Can the Arts Save Human Rights?
Human rights are under siege. As intersecting global crises demand new approaches to advocacy and expression, Art Rights Truth (ART) explores how creative collaborations between artists and activists can form new idioms and practices to support rights in times of crisis.
To date, ART has engaged 34 artists and activists across 21 countries through residency programmes, research, and joint commissioning calls with partners including CIVICUS and Amnesty International. Through localised events, artistic outputs, and shared toolkits, the project contends that collaborations between artists and activists can both represent and inform new ways of working and thinking, and thereby help create powerful new human rights languages.
ART has launched five targeted commissioning calls, including joint initiatives with CIVICUS and Amnesty International, supporting new arts-based collaborations between artists and activists worldwide.
Through our artist residencies, ART provides artists with the dedicated space, time, and materials to develop their practice with regard to new languages for human rights.
Across two podcast series—Rights in Dialogue and The Art of Truth—we bring together artists, academics, and activists to examine how art documents, deconstructs, and reimagines human rights.
Artful Activism Toolkit
The Artful Activism Toolkit was developed through the Development Alternatives network and integrated into ART’s work on new human rights imaginaries. It provides accessible guidance for using arts-based methods to expand and strengthen development and human rights work.