Thursday, May 18, 2006

Signs For Peace

Kindly to Don McBurney,
Deeply appreciating your commitment to culture, Peace and Human Rights I am asking you kindly to consider to include in your Culture of Peace Campaign the SignsForPeace-project.

I'm Claus Miller, a Danish artist working on an ambitious Art&Peace project. Two years ago I started to contact people with a culturally significant biography; Nobel Prize Laureates, Mayors, Scientists, Actors, Musicians, Artists and Sports-people from all over the world, asking them to send me their fingerprint as a sign - in order to reflect on human identity and the need of human right, peace and democracy in the world -, through art.

The creative idea was to translate and transform the original fingerprints into artworks representing the identity of the portrayed person on large surfaces. Even though they could seem abstract paintings, the portraits are empirical events, stories, short biographies, warnings, and creative human thinking formulas.

The idea was well accepted and the exhibition "SignsForPeace" featuring fingerprint-portraits of famous spokespeople for humanity was born.

:: The Debut
The first SignsForPeace exhibition started as the opening ceremony of the VI Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates in Rome. The Nobels Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan with Mayor Walter Veltroni introduced the exhibition to a large public and the media representatives. The event was made possible thanks to the advocacy of the President of the Italian Republic, the Mickael Gorbachev foundation and the City of Rome.
The SignsForPeace portraits participating in 2005 was:
Albert Einstein (Nobel Laureate in Physics 1921)
Betty Williams (Ireland. Nobel Peace Laureates 1976)
Carlos Santana (USA. Musician. Spokesperson for peace)
Cora Weiss (USA. President of International Peace Bureau)
Dalai Lama (Tibet. Nobel Peace Laureate 1989)
Dario Fo (Italy. Nobel Laureate in Literature 1997)
Desmond Tutu (South Africa. Nobel Peace Laureate 1984)
Franca Rame (Italy. Actress. Spokesperson for peace)
Harry Kroto (UK. Nobel Laureate in Chemistry 1996)
Herbie Hancock (USA. Musician. Spokesperson for peace)
Joan Baez (USA. Musician. Spokesperson for peace)
Jody Williams (USA. Nobel Peace Laureate 1997)
John Lennon (UK. Musician. Spokesperson for peace)
Joseph Rotblat (UK. Nobel Peace Laureate 1995)
Luciano Pavarotti (Italy. Opera Singer. UN Messenger of Peace 1998)
Mairead Corrigan Maguire (Ireland. Nobel Peace Laureate 1976)
Malcolm X (USA, Spokesperson for Civil Rights)
Martin Luther King. Jr. (Nobel Peace Laureate 1964)
Mia Farrow (USA. Actress. Unicef Goodwill Ambassador)
Mohammad Ali (USA. World Champion. UN Messenger of Peace 1998)
Peter Gabriel (UK. Musician. Spokesperson for peace)
Rosa Parks (USA, Spokesperson for Civil Rights)
Susan Sarandon (USA. Actress. Unicef Goodwill Ambassador)
Walter Veltroni (Italy. Mayor of Rome. Spokesperson for peace)
Achille Bonito Oliva (Italy. Art Critic. Spokesperson for Peace)
Zucchero Fornaciari (Italy, Musician. Spokesperson for Peace)
.....
The very first idea foresaw the participation of SignsForPeace-portraits of children living in conflict areas to be staged in line with the above icons. Unfortunately the budget was too low, but this is one thing I would like to fulfill in the very next future.

The personalities in the project state a strong and important message of humanity toward the visitors. The exhibition is a colourful, and innovative eulogy of profound values, suitable for visitors of all walks of life, ages and beliefs. It is a flexible medium and can be personalized for any needs of communication and space.
The idea is to implement the collection of portraits: each new host can invite their local spokespersons to add a sign-for-peace.

:: Education
The exhibition suits well to educational visits for students. They will learn about the involved personalities and matters about individual identities versus global identity.
March 2006, during a panel discussion at the Goethe Institute in London featuring the legacy of Joseph Rotblat, with Nobel Laureate Betty Williams, Ambassador Rolf Ekeus and Chairman of British Pugwash Prof. Robert Hinde, the SignsForPeace project was included in a wider inter-disciplinary European project forming educational work for schools in Italy, Sweden and UK.

:: Mayors for Peace advocacy:
The International Mayors for Peace Organization, counting more than 1200 member cities in the world, has included the exhibition as a project that has immediate relevance to the "Mayors for Peace 2020 Vision Campaign".
See: http://www.mayorsforpeace.org/english/campaign/2020vision.html
Your local Mayor may be pleased to get involved.
:: Future Venues:
Vancouver City has booked the exhibition for the "World Peace Forum 2006", 23-28 June. The artworks will welcome thousands of delegates arriving in Vancouver for the forum.

Chicago has booked the exhibition from October 2006 to February 2007. In that period the city of Chicago features an important Humanity Festival.

We will promote different venues in North America in 2007 and create other venues around the world.

:: Opportunities:
First of all the project is an opportunity to speak about peace and human rights in a creative, joyful and positive way.

The theme of the exhibition suits well to create additional educational coordinated events, animations and visits for students of all ages.

The exhibition is an opportunity to create social awareness and media exposure for the sponsors and advocacy organisations.

Your participation by supporting this project with advocacy, assistance and coorporation would represent an important statement for all of us.

Thank you in advance for your kind support and for taking your time to read this.

You can see the exhibition at:
http://www.clausmiller.com/SignsForPeace.html
You can download the exhibition catalogue at:
http://www.clausmiller.com/SignsForPeaceRome.pdf

I would be pleased to send you a copy of the documentation.

Looking forward to hearing what you think.

Yours sincerely
Claus Miller
SignsForPeace

No comments:

Nepal - Dental care camp

Nepal - Dental care camp This dental health camp is one day camp for the students of Bal batika school. The main objective of the camp is t...