Event will support UNEP's
climate change campaign and the UN Millennium
Development Goals
Nairobi, 20 February
2008 - A weekend-long art festival will
bring together 120 performers from around
the world in Kenya to raise environmental
awareness. The Earth Festival will take
place on 22-24 February at the Laikipia
Nature Conservancy, a nature and biodiversity
oasis in Kenya's Rift Valley. The event
is being organized by Kenya-based environmentalist
Kuki Gallmann in support of the climate
change awareness campaign of the United
Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
UNEP welcomes the aims
and aspirations of this ambitious event,
which is the first of three shows on the
theme of water as part of the AQVA Project.
Proceeds will go to water projects to help
communities in the Great Rift Valley and
Laikipia region, and especially areas which
have suffered as a result of the recent
unrest in Kenya.
Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary
General and UNEP Executive Director, said:
"Science informs the head, music the
heart and art the spirit?three unique human
qualities that must all be motivated if
we are to answer the sustainability challenges
of the 21st century."
"UNEP, through
its own Art for the Environment Initiative,
is therefore proud to support the Trust
and the Foundation and publicize its latest
creative endeavor," he said.
The objective is to raise
environmental awareness through art with
the participation of musicians, dancers,
and other artists from Africa, Europe, the
Middle East and the Americas. Following
the premiere, the show will tour capitals
around the world. A group of young Italian,
Kenyan, Serb, German and American documentary
makers will film the making of the event.
The organizers hope
that after the post-election violence which
has erupted in Kenya, the event, by bringing
together people from across the world and
having a strong environmental focus, will
contribute to the restoration of peace and
bring a positive image of Kenya to the world.
Notes to editors
Project AQVA is organized by the Great Rift
Valley Trust and the Gallmann Memorial Foundation,
in association with the Italian Fondazione
Ipazia and with support from the Italian
Ministry of the Environment. The aim of
the project is to create three live open-air
shows involving major outdoor-theatre companies:
Compagnia di Valerio Festi in 2008, Fura
del Baus in 2009 and Franco Dragone in 2010.
The event is part of
the Great Rift Valley Earth Festival, which
started in 2005 and brings together artists
from around the world every year. In 2007,
the Trust with the Gallmann Memorial Foundation
embraced the UNEP-federated Billion Tree
Campaign and fulfilled their commitment
to plant one million trees through the festival.
For more information visit http://www.gallmannkenya.org/earth/
or email event@gallmannkenya.co.ke
Or contact: Nick Nuttall, UNEP Spokesperson/Head
of Media
