The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2023 - Issue 33

Lisa Ogun’ was inspired to attend Certain Blacks’ 9th annual offering at Rich Mix Arts Centre in east London and catch John-Paul Zaccarini’s MixRace MixTapes performance. Heroes: The MixRace MixTapes bitetheatre T he Rich Mix arts centre is the ‘east of London’s home for culture and creativity’. As it’s a beloved personal venue of mine, having attended cultural themes no less than 30 times over the last twenty years, I can attest that this is true. I got invited to attend Certain Blacks’ 9th annual festival and found out John-Paul Zaccarini was billed as “a stand-up, hip-hop, spoken word journey of passion, hope and humour taking audienc- es on a lush, poetic journey through everyday racism, homophobia and classism.” He explores the political and emotional minefield of Intersectional- ity with poignancy in this highly personal and provocative perfor- mance. John-Paul Zaccarini is a Professor of Performing Arts at the Stockholm University of the Arts, an award-winning solo theatre artist and a poet. He is also a ‘dragademic’, working class, queer hip- hop, and drama clown queen of colour. “Homo-funky and spunky street, serving up south London shade and immigrant working class realness, he blends the ‘brains with the b*tch’ and the spectacular with the serious.” I was overwhelmed by curiosity to witness the artistic prowess, mainly as spoken word isn’t my standard go-to form of culture seeking. I was intrigued, to say the least. I was delighted to have accepted the invitation as what I experi- enced that night was no less than a fabulous urban powerhouse of lyrics, a mixture of stand-up, hip-hop and spoken word, alongside some captivating visuals. Despite it being several months ago, I’m still reflecting on the performance with specific affecting phrases, so poetically expressed, echoing through my mind repeatedly. I cer- tainly know why he was billed for a Heroes event.