Creative Africa Network - Art Works for Change

Art Works for Change produces contemporary art exhibitions to address social and environmental issues such as social justice, human rights, gender equity, and environmental sustainability. It uses the transformative power of art as a vehicle to promote dialogue and awareness, inspire action and thought, and address systems for social change. Through partnerships with the communities that host our travelling exhibitions -- museums, grassroots organizations, advocacy and educational institutions, Art Works for Change projects serve as both a forum and a catalyst to galvanize support and action around our most pressing issues.

Art Works for Change is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization.

The organization, founded by curator Randy Jayne Rosenberg, was established in 2008 to expand upon the efforts of a small team of dedicated arts and social change activists that, since 2005 has produced a series of acclaimed traveling museum exhibitions focused on social and environmental themes. These include: Melting Ice/A Hot Topic, produced for the United Nations World Environment Day (WED) 2007; Moving Towards a Balanced Earth, for the UN’s WED 2008 opening in New Zealand; Millions of Pieces: Only One Puzzle for WED 2010 in Rwanda; The Nature of Cities for the Shanghai Expo 2010; Bringing Forth an Environmental Renaissance; Unlearning Intolerance; and The Missing Peace: Artists Consider the Dalai Lama. These exhibitions have traveled to leading museums and art internationally.

In June of 2009, AWFC launched Off the Beaten Path: Violence, Women and Art (OTBP), a traveling contemporary art exhibition that brings together 33 artists from 26 countries to address gender-based violence (GBV) nationally and globally. Click here to tour the exhibition.

Due to both the international relevancy and urgency of the subject matter, along with the power of the Exhibition’s artwork, the OTBP Project is attracting strong interest in Africa. The South Africa National Gallery in Cape Town, and the Johannesburg Art Gallery have both requested the existing exhibition for 2012, and last year the UN organizations, UNIFEM and UNESCO in West Africa, approached AWFC about creating a version of the original OTBP Exhibition customized to the specific challenges, both cultural and political, that women and girls face with respect to gender-based violence and issues of empowerment in West Africa.

As a result, AWFC envisioned an Off the Beaten Path: Africa using the original framework, but re-worked to suit the logistical challenges of the West Africa region, and to more specifically represent the artistic visions, voices and communities of Senegal, Ghana, and Nigeria.

In partnership with AFRICOM (the Africa consortium of museums), and RAES (Réseau Africain d'Education pour la Santé), we plan to open the Exhibition in Dakar, Senegal in March 2011, at the IFAN Museum of African Art, to coincide with the International Women’s Day activities.