International Women’s Day Celebration 2024
Addressing the visibility of women through art, music, discourse and activism.
Lubna, Gala, Gail, Shruti, Anja with Jane Masojada’s portrait of Her Honour Judge Sarah Monro KC
Thursday 7th March 2024 was the Worshipful Company of World Traders’ 3rd annual International Women’s Day celebration in the Great Hall of Goodenough College, London.
The spectacular hall was full of international postgraduate students (for whom Goodenough College is a residential community) and livery company members.
The organisers curated a program of first hand accounts by women, including experience at the top of UK business and politics, research into the experiences of young women with HIV in South Africa, and activism against the criminalisation of abortion in Brazil. This was set against a backdrop of art and music created, composed and performed by women.
The event brought together artists, musicians, academic, professional, social and commerce leaders:
In addition to the program above, Jillian LeBlanc (Canadian consulting feminist) and Dame Susan Langley (Alderwoman, Sheriff, and non-exec chair of Gallagher Insurance, Risk Management & Consulting) conducted a fascinating ‘fireside chat’. As Non-Executive Chair for Gallagher UK and the Senior Independent Director for UKAR, it was so interesting to hear about Susan’s career path, opportunities, experiences and choices. Some great personal anecdotes of her approaches to various situations too.
(L to R) Jillian LeBlanc, Susan Langley, portrait of Maeve Goodenough (whose idea it was to found Goodenough college) by Gala Hills
Following this, Lesley Batchelor CBE facilitated the panel discussion. The four panellists each presented women who are/have been invisible. Moving examples were discussed in the fields of family businesses, HIV in South Africa, and abortion criminalisation in Brazil (see the program summaries below). I hope to do a future blog on my ‘invisible woman’, having invested a fair bit of research into her life!
Event pictures
This video is a short overview of my four paintings in the exhibition:
Sign up to my newsletter for a free guide on “how to get the best out of an artist”, invitations to events, news, and my blog.
To share this blog, just copy and paste this text: https://www.gailreidartist.com/blog/iwd24 into messages, Facebook, emails, LinkedIn, X, Y, Z, wherever you like! If you want to tag me on social media that would be great, @gailreidartist across the board. Thank you so much for reading, and for all the lovely messages xxx