Tuesday 23rd September Opening event

7.00pm – The Peckham Pelican – 92 Peckham Road, SE15 5PY London

HYSTERIA presents, along with the Festival of Choice, a hysterical event at The Peckham Pelican, starting at 7pm.

The Festival of Choice seeks to raise awareness about the current lack of abortion rights for women found throughout the world. Together, with other feminist organisations, we hope to engage in the pro-choice conversation and advocate women’s right to safe and legal abortion globally.

HYSTERIA presents a performance video by HELENA WALSH, a performance/talk by FANNIE SOSA and an interactive installation by AMA JOSEPHINE BUDGE.

Helena Walsh is a performance artist from Speaking of IMELDA – a direct action feminist performance group challenging the ongoing problem of I.M.E.L.D.A. (Ireland Making England the Legal Destination for Abortion).
http://www.helenawalsh.com/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Speaking-of-Imelda

Artist, Fannie Sosa, based in Paris, works with elements of physical theatre and dance, live music, performance and video art. At opening of the Festival of Choice, she will be presenting on TWERKING, exploring the taboo dimension of the «ghetto of the body» through speech and movement -linking this dance form to pro-choice, and abortion debates.

You can also join Fannie for an interactive workshop before the launch event:
“Through speech and movement ; between otherness and identity ; individual and collective ; we practice unifying our intimate body (comfortable, sexual, relaxed) with our public body (efficient, alert, racial).”
£10 online, £12 on the door for two incredible hours!
Get your ticket here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/feminist-twerkshop-with-fannie-sosa-by-hysteria-the-festival-of-choice-tickets-13199448907
Location: Goldsmiths, University of London, Education Building, Room 110. See map for details: http://www.gold.ac.uk/media/campus-map.pdf
Nearest Tube: New Cross/New Cross Gate.

Activist, writer, performer, curator and editor Ama Josephine Budge focuses in her work on live art, feminism & gender politics, racial identities and activism.
http://amabudge.wordpress.com/

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Wednesday 24th September Theatre of the oppressed Workshop: “I choose”

Theatre of the oppressed workshop – “I choose” 

6.30pm – Unite The Union – 128 Theobald’s Road, WC1X 8TN London

The objective is to offer a taster to participants of what a normal session of theatre of the oppressed works like.

The theatre of the oppressed is a way of challenging and changing oppressions through theatre. This will be a fun taster of what a session of theatre of the oppressed looks like.

This workshop will focus on abortion: what it means to have access to and to enjoy this right, and the impact of governments and societies regulating this right and banning it.

Anyone can join the session. Please, bring comfortable clothes.

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Thursday 25th September Solidarity Event: Panel Discussion on the Impact of Banning Abortion

Panel Discussion: The Impact of Banning Abortion

6.30pm -9.30pm – Amnesty International Secretariat – 1 Easton Street, London WC1X 0DW

In solidarity with the International Day of Action for the Decriminalisation of Abortion – 28th September – and in collaboration with the Festival of Choice, Amnesty International, Central American Women’s Network, and Reproductive Health Matters invite you to a discussion on the impact of the total ban on abortion on women and girls in El Salvador and the status of access to abortion globally.

Illustration by Paula García Ciruela

PROGRAMME

Part I: Context: EL SALVADOR
6.30 – 6.40 Chair: Thomas Schultz-Jagow, Senior Director, Amnesty International
6.40 – 6.55 AI – Guadalupe Marengo, Deputy Programme Director, Americas
6.55 – 7.20 ‘Life at any price’ screening
7.20 – 7.35 Vicky Knox, Co-Director, Cental American Women’s Network
7.35 – 8.00 Q&A

Part II: Context: EUROPE and the USA
08.15 – 08.30 Marge Berer , Editor Reproductive Health Matters
08.30 – 08.45 Cindy Cooper, Playwright and human rights activist
08.45 – 09.00 Q&A

09.00 – 09.30 Drinks reception and networking

SPEAKERS:

• Chair: Thomas Schultz-Jagow, Senior Director,  Amnesty International
• Guadalupe Marengo, Deputy Programme Director, Americas, Amnesty International, will speak on Amnesty International’s new report: the impact of the total ban on abortion on women and girls in El Salvador.
• Vicky Knox, Co-Director, Cental American Women’s Network (CAWN), will speak on campaigns supported by CAWN focussing on the Citizen Group for the Decriminalization of Therapeutic, Ethical, and Eugenic Abortion campaign ‘We are all the 17‘.
• Marge Berer Editor, Reproductive Health Matters, will provide an international perspective on access to abortion, with a focus on Ireland, Spain and UK.
• Cindy Cooper, Playwright, Journalist and  activist, words of Choice will speak on the USA perspective on access to abortion.

