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[email protected] Southbank Centre announces Grace Jones as curator of Meltdown 2020 Grace Jones © Kristian Sibast Southbank Centre today announces that the next curator and headliner of its award-winning M eltdown festival, the longest-running artist-curated festival in the world, will be the international icon of music, fashion, art and film, a nd inimitable singer, songwriter, producer and performer, G race Jones . From 1 2-21 June 2020 , Jones will take over the UK’s largest arts centre with her defiantly unique creative vision and a ten day playbook of her creation. At her invitation, global names and new talent, artists who inspire and have been inspired by her, and special one-off collaborations will take to the world-class stages of Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room, and the remainder of Southbank Centre’s 17-acre cultural quarter on the banks of the River Thames. Grace Jones is one of the most recognised figures of contemporary culture with an influence spanning genres and generations. After taking the world by storm as one of the first black supermodels, Jones signed to Island Records in 1977 and with her first few singles - and mould-breaking fashion - became a star of New York City's Studio 54-centered disco scene. The 1980s saw her move to a new-wave hybrid of reggae, funk, pop and rock, as she worked with superstar producers such as Trevor Horn and Nile Rodgers and released a string of internationally acclaimed and enduring albums including Warm Leatherette (1980), Nightclubbing ( 1981), and S lave to the Rhythm (1985).