The March 4th event of the Global Women's Rights Forum, Art+Gender+Conflict, focused on the works by Patricia Ariza, a playwright, director and actor from Colombia. Ariza was one of the founders of Teatro le Candalaria, a cultural theater house which largely showcased plays dealing with serious political and social issues of Colombian culture. According to Ariza, Colombia had been armed in social conflict for approximately 50 years, alongside issues of inequality, poverty and patriarchy. Women largely shouldered the burden of this conflict, whether as displaced workers or dehumanized and objectified to mere "booty" or "prizes" of war. Seeing this, Ariza was inspired to join the cultural resistance against this injustice via theater. About 22 years ago, she began a festival called "Invitacion Festival de Mujeres" to highlight women's issues in Colombia. The theater festival was done in association with other women's movements across the Colombia, as well as various social movements internationally.
Much of her emphasis on global involvement reminded me of transnational networks discussed in Cynthia Cockburn's From Where We Stand, such as the Women in Black, Code Pink and the East Asia-US-Puerto Rico Women's Network. Though the theater group began with only four or five groups of women participating, it rose to 65 groups in 2012. Ariza mentioned that large national and international mobilization was needed to draw attention to women's issues and truly enact change - that the "personal is political" and that it's important to strive for bigger and better events and movements.
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