To attent this wonderful evening full of discussion please register for free on evenbrite to secure a place.

Having trouble registering or any queries, please contact Roos Saalbrink on rose@cawn.org

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Friday 26th September – An evening of Art, Music and Poetry

Live art and music, poetry, spoken word…all in the name of prochoice activism!
7.00pm – 00.00pm LARC – 62 Fieldgate St, London E1 1ES
Join us on Friday at the London Action Resource Centre for a fun, disobedient, feminist evening!

The plan is to dance and transgress, and the aim to raise some funds for feminist organisations working to uphold the to safe abortion and to decriminalise it, such as the Central America Women’s Network (CAWN) and  the Abortion Support Network

We ask an entrance fee of £5 waged /£3 unwaged offering you the following:
DRINKS! It’s Friday, we know what you need
lovely little snacks and sandwiches

Artists
The Festival of Choice is honoured to present to you these wonderful artists and performances

BodyWords by Alexandra Unger and Emily Beart-Albrecht
Being the first collaborative performance between Alexandra Unger and Emily Beart-Albrecht, BodyWords is the eternal battle between body and mind.

Songs and poetry by Isabel Ros from Spain and Mabel Encinas from Mexico

Spoken word by Leyla Josephine
Leyla is a performance artist and poet from Glasgow, all of her poems are based on feminist issues and herself. She made a recent video about abortion which has had about 80 thousand views

I Think She Was A She

Exhibition Naked In Africa & We Are Not Chicks by Sarah Peace
Sarah Peace is a visual art activist producing work in a range of mediums including photography, film, sculpture and site-specific installations often interlinked by themes of gender, subjugation or freedom of choice.

Raffle
Win a CAWN t-shirt, No going back T-shirt or the HYESTERIA reader ‘A collection of feminism’.

Pictures for the 17s campaign
In solidarity with the ‘We are all the 17‘.campaign we are taking pictures for their flower campaign

Artist websites

http://www.alexandraunger.com

alexandraungersblog.blogspot.co.uk

drawwiththerightside.blogspot.co.uk
http://www.sarahpeace.co.uk

Saturday 27th September: Film Screenings, Performance and Discussion

Irish and Spanish Prochoice Activism in London from the 80s till Present

Ann Rossiter, writer and prochoice activist, at a recent My Belly is Mine protest

12.oo pm – Amnesty International UK – 17-25 New Inn Yard, EC2A 3EA London

Join us for a film screening, performance and Q&A celebrating Irish and Spanish prochoice activism in London in the 80s and at present. We will be screening three short movies focusing on the issue of abortion and prochoice activism in Spain and Ireland. This will be followed by a short performance by direct action feminist performance group challenging the ongoing problem of I.M.E.L.D.A. – Ireland Making England the Legal Destination for Abortion. We will end the event with a conversation with Irish and Spanish activists and Mara Clarke, founder of Abortion Support Network.

12:00 – 12:05: Introduction by Cristina, from My Belly is Mine

12:05 – 13:15: Film Screening

“The Christening” directed by Oonagh Kearney

“Repeating Histories” – A short film on Irish and Spanish prochoice activism in London in the 80s and at present

“The Freedom Train” (English subtitles) – A film on the prochoice demo in Spain in February, 2014. Introduced by CIMA, Association of Women in Film and Audiovisual Media (via Skype)

13:15 – 13:35: IMELDA performance

13:35 – 14:00: Q&A (chaired by Cristina)

Film director and prochoice activist Oonagh Kearney, current member of Speaking of Imelda

Isabel Ros, activist and poet, former member of the Spanish Women’s Abortion Support Group

Mara Clarke from Abortion Support Network

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