#4: “There is little evidence to suggest that stop and search provides an effective deterrent to offending”

About the Installation

The Know Your Rights installation covers the rear access shutters of both Whitechapel Gallery and Freedom Press and Bookshop.

During the project, we understood the potential for physical intervention in Angel Alley not as a final product but as either the delivery or rehearsal of essential services for the alley’s most vulnerable users. The Know Your Rights installation was designed after a series of meetings with the Angel Allies, a regular convening of Angel Alley stakeholders assembled by Luke Gregory-Jones and Siobhan Forshaw of Whitechapel Gallery which includes Freedom Press, Whitechapel Gallery, Cardboard Citizens, Providence Row, House of Annetta, and a variety of empathetic individuals and practitioners. These meetings also became the basis for the delivery of a now well-used water tap in the alley, improved lighting, and a revised landowner agreement on gate access with a view towards eventual access to Gunthorpe Street.

The Angel Allies also expressed a desire for an art installation that is informative, helpful and meaningful to Angel Alley’s vulnerable users. Concerns over police misconduct were ubiquitous amongst the Allies and we often experienced instances of this firsthand during our time in the alley. We witnessed these incidents acutely during Summer 2022, following the Home Office’s permanent removal of BUSS (Best Use of Stop and Search) restrictions on section 60 searches in May that year. BUSS is the name for guidance that was implemented by the UK government in 2014 to “create greater transparency, accountability and community involvement in the use of stop and search powers”^[1] and the use of stop and search powers under section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 as amended (sometimes known as a ‘no suspicion search’, ‘suspicion-less search’, ‘section 60 search’, or, within policing, as a ‘pre-condition search’) refers to a power that allows officers to search people without reasonable grounds and can be applied across entire boroughs^[2].

We sought to address these incidents by providing key information for victims of police misconduct in the alley, particularly vulnerable populations who, as we saw firsthand, were often unaware of their rights at the time of being stopped and searched or unclear on the premise under which the police were using these powers. As such, the Whitechapel Gallery shutter exhibits the GO WISELY acronym, an aide memoire used by both police officers and human rights activists for the information that is supposed to be given to a stop/search subject, whilst the Freedom Press shutter displays information from GOV.UK on ‘Police powers to stop and search’.

The aesthetic took cues from anarchist literature and activist flyering, particularly the ‘Know Your Rights’ campaigns of groups such as Hackney Cop Watch. The installation also used old Freedom Press newspapers from its archive to add a flypaper-like texture to various sections.

[1] Home Office, Best use of stop and search scheme, 26 August 2014: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/best-use-of-stop-and-search-scheme

[2] House of Commons 20 July 2022 Research Briefing on ‘Police Powers: Stop and Search’: https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN03878/SN03878.pdf

This pamphlet can be picked up for free at the Whitechapel Gallery, please contact publicprogrammes@whitechapelgallery.org to reserve your copy.