Nudrat Afza’s moving record of Bradford's Jewish-Muslim friendship opens soon at Settle’s Quaker Meeting House

In a coup for Settle, the nationally acclaimed exhibition which has featured at Cartwright Hall and elsewhere will be hosted at the Quaker Meeting House from 15th February until 12th April 2026. Manningham-based photographer Nudrat Afza spent years recording Bradford's dwindling Jewish community in a series of deeply moving photographs.

Settle’s Quakers hope to attract Bradfordians as well as locals to the public launch with refreshments at 12 noon on Sunday 15th February.

‘Kehillah’ (Hebrew for 'community' or 'congregation') offers a rare and intimate glimpse into the lives of Bradford's practising Jews. In atmospheric images that transcend the purely documentary, moments of tradition, history and quiet endurance are immortalised in Afza’s signature grainy textures and beautifully balanced tones.

"Settle Quakers are honoured to host Kehillah in our Meeting House," organisers said. "As with our fundraising art exhibition last year called ‘The Flower Show', in aid of the Shalom Salaam Trust’s emergency work with Palestinian children, Afza shines a light on reconciliation and cooperation across faiths and cultures. Kehillah is a further signpost towards peace and hope for the world.”

The exhibition tells the extraordinary story of interfaith solidarity for which Bradford is now famed. When the Reform synagogue in Manningham faced closure in 2013 due to costly repairs, the surrounding Muslim community and the Bradford Council of Mosques rallied to raise funds alongside a Lottery grant, ensuring the building's survival. This remarkable act of neighbourly compassion forms the backdrop to Afza's work, which began in 2012 when she photographed the newly closed Orthodox synagogue before its demolition.

The late Rudi Leavor, a Kindertransport refugee and the synagogue's nonagenarian chairman, later granted Afza unprecedented access to photograph the Reform synagogue's interior and its congregation, resulting in images that transcend documentary photography to become meditations on belonging and change.

Born in Rawalpindi in 1955 and moving to Bradford in 1965, Nudrat Afza is already known to many Bradfordians as a self-taught photographer dedicated to documenting overlooked communities in her city. National media coverage of Kehillah's earlier exhibitions (2019, 2020, 2025-6) have all highlighted the exceptional bond between Bradford's Jewish and Muslim communities, with Afza quietly informing them that "in Bradford, people from different communities respect each other."



Exhibition Details:

Launch: 12 noon, Sunday 15th February

Open: 15th February – 12th April 2026

Location: Settle Quaker Meeting House, Kirkgate, Settle BD24 9DX

Hours: Daily, 9am – dusk

Admission: Free

For further information: suevickerman1@gmail.com