In the 2017 Manchester International Festival (MIF), artist and musician Karl Hyde, known as one half of Underworld, joined forces with various local organisations to create Manchester Street Poem.
This installation in a disused shop on Oldham Street, Manchester was a combination of cardboard sculpture and painted words, documenting the thoughts and feelings of the region’s homeless people. However, after the festival it took on a life of its own, becoming an endless digital archive.
Now, for this year’s MIF, Manchester Street Poem has returned as a live workshop and an exhibition in Festival Square. Revive Magazine talked to Karl Hyde about its work, and what inspired him to help create it in the first place.
Looking for an Answer
“I was walking down the street with my kids, and they were pointing at people in doorways asking who they were and what they were doing there, and I realised I couldn’t answer them properly. There was something unacceptable about walking past someone who was exposed in such a way.”
Karl thought about this for a long time, until it got to a point where he felt he had to do something.
“Even if the something you do seems small, it’s more than doing nothing.”
The inspiration came from an installation he had put together in Japan, called Tokyo Street Poem, and when MIF originally asked for music-based ideas, instead Karl suggested this.
Manchester Street Poem links cardboard, a material associated with homelessness, with the words of homeless people themselves.
“Cardboard is a discarded material, but it provides shelter, warmth and privacy.”


