Event Description
The Women and Girls Initiative (WGI) invites you to sponsor, attend and be recognized as a female empowerment champion of this cultural and fundraising event. As part of our 2018-2019 artistic series, the Women and Girl Initiative (WGI) in partnership with the University of Miami’s Institute for Advanced Studies in the Latin America and the Caribbean (UMIA) and the University Student organizations Planet Kreyol and PIH Engage, is hosting a closing event entitled “DLO, VAN, DESTRIKSYON": an Art and Cultural Soirée on Thursday December 5, 2019 at the Donna Shalala Student Center, University of Miami.
Keeping in theme with our mission of female empowerment, the evening will be headlined by Haitian American women artists, including New York’s singer/dancer and cultural ambassador, Riva Nyri Precil! In tribute to our successful 2019 mobile tour, the “DLO, VAN, DESTRIKSYON” Art exhibit which was featured at the United Nations Conference on the Status of Women in March this year will be on view. To complete the cultural evening experience, a seated dinner featuring the best of Haiti’s national dishes will be served by the Miami renowned Chef Jerry Dominique of KC Healthy Cooking.
About the Exhibit
The Mobile Art exhibit of the artistic series travelled in Miami, New York City, Haiti and Rwanda from February to November this year through five major events showcasing a collection of drawings, poems, collages, photographs and video clips produced by and with the Haitian Adolescent girls’ cohort of WGI’s 2018 Summer Leadership Academy through creative and performing art therapy workshops. In the aftermath of the 2010 Earthquake that struck our country Haiti and its people, psychosocial support and counseling have been at the center of our services. For the past three years, we’ve deepened our commitment to mental health by dedicating our summer leadership academy platform to address the mental health needs of our girls. We fuse leadership training with interventions that meets their psychosocial needs using an Art-based Therapy methodology. WGI serves 80 adolescent girls age 15-24 in Haiti from Port-Au-Prince and the South of Haiti affected by the 2010 Earthquake and the 2016 Hurricane Matthew.
All donations and sponsorships received will benefit the girls and their families we serve in Haiti, ensuring our girls continue attending school, complete high school and aim for higher education while allowing them to continue building their leadership capacities.