FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, May 7, 2024
Contact: media@vday.org

(Tuesday, May 7, 2024 – New York, New York) – V-Day is proud to announce that their new audio play, VOICES: a sacred sisterscape, will be available for streaming across all audio platforms beginning June 11, 2024. VOICES, spearheaded by Grammy nominated poet aja monet (“When The Poems Do What They Do”), is an audio experience of stories written by, narrated by and centering Black women across the diaspora.

VOICES is the newest artistic project and campaign out of V-Day, the global activist movement to end violence against all women, gender expansive people, girls and the Earth, founded by V (formerly Eve Ensler) in response to the overwhelming number of stories of violence heard in response to The Vagina Monologues. For over 25 years, V-Day has unleashed vast grassroots, anti-violence work on college campuses and in communities – visionary work that has been survivor-led and focused, all the while revealing the power of art and activism to change culture and systems. When VOICES began in 2020, it was commissioned as a new play and campaign to move into the space The Vagina Monologues once occupied in the V-Day movement. VOICES interdisciplinary performance art project and campaign is grounded in Black women’s stories of the African continent and diaspora brought to life.

“At a time where so many are being encouraged to speak, to voice, and tell their stories—we find it just as important if not more to listen. It is critical to facilitate art that encourages radical listening for the sake of connection, compassion, and community. This art piece is a celebration of the interior lives we embody and less about fixating on our identities or appearances. We seek to encourage and establish a culture that fosters radical truth-telling love & solidarity,” shares aja monet, VOICES Artistic Creative Director for V-Day.

“I am so moved by this extraordinary piece that will be a new artistic centerpiece for the V-Day movement. What’s different about these stories is that Black women are telling them through their lens. There’s no monolith, there’s no one story – the stories are rich, intricate and complex. They are specific, yet universal and they are necessary. And we, the audience, are invited to listen in a whole new way,” stated V (formerly Eve Ensler), playwright, activist and founder of V-Day.

When monet began by inviting Black women to share their stories and participate in a call for their submissions. After receiving over 800 submissions, and two-years of gathering stories, collective study, and collaborating with Black women actors and musicians, a selection of poems was curated into a powerful audio play. An initial event for the piece was held in 2022 in Accra, Ghana where these stories were celebrated live at a joyous festival.

LeahAnn “Lafemmebear” Mitchell, a Grammy nominated producer, has composed new music to accompany the audio play. In 2021, she became the first Black trans woman to produce a record featured on a Top Ten charting album. VOICES is produced by Hollis Heath and V-Day.

VOICES will premiere at two listening launch events at The Apollo’s Jonelle Procope Theater at The Victoria on Friday, May 31, one hosted by Anna Deavere Smith (Fires in the Mirror, “Nurse Jackie”), monet and V for a shared listening experience in anticipation of the launch. $20 tickets will be made available to the public to attend the evening launch session. Please visit the website and follow our social channels for more information on this offering. The audio play will then be distributed by Blackstone Publishing on all streaming platforms and V-Day will host an accompanying website featuring a solidarity toolkit as a guide for listeners as they experience VOICES.

For more information, please visit https://www.visforvoices.org/ and follow the journey at @visforvoices and @vdayorg.

ABOUT V-DAY – V-Day is a global activist movement to end violence against all women, gender expansive people, girls and the Earth.  For over 25 years, V-Day has unleashed vast grassroots, anti-violence work on college campuses and in communities – visionary work that has been survivor-led and focused, all the while revealing the power of art and activism to change culture and systems.  V-Day campaigns include One Billion Rising, City of Joy, the Beyond Incarceration Project, Dismantle Patriarchy Contest and now VOICES.  With ingenuity and determination, V-Day activists around the world are tirelessly working to end harassment, rape, battery, incest, female genital mutilation, sex slavery.

AJA MONET (Artistic Creative Director) aja monet is a surrealist blues poet, storyteller, and organizer born and raised in Brooklyn, NY. She won the legendary Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam poetry award title in 2007 and aja monet follows in the long legacy and tradition of poets participating and assembling in social movements. Her first full collection of poems is titled, My Mother Was a Freedom Fighter on Haymarket Books. Her poems explore gender, race, migration, spirituality and much more. In 2018, she was nominated for a NAACP Literary Award for Poetry and in 2019 she was awarded the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Award for Poetry for her cultural organizing work in South Florida. aja monet cofounded a political home for artists and organizers called, Smoke Signals Studio. She facilitates “Voices: Poetry for the People,” a workshop and collective in collaboration with Community Justice Project and Dream Defenders. aja monet currently serves as new Artistic Creative Director, Voices Campaign, for V-Day, the global activist movement to end violence against all women and girls. She is working on her next full collection of poems entitled, Florida Water. @ajamonet

LEAHANN “LAFEMMEBEAR” MITCHELL (Composer) Meet LeahAnn Mitchell, also known as Lafemmebear, a trailblazing figure in the music industry. In 2021, she etched her name in history as the first black trans woman to produce a record featured on a Top Ten charting album. Her remix of “I’m a Survivor” on Reba McEntire’s “REVIVED, REMIXED, REVISITED” showcased her unparalleled talent and creativity. Lafemmebear’s collaborative spirit knows no bounds, having worked with a diverse array of artists, from composing and sound designing for “Voices” with poet Aja Monet and V-Day to working with Time’s Up, me too International, Peppermint, Bob the Drag Queen (RuPaul’s Drag Race), Dawn Richard, Suzi Analogue, and contributing to Sudan Archives’ latest Billboard charter “Selfish Soul.”

Beyond her music endeavors, Lafemmebear is also a prolific producer and director, spearheading the documentary series We See You: Black Trans Living Legends. This series is dedicated to preserving the invaluable legacies of Black queer and trans elders.

HOLLIS HEATH (Producer) Hollis Heath is an award-winning theatre artist, producer and girls and women’s empowerment leader. She is co-founder of Harlem KW Project, a theatre company that produced the Audelco award-winning play, Renaissance in the Belly of a Killer Whale. Hollis has spent the last decade crafting transformative cultural events, experiences and initiatives aimed at propelling the personal and professional growth of women of all ages. She has led experiences globally, producing programming and curriculum to empower young women to own their unique voice and connect them with brands and organizations to increase their social capital. Brands she has produced events for with young women include Coach, Verizon, Refinery 29, Benefit Cosmetics, American Express, Jet Blue, Universal Records, Salesforce, and many others. She holds a Masters in Educational Theatre from the City College of New York. She is in the process of writing her show Confessions of a Late Bloomer. @heartofhollis

V (formerly Eve Ensler) (Producer) V is the Tony award-winning playwright, author, and activist. Her play The Vagina Monologues is an Obie award-winning theatrical phenomenon that has been translated into 48 languages and performed in 140 countries. She’s the author of numerous plays off and on Broadway and many books, including bestsellers Reckoning, The Apology, and In the Body of the World. She is the founder of V-Day, the 26-year-old global activist movement that has raised over 120 million dollars to end violence against women, gender-expansive people, girls, and the planet—and founder of One Billion Rising, the largest global mass action to end gender-based violence in over 200 countries, as well as a co-founder of the City of Joy. She writes regularly for The Guardian.