By Stephanie Ahlgrain | Manager of Fundraising and Alliances
Dear friend,
Thank you for your continued interest and support of this Community Narrative Practice(CNP) pilot program in Mexico, led by Amextra. While the pandemic has made the process of illustrating the stories more complicated, we are proud of our advances today.
After an exhaustive selection among 20 candidates to be part of the team of illustrators, four people were chosen: two women who are not from the state of Chiapas, but have had contact with the Tzeltal communities, and two men who are from Chiapas: one is from the Chol indigenous region and another is from San Cristóbal de las Casas. To date, 11 stories have been illustrated; These have been meticulously elaborated by hand, painted in watercolor, seeking that the illustrations capture the sense of the problems that are to be addressed in each of the stories; so that this allows in the implementation, to generate the dialogue of the causes and effects of the violence problem. Three such stories are attached to this report, so you can see the richness of the drawings which will be used to spark dialogue.
The process has been slower than planned, since it is the first time it has been carried out virtually. We planned to have the illustrators concentrated in Chiapas for 8 to 10 weeks, so that they could dedicate themselves full time to the illustrations, and thus be monitored daily. But due to the pandemic, this had to be modified and carried out virtually. To facilitate the process we have had one or two weekly meetings with each artist to monitor their work and provide feedback. The stories are being assigned according to artistic abilities and also according to what they and they are choosing. In the first week of June a new illustrator joined to help finish more of the illustrations in a shorter time.
Starting on July 15th we should have all of the illustrations complete and will be able to advance to the printing of the books. Work with the communities is scheduled to begin in October, after the training of the facilitators in September.
We deeply appreciate your interest and investment in this life-changing work. Violence against women should not be a normal part of society and this project is gradually working to change this reality in Chiapas, Mexico.
All the best,
Stephanie
Manager of Fundraising and Strategic Alliances
www.amextra.org
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