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Opening Event of Quilt Exhibition “A Life Once Had, A Dream of Hope”
7 March, 2023 @ 5:30 pm - 7:00 pm
The quilt exhibition “A Life Once Had, A Dream of Hope: Stories of Women from the Rohingya Refugee Camps” will be launched with a discussion on 7 March 2023, 5.30-7.00 pm at SEA Junction, 4th floor, Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC).
Speakers:
- Yasmin Ullah, Rohingya Activist
- Pranom Somwong, Representative of Protection International Thailand
- Galuh Wandita. Co-Founder & Director of Asia Justice and Rights (AJAR)
Moderator: Rosalia Sciortino, Founder & Executive Director of SEA Junction
Speakers’ Profiles
Yasmin Ullah is a Rohingya feminist, author, poet, and a social justice activist. She served as the President 2018-2020 of the Rohingya Human Rights Network, a non-profit group led by activists across Canada advocating and raising public awareness of the Rohingya genocide. She was elected chair of the ALTSEAN-Burma board for one year effective September, 2022. She is a member of the US Campaign for Burma and of the steering committee in Bridges MM Youth Dialogue project.
Pranom Somwong is the Protection International’s country representative in Thailand. For several years she has been facilitating trainings and workshops for community-based human rights defenders (HRDs), women human rights defenders (WHRDs) and young HRDs and activists all across Thailand. In 2020, she and her team organized the exhibition of quilts by women human rights defenders, read more at https://prachataienglish.com/node/8356.
Galuh Wandita began working on peace and conflict issues in the 1990s in Indonesia, focusing on women’s health and human rights, community rights impacted by mining, with an emphasis on empowering local actors, during the authoritarian New Order regime. In 2012, Galuh co-founded Asia Justice and Rights (AJAR) and continues to lead the organization as its Executive Director, managing programs and staff in Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Bangladesh, Myanmar and other countries.
Exhibition Description
Organized by Asia Justice & Rights and SEA Junction, the A Life Once Had, A Dream of Hope exhibition will be held at SEA Junction, 4th floor, BACC to commemorate International Women’s Day from 7-12 March 2023. The exhibition will display a series of collective quilts from the Rohingya women’s embroideries in Kutupalong Camp Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh.
Since March 2019, Asia Justice and Rights (AJAR) and the Liberation War Museum (LWM) of Bangladesh have been conducting documentation work using participatory action research with more than 120 women in the Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar. The process involved sewing activities in sharing their stories and healing while building solidarity and peer support among women survivors.
Using embroidery as a medium, a group of Rohingya women refugees have depicted their life stories, focusing on their exodus from Myanmar in the face of atrocities. The embroidery expresses their hopes, dreams, & memories – a response to being survivors of genocide and the challenges they face living in the refugee camp. Through this exhibition, we hope to build solidarity and promote human rights for the Rohingya.
For more information, please email: southeastasiajunction@gmail.com or phone/wa/signal/line: +66970024140
Organizers
Asia Justice and Rights (AJAR) is a non-profit organization, based in Jakarta, Indonesia, whose aim is to contribute to the strengthening of human rights and the alleviation of entrenched impunity in the Asia-Pacific region. Its work focuses on countries involved in transition from a context of mass human rights violations to democracy, where it strives to build cultures based on accountability, justice and a willingness to learn from the root causes of mass human rights violations to help prevent the recurrence of state-sanctioned human rights violations. For more information, see www.asia-ajar.org.
SEA Junction, established under the Thai non-profit organization Foundation for Southeast Asia Studies (ForSEA), aims to foster understanding and appreciation of Southeast Asia in all its socio-cultural dimensions- from arts and lifestyles to economy and development. Conveniently located at Room 407-8 of the Bangkok Arts and Culture Center or BACC (across MBK, BTS National Stadium), SEA Junction facilitates public access to knowledge resources and exchanges among students, practitioners and Southeast Asia lovers. For more information, see www.seajunction.org, join the Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/groups/1693058870976440/ and follow us on twitter and Instagram @seajunction
