Sir Geoff Palmer OBE is a life-long human rights activist and historian of Scotland’s relations with the Caribbean. His story is a remarkable one. After leaving Jamaica for London in 1955 aged 14, he attended school in the city, eventually continuing his studies at Leicester, Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt universities. As a scientist, his research at the Brewing Research Foundation from 1968–77 led to the discovery of the barley abrasion process – which makes the malting process more efficient. For this research, he was awarded the American Society of Brewing Chemists Award of Distinction in 1998. 

In 1989, Sir Geoff became the first Black university professor in Scotland. He is the author of a critically acclaimed book, The Enlightenment Abolished: Citizens of Britishness, in which he argues for maintaining but reinterpreting public monuments associated with the transatlantic slave trade. Artist Graham Fagen worked in collaboration with Sir Geoff to create a portrait which, in Fagen’s own words attempts to ‘expand our perceptions on portraiture in the age of the selfie.’