At WomenArts we believe that creativity is an essential survival skill, especially when times are hard. We know that imagination is the key to solving society’s problems, and for 23 years we have been building a powerful global community of women who are using their creativity to work for peace and justice.
Please join us by making a gift to WomenArts today! You can donate online or you can snail mail your gift to WomenArts, 1442A Walnut Street, Suite 67, Berkeley, CA 94709.
When you support WomenArts and SWAN Day, you are affirming the value of celebrating other cultures instead of suppressing them. You are joining with women all over the world to create pockets of sanity where people sing, dance, and put on shows together instead of killing each other. Please help us lift the voices of women who are using their art to affirm our common humanity and renew our hope. Make a gift today>>
WomenArts Highlights of 2017
* Support Women Artists Now Day/SWAN Day – 10th Anniversary!
Support Women Artists Now Day/SWAN Day was ten years old in 2017, and thousands of women around the world celebrated it! The holiday that WomenArts Executive Director Martha Richards and film critic Jan Lisa Huttner co-created in 2008 keeps getting better every year. In 2017 there were multi-day festivals in several major cities, as well as many individual events, and women presented innovative work in every art form.
* SWAN Day Song Contest
SWAN DAY SONG CONTEST
First Prize: Lydiah Dola, Nairobi
In December 2016 we announced our first ever SWAN Day Song Contest, and we were blown away by the 175 entries. We ended up giving out 5 top prizes and 9 honorable mentions. We awarded the $1,000 First Prize to Lydiah Dola of SWAN Day Kenya for her song, SWAN Girls. Her lively chorus perfectly captured the global SWAN spirit:
“From Africa to Asia, Europe & Australia,
America & everybody celebrate.
Our diversity, our prosperity,
our unity, our creativity . . . “
* SWAN Day Photo Contest
SWAN DAY PHOTO CONTEST
Second Prize – Jesse Newman, Hartford
We also added a SWAN Day Photo Contest this year. The photos we received provided stunning examples of the quality and diversity of our SWAN events. The winning photos captured the inventiveness of the women artists participating in the events, as well as the skill of the photographer.
The $500 First Prize went to Jamie Bilgo Bruchman of SWAN Day Milwaukee for her picture of Wendy Diedrich carrying Isabelle Spike’s giant swan created entirely from menstrual products.
The $300 Second Prize went to Jesse Newman for his photo of Kaylee Doll doing an elaborate swan body-painting on model Jenn Marie at SWAN Day Connecticut.
* Guest Blogs Offer Diverse Perspectives
Merry Lynn Morris with the Wheelchair She Invented
We put out a call for guest bloggers this year and received 140 query letters. We picked 22 women writers who were diverse in terms of race, class, age, region, and art form. We paid them $200 each and published their articles about women artists of Appalachia, a Latina woman who photographs migrant housing in Tijuana, an African-American woman who addresses race and gender issues through quilts, a woman who has invented a wheelchair designed for dancing, women cartoonists, women science fiction writers, women electronic music composers, and much, much more.
Invest in Imagination!
The world needs artists now more than ever – especially women artists and others who have been marginalized. Please help us if you can!
Donate online or snail mail your gift to WomenArts, 1442A Walnut Street, Suite 67, Berkeley, CA 94709. Please contact us if you need instructions for gifts of stock.