Compassion Speaks: Seeds of Reconciliation
© Isa Leshko
The 2019 Compassion Arts Festival will launch Compassion Speaks, an outreach program from Compassion Arts in which four or five special guests give voice to compassion in action through the arts and education. Guests share their work in relation to a specific topic by contributing a short talk, performance, or presentation. The program will be an integral part of Compassion Arts going forward and will take place in multiple cities.
Seeds of Reconciliation will focus on themes of healing our relationship with the life with which we share this planet through a new perspective on our narrative about animals. The event will feature a Playback Theatre performance of stories about animals in our lives from True Story Theater; special presentation of readings by artist and photographer Isa Leshko from her book Allowed to Grow Old along with a book signing in support of her exhibit at Griffin Museum; musical performance by The Rattle & Thunder ensemble; and 46 Million Turkeys Community Art Project with Cheryl Miller.
Tickets and Registration
Tickets cost $20 and can be purchased online or at the show. General Admission.
About True Story Theater
True Story Theater is a nonprofit theater company that offers over 50 improvisational performances and workshops a year for community groups, businesses, and individuals in New England and California. Their mission is to promote social healing through theatre.
During performances, volunteers from the audience are helped to share what’s important in their lives. On the spot, actors then portray the heart of what they heard using music, movement, and dialogue. From this simple interaction, people laugh, cry, share fresh insights, and bond. Events create a respectful atmosphere where every voice can be heard and any story told — however ordinary or extraordinary, difficult, or joyful. True Story Theater offers audiences fresh perspectives, deeper connections, and a renewed appreciation for our common humanity.
About Isa Leshko
Isa Leshko is an artist whose work examines themes relating to animal rights, aging, and mortality. Isa’s images have been published in The Atlantic, The Boston Globe, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, The Guardian, Harper’s Magazine, The New York Times, and Süddeutsche Zeitung. In May 2019, the University of Chicago Press published her first monograph, Allowed to Grow Old: Portraits of Elderly Rescued Farm Animals, which included essays by activist Gene Baur, author Sy Montgomery, and curator Anne Wilkes Tucker.
Isa has received fellowships from the Bogliasco Foundation, Culture & Animals Foundation, Houston Center for Photography, Millay Colony for the Arts, and Silver Eye Center for Photography. She has exhibited her work widely in the United States, and her prints are part of numerous private and public collections. She will next be exhibiting her work at the Griffin Museum starting October 24.
About the Rattle & the Thunder Ensemble
The Rattle & the Thunder Ensemble is a Compassion Arts group of singers who perform original songs from The Rattle & the Thunder, a musical play about transformation of consciousness and other animals.
About the 46 Million Turkeys Community Art Project
46 MILLION TURKEYS PROJECT is a community art project that works to cultivate understanding and empathy for other animals, through an ongoing exhibit in progress for humane education. Created by Cheryl Miller, the project provides people with the experience of creating their own personal original artwork and drawings of turkeys, for a unique exhibit inspiring compassion through creative community.