A year and some months ago we had a dream : to launch Moleskine Foundation. An unconventional entity that would challenge the paradigms of profit and non-profit conventions in order to create something new, something unexpected, something creative. With an ambitious mission: to create positive change in the society through Creativity and Quality Education.
Today, a year after our birth, the journey has begun and the first dreams came true.
We have the Foundation. We have launched our first ever AtWork Tour “I had a dream”, which has travelled in 3 countries and is concluding in Zimbabwe this November. 100 participants, 100 dreams, 100 notebooks that will be exhibited in the first ever international AtWork exhibition in 2019. We have consolidated our WikiAfrica program and in 3 days will be holding our first big WikiAfrica Education event for teachers in Johannesburg, South Africa. We have added 100 new notebooks to our Moleskine Foundation Collection and held 4 notebooks’ exhibitions in 3 different countries. We have doubled our fanbase on social media channels. We have opened multiple conversations with Moleskine Company to create shared value initiatives that would amplify our social impact worldwide. We have secured new strategic partnerships with some key global cultural players that will be announced very shortly.
And we have new dreams. Dreams of expanding our initiatives and scaling them up. Dreams of launching new exciting programs in 2019. Dreams of opening new offices around the world. Dreams of touching the minds of more and more young creative talents with our transformative educational formats. Dreams of changing the world through creativity.
And of course dreams of having an ever-growing community of supporters and believers in our mission without whom we could never have achieved our crucial first steps and all the great things we are determined to achieve in the future.
So thank you to all of you for your support in so many different ways: for having become our members, for giving your time or expertise, for spreading our message, for being there for us and dreaming with us.
Stay with us in this journey, become a member, renew your membership, follow and support our programs, let’s continue the change, together!
Claude Bunny Massassa is a contemporary artist from Gabon. She created Bunny Studio in 2016, a start-up dedicated to photography production, which became DWABI Studio in 2021. As an artist, she has represented Gabon in many international exhibitions in Senegal, Uganda, France, the United States, and Italy. In her art, she denounces social stigmas around issues of identity and mental health, and explores themes of traditions and myths.
Executive Director Kimberly Aceves- Iñiguez has been passionately committed for over 20 years to social justice organizing and advocacy efforts that bring voice and power to youth, LGBTQ people, people of color, and working-class communities in the Bay Area. Before coming on as the Executive Director for RYSE, Kimberly served as the Executive Director for Youth Together, the founding organization of the RYSE Center.
Kanwarpal Dhaliwal is one of the co-founders of RYSE and currently acts as the Associate Director. She supports and guides the implementation and integration of healing-centered practices, grounded in racial justice and liberation, and also develops, promotes, and advocates for policies, investments, practices, and research that enliven healing, justice, and liberation. Kanwarpal believes that the purpose of her work and life is to contribute to movements, communities, and legacies of liberation that honor the ancestors who fought for her existence and survival, and to forge a world that is just and gentle for future generations.
Sagal Ali is the founder and executive director of SAF. After a few years in her career in heritage protection in the cultural sector, she decided to develop the initiative to directly support young creatives in Somalia by launching her own foundation. She hopes to bridge the social gaps and inequalities women face in Somalia, both in society and in the arts scene.
Co-founders Catherine Dunga and Marleen Palmaers created Kitambo to bridge the gap between the African diaspora in Colombia and the narratives from the continent. From Kinshasa and Antwerp respectively, they work to connect African artists from the continent and their peers from the Colombian diaspora.
Martha Kazungu is a curator, art Historian and Founder of Njabala Foundation, an organization that curates periodic exhibitions and organizes a public program of activities to create a safe space for female artists to thrive and blossom.
Alicia Hansen is a photographer and teacher from New York. She founded NYC SALT in 2008 and, beyond teaching valuable creative skills to her students, has developed a long-term support system to uplift them through school and into their early artistic careers.
