4 Years in Dreamland

Geoffrey Chambers, Jas Dhillon, and Peter Nichols

10th October - 22nd October 2025

Between 2020 and 2024, as we waited for a promised building that never materialised, People Dem Collective was given an abandoned office in Dreamland. Harsh strip lighting above, tired blue carpet underfoot. What could have been a stopgap became our HQ, a place we transformed into a community space with studios and, in the process, planted the seed of our residency programme.

In that time, artists Geoffrey Chambers, Jas Dhillon, and Peter Nicholls worked alongside us. Their journeys have included commissions from PDC, self-initiated projects, and opportunities supported by other organisations. Not all the works in this exhibition were commissioned by us, but all were nurtured, in part, by the confidence, community, and sense of belonging that a Black and Brown-led space in Dreamland made possible.

The exhibition brings together photography, ceramics, mark-making, sound, installations, social practice, and research-driven work rooted in archives and histories. It shows how practice can take root and flourish when artists have access to space, care, and time, even in unlikely conditions.

4 Years in Dreamland is both a reflection of what was made in those years, and a wider reminder: nurturing artists requires more than short-term projects. It needs environments of trust, continuity, and care. For us, this connects directly to spatial justice, the fight for permanent premises where Black and Brown-led art and culture can thrive, rather than survive.