Death Café

Join Ayesha Jones (exhibiting artist in What are the Odds? Ikon Creative Health at the Library of Birmingham) and Suzanne McArthur for a Death Café. Set against the backdrop of Ayesha’s film and photographic work exploring death, dying, and loss in Erdington’s South Asian community.

A Death Café is a place for tea, cake and open conversation around death and dying – a space to think about living well, until we die. There is no theme and no agenda, teas, cake and coffee provided. The Death Café is a place to increase awareness of death in order to help people make the most of their (finite) lives. This event is for discussion around death, dying, ageing and living well, rather than grief support or counselling.

This event is organised to coincide with Ikon’s exhibition What are the Odds? at the Library of Birmingham.

About the artist

Ayesha Jones is a West Midlands based artist working with photography and film. Her practice explores art as a catalyst for growth, healing and social impact. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, receiving recognition from Magnum Photos, Portrait of Britain (2022, 2023), and Decade of Change. Her major works include Motherland (Coventry UK City of Culture 2021), We Feed the UK (Multistory & Gaia Foundation, 2023-25), and The Backbone (2025), a photobook exploring female health and how the erasure of the female body- its knowledge, cycles and truths- create imbalance, both personally and collectively. The Backbone was featured by the BBC and exhibited at the Saatchi Gallery and The Royal Photographic Society (RPS).

About BrumYODO

BrumYODO is a Birmingham based Community Interest Company consisting of artists, undertakers, hospices, palliative care professionals amongst many more. BrumYODO operate with the belief that there is such a thing as a good death, and that it will only happen if it is demanded, and that demands can only be made if we are able to understand what we need to demand, and will only understand that if we talk about.

BrumYODO have organised the yearly A Matter of Life and Death Festival for almost a decade, programming a diverse range of events, including walking tours, trips to cultural venues such as The Coffin Works Museum and a series of Death Cafes and Death Over Drinks events.