Get Out Your Paintbrush, it’s International Women’s Day
Discussion details
It’s International Women’s Day and the use of art to share the day’s message is featuring prominently, especially in South America. In Honduras they’re staging an Art Battle on the streets of the capital, Tegucigalpa, while in Colombia a street graffiti project is planned.
EU delegations across the world have been in touch to tell us about the novel activities they’re organizing or taking part in to mark International Women’s Day. Or simply to highlight gender focused projects that are meeting with particular success.
The information was gathered for inclusion in the bi-annual Gender Newsletter, a copy of which can be downloaded here. But we were so overwhelmed with great contributions from our colleagues in delegation that we’ve chosen to share more here, in this blog.
Art is featuring prominently in activities in South America. Today, 8 March, twelve local artists in Tegucigalpa will compete to produce a live piece of art on a surprise topic relating to this year’s International Women’s Day theme of ending violence against women. The topic will be announced at the event opening on March 8th and artists are expected to be given three hours to complete their masterpiece.
To inspire them, and to help entertain the crowds, dubstep musicians will be performing live. This Art Battle is being organized by the EU delegation in Honduras in close collaboration with the Alliance Francaise in Tegucigalpa, the French Embassy, The Spanish Cultural Centre and the locally-based Women in Arts organisation. The winning artwork will be chosen with a vote from assembled members of the public.
In Colombia, EC staffer Asier Santillan will also be taking part in the production of some street art, in this instance to promote women's rights in the Commune 18 of the country's third largest city, Cali. The graffiti project is organised by the NGO Medina.
The EU delegation in Beijing, China, also sent us this submission about a project:
In 2009, the EU Delegation in Beijing awarded a grant to support the "INDIGO" project (Intercultural Development in favour of Gender Opportunities). The goal was to empower and improve the livelihoods of rural women from the Miao, Qiang and Tujia ethnic minorities, who live in remote rural areas of Hunan, Guizhou and Sichuan provinces of China. During three years the INDIGO project has trained the Miao, Qiang and Tujia women in the production and marketing of handicraft products that draw from local ancient traditions, trained women as trainers of other women and youth, and set-up a network of women across the three provinces. INDIGO has established cooperation with cultural institutions and museums in China and in Europe and was represented at the Shanghai Expo and the Fair-Trade expo in Italy. It went so far as to register its own INDIGO brand! All in all, INDIGO has not only successfully developed local economies and income generation opportunities for the Miao, Qiang and Tujia women but also instilled a greater sense of confidence and ownership in them whilst reviving local cultural identities and creating an alternative to female labour migration.
To see a powerpoint presentation on the INDIGO project, click here.
The newsletter also features activities and projects in Burkina Faso, India, Lebanon and South Sudan. Not all the information they submitted could be included in the newsletter, so we've shared more below.
BURKINA FASO
To see a collection of photographs from Burkina Faso, follow the link below:
Also, staff in outfits made from their International Women's Day cloth.
INDIA
The EU Delegation in India sent this comprehensive review of their gender activies. We could only touch on a small part of their work in the newsletter, but there's plent of interest here. You can also visit the India delegation website to see a post-event round-up of their 8th March activities.
LEBANON
The EU Delegation in Lebanon part sponsored this video promotion of the 'White Ribbon Campaign' - an action urging me to end violence against women and find 'new perspectives of their virility'. The video is in Arabic.
SOUTH SUDAN
Read a report on a project working to end sexual and gender violence in South Sudan. The report includes case studies.
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