Cult to Culture at V&A East

Written By Ciaran O'Shea

A selection of images from the Cult to Culture Archive will be featured in back2back: Up Ya Archives x Rendezvous Projects at V&A East Museum on Saturday 16 May 2026.

The one-day artist-led takeover has been curated by Nia Archives through her creative platform Up Ya Archives, in collaboration with Rendezvous Projects.

The archive images form part of a wider presentation throughout the event, selected by Katherine Green at Rendezvous Projects as part of their contribution celebrating London’s role in the development of Jungle music and its evolution into both an art form and a global culture.

More information below:


See the full programme across V&A East Storehouse and V&A East Museum here: FULL PROGRAMME

Taking the Amen break as a connective thread, Up Ya Archives reimagines the archive as something living, collective and in motion. Co-curated with Rendezvous Projects, the programme explores how music travels across time and geography, and how histories are constructed, circulated and contested.

Through DJ sets, talks, workshops and screenings, this back2back will trace the past, present and future of jungle, foregrounding the hyper-local infrastructures of East London that have sustained the genre and its wider ecosystems, from pirate radio and record shops to visual culture and community-led archiving.

Developed in dialogue with The Music is Black: A British Story, this takeover moves through a constellation of sonic encounters beyond display, honouring originators while amplifying the voices shaping what comes next.

Part of The Music is Black Festival from East Bank.

Nia Archive

Ciaran O'Shea