The International Human Rights Art Festival Returns For Its 6th Year

The International Human Rights Art Festival (IHRAF) returns to New York City for its 6th year. During the week of December 9th to 15th, sixty new shows will be presented including new short musicals, dance pieces, one act plays, solo shows, poetry, puppetry, and musical acts.

Over 200 local and International Artists will showcase their work which revolves around pressing social issues such as climate change, religion, immigration, caregiving, identity, diversity, LGBTQIA+, women's empowerment, and more. Performances take place at The Tank in midtown Manhattan.

IHRAF was founded in 2017 with the mission to amplify the critical voices of artists who bring human rights issues to the forefront of conversation and to inspire social change around the world. IHRAF, a 501c3 non-profit believes in a world where artists are free to use their creativity to provide an engine for social change, and their work is honored as a human right.

Tom Block, IHRAF's Founder and Executive Director shared his thoughts on this year's festival, "As an organization that highlights and supports activist artists around the world, we now become one of them, instead of simply innocent bystanders in the international struggle for justice and human rights. As America enters its most challenging era since the Civil War, we will stand not with or against one or the other political parties, but for our values: human rights, social justice and celebrating diversity, equally for all people."

"Our artists open space through their own sincerity and vulnerability (no anger or finger-pointing, justified though it may feel) for conversation, understanding and appreciation of the 'other,' however imagined. Our work is based on our common humanity, and the talent, passion and creativity of our performers."

During the week, twelve performance blocks will be presented which will feature a mix of genres and include specific themes such as a Celebration of Women, Celebration of Immigration, Celebration of Human Rights, and Climate Change Action, among others.

Three short musicals will be presented including ANOTHER COUSIN'S WEDDING, where a closeted gay man is about to be set up with a traditional marriage, TURBULANCE follows three people who end up helping each other overcome fears on a flight from New Jersey to Milwaukee, and BIG ASS SECRET about a gay Florida highschooler.

Twenty-five dance pieces will be presented including MOTHER EARTH, LET ME BLOOM!, a multi-layered, dance theater experience that centers on the euphoria, dysmorphia, and oppression of the trans and genderqueer community, ECHOES, a contemporary, hip-hop, and traditional Filipinx dance forms, elevated by cutting-edge motion capture technology, and WE RISE that addresses the critical issue of domestic violence, aiming to uplift and empower women worldwide.

Twenty-four theatre pieces will be showcased including the short play ƎVERYTHING OKAY, where a family relocates to Mars to avoid the problems the earth faces, MOONLIGHT BECOMES YOU, set in a haunted Provincetown Bed & Breakfast, a young lesbian couple discover the queer trailblazers who came before, and LUCY JOSEPH, that centers around a 19th century gender non-conforming pioneer Lucy Ann Joseph Israel Lobdell

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