Piece of Work - Poetry at Bmag

About this event

Poetry and spoken word arrives at the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery in the form of Piece of Work: Birmingham's premiere poetry night, featuring acclaimed, world-renowned poets, as well as an open mic at one of Birmingham’s most beautiful and unique venues: the historic Tearoom at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery.Enjoy a pre-show museum wander through our Level 2 galleries and grab a drink before settling in to enjoy the show.Each Piece of Work will feature two headline acts: a ‘local legend’ poet based in the Midlands, alongside an ‘honorary Brummie’ for the evening, from anywhere in the world.Full programme: OctoberNational Poetry Day SpecialLocal Legend Zakariye ; Zakariye’s debut pamphlet, Pulling Faces, has been longlisted for the Jhalak Poetry Prize and was published by Bad Betty Press. In 2022 his short poetry film Cages was broadcast on BBC 4 and BBC iPlayer. In 2025 he turned the short film into a play, also titled Cages, which had a 3-show run at the Roundhouse. Honorary Brummie: Georgie Jones; a writer and performer known for her humour and heart. She was a Roundhouse Poetry Slam finalist, before joining the Roundhouse Poetry Collective and subsequently spent a year as Roundhouse Resident Artist. Special Guest to be announced soon. NovemberHonorary Brummie: Joelle Taylor, author of 4 collections of poetry. Her most recent collection C+NTO & Othered Poems won the 2021 T.S Eliot Prize, and the 2022 Polari Book Prize for LGBT authors.Local Legend: Liz Berry; award-winning poet whose collections include Black Country (Chatto, 2014); The Republic of Motherhood (Chatto, 2018); and The Home Child (Chatto, 2023), a novel in verse. Liz’s work, described as “a sooty soaring hymn to her native West Midlands” (Guardian), celebrates the landscape, history and dialect of the region.