khan
My favourite building in Glasgow.
Niall Murphy
Yep. It doesn’t have to be a building, it could could could be a space.
Bash Khan
No. No. Actually, literally, no. No. two days ago, I I grew up around Kelvingrove Park.
And, actually, right now, I’m in, yeah, I’m in in the house that I grew up in, actually. I’m in here at the moment. Right. So and the other day, I was just driving past, and, of course, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum was beautifully lit up. And as I drove past, I kinda went, you know what?
It wasn’t a bad place to grow up, but you’ve got that right there, okay, on your doorstep. But as a kid growing up, actually, the bandstand for us was also an amazing new place because when we were growing up, the bandstand was, shut down. It was kinda derelict. So we managed to kind of, course, kinda sneak in and mess around. We didn’t we didn’t set fires or anything or damage anything, but we enjoyed that was our back garden, really, that whole that whole area.
Niall Murphy
That’s lovely.
Bash Khan
So, definitely, like, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum has got a special place, but, again and again, I love, there’s this beautiful big cafe in Kelvingrove Park next to next to the and as kids, we used to play there all the time. And at that time, there used to be toilets.
Niall Murphy
Yes. Yeah. I remember. Yeah.
Bash Khan
But even as a young kid, at that point, I would just say, do you know what? It’d be amazing if this wasn’t shut down toilets, but be something else. Yep. An Clachan the cafe.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. That’s the cafe.
Bash Khan
So, actually, that rebuilding itself, I really loved that little rebuilding going up because that’s literally our playground. So Kelvingrove Grove is is is special to me. So I would go with that one. Yeah.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Fantastic. Good good choice. You’re actually the first person to have chosen Kelvingrove in the podcast so far. So which is which is very interesting.
So we’ve had
Bash Khan
Well, I was gonna go between the people. The toilets the toilets are exactly like, I said, those and do you know do you know what? Maybe I should be in the toilets. I think maybe I should be in the toilets because that’s a perfect example of a place that’s been very used for people again.
Niall Murphy
Yeah. Definitely. Definitely. Because it was, yeah, it was derelict for years. And yeah.
Absolutely. It’s a really good idea.
Bash Khan
Mhmm. And, again, as well as defense, how do we make our parks more safe? Well, if you add more lights and add more food carts and food places
Fay Young
Yep.
Bash Khan
You know, parts become safer.
Fay Young
Yep. Yes. You know? Yes.
Niall Murphy
It has been an issue in Glasgow because I know I remember when peep people had previously talked about putting up cafes in various places, there had been resistance. But, yeah, to me, it makes sense because it means you can use those spaces after dark, and they’ve they’ve become safer because there are people around you.
Bash Khan
That’s it. Yeah. There we go. Kelvingrove. Alright.
At the moment, actually, Kelvingrove’s quite interesting because I’m trying to write up some stories from the time I’ve kind of grown up around here. You know, in the good old days in the eighties, grown up around Kelvingrove . Mhmm. So, yeah, it was good to come back.
Niall Murphy: Very good.
Fay Young: We look forward to that.
Niall Murphy
Well, it was an absolute pleasure talking to you, Bash. Well yeah. Look forward to hearing those.
Fay Young
Yes. Thank you.
Bash Khan
Well, thank you so much for in in for inviting me. And, yeah, I was hopeful to see you guys at some point. That was a pleasure. In due course. Okay?
Fay Young
Yes. At a good gathering place. Okay.
Niall Murphy
Yes. Very much. Okay. Thank you, Bash.
Fay Young
Thank you.
Niall Murphy
That’s much appreciated.
Katharine Neil
Glasgow City Heritage Trust is an independent charity and grant funder that promotes the understanding, appreciation, and conservation of Glasgow’s historic built environment. Do you want to know more? Have a look at our website at glasgowheritage.org.uk and follow us on social media at Glasgow Heritage. This podcast was produced by Inner Ear for Glasgow City Heritage Trust and is sponsored by Tunnock’s.