4 Irwin talks about Int'l Women Day, W2 Launch Pad and W2 Communiity Media Arts

Event Description
The setting
The downtown eastside neighbourhood of a city, struggling with poverty, drug abuse, violence.

The story
A young woman grows up in this neighbourhood. She and a group of artists start a successful technology and design collective. They launch a business and help establish a non-profit society. They raise the money to buy an old building and rehabilitate it. It houses their company, a bilingual daycare, a cultural centre, and 16 units of low-income housing. Their efforts are bringing social and economic development, music, art, and their community together. It's an incredible transformation.

Where is this?
Oakland, California.

It's an inspiring vision for what could, and should, be possible here in Vancouver.

On Sunday, March 8, the Sista'hood Celebration presents Art, Resistance, and Community Transformation," a public art presentation and community dialogue with Favianna Rodriguez, co-founder of Oakland's Eastside Arts Alliance. This vibrant young woman has just been named one of Utne Reader magazine's Top 50 Visionaries. Rodriguez is an artist, activist, technologist, and organization builder.

Art alone does not transform the world. Mass movements do. It is the unique collaborations between artists, activists, and people that forge true social change, notes Rodriguez.

Her work on such issues as immigration, racism, war, and globalization has been featured in Mexico and across America, including at the recent Democratic National Convention. She is currently teaching in an artist residency at the University of Illinois. Rodriguez also leads TUMIS, a flagship of innovative web design for progressive campaigns. This company's profits are donated back to the Oakland Eastside Arts Alliance.

During her visit to Vancouver in early March, Rodriguez will engage in a number of local projects, including workshops with union members. See her Designing for Democracy show with VJ Reed Rickert, March 5 at District 319 (319 Main Street, $20/$15, sponsored by Web of Change). On March 6 at 9pm, Rodriguez and Rickert are special guests of W2 for their fundraiser Techforms (Northern Way Campus, 577 Great Northern Way, $25).

Sista'hood Celebration is a festival held every March that highlights womens arts and issues. www.sistahoodcelebration.com

W2 Launch Pad Gallery, 116 West Hastings Street, Vancouver, free admission, co-sponsored by DTES Community Arts Network and Tides Canada-Endswell Fund

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• Nokia N95
• Favianna Rodriguez
• Sista'hood Celebration