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SPEAKING

“In a world besieged by authoritarian leadership, freedom of speech and all civil liberties are in jeopardy. Theatre artists have emerged as essential change agents, working selflessly in areas of conflict, often at personal risk, to introduce hope and strategic plans of action for emotional and creative survival. Unique among them is the award-winning playwright, and social activist Catherine Filloux, who for more than thirty years has made this her personal mission. Catherine's creativity as artist, playwright and librettist has been an unrelenting presence in challenging areas of conflict across the globe and she maintains essential connections with the artists and civic leaders as she uncovers new areas of distress and need. Catherine exemplifies the invaluable role that artists play, arming her creative colleagues with the tools and the courage to persevere.”

 

―Joan D. Firesteone, former executive director of The Moth

and co-director, LPTW Gilder-Coigney International Theatre Award Program

Theater veteran Jan Buttram, founder of Abingdon Theatre Company, interviews Catherine Filloux about her award-winning plays and passionate hope as an artist changemaker.

Filloux has served as a speaker/panelist at playwriting and human rights events and organizations around the world including:

 

  • University of Michigan Donia Human Rights Center, Ann Arbor, MI

  • Making Rights Real, Edinburgh, Scotland

  • HowlRound Theatre Commons, Emerson College, MA

  • Gilder/Coigney International Theatre Award Program Events, New York, NY

  • University of Rochester, International Theatre Program, NY

  • Aragon High School Performing Arts, San Mateo, CA

  • Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University and GBH Forum Network, Boston, MA

  • The Abuja Writers’ Forum (AWF) Abuja, Nigeria

  • Dramatists Guild Institute, NYC

  • Pen America World Voices Festival, NYC

  • Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School, NYC

  • Library of Congress, International Literature Series, Washington D.C.

  • Theatre & Resistance Symposium, The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, CUNY Graduate Center, NYC

  • Japan Society Performing Arts' Rest in Peace, New York, a public forum, NYC

  • American Library Association Annual Conference, Alexander Street Press Breakfast, Atlanta, GA

  • Distinguished Speaker Series, Monmouth University, School of Social Work 40th Anniversary, West Long Branch, NJ

  • Playwriting Workshop for Teen Leadership Summit, Girl Scout Council of Greater New York, NYC

  • Mount Holyoke College-Simmons College-Smith College, The Women in Public Service Project, Reconstructing Societies in the Wake of Conflict, MA

  • hotINK at the Lark, NYC

  • Bridges of Understanding's annual conference, Emotionalizing Arab Identity in the Digital Age, Mead Center for American Theater, Washington, DC

  • Visions and Voices, the USC Shoah Foundation Institute, Los Angeles, CA

  • NYU Abu Dhabi Institute, NYC  

  • The University of British Columbia, A Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies International Roundtable, Breathing Life Into the Ashes: Resilience, Arts and Social Transformation Vancouver, Canada

  • Assumption College, Women’s Studies Program, Worcester, MA

  • Marymount Manhattan College, Postcolonial Drama and Performance, NYC

  • Brandeis University, “Just Performance: Enacting Justice in the Wake of Violence; Justice-Seeking in Cambodia” Waltham, MA

  • Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice, University of San Diego, “Women, Media, Revolution: Acting Together on the World Stage”

  • Theatre Communications Group Conference, Los Angeles, CA

  • Brown University, Literary Arts, Providence, RI, “Khmer Voices Rising: An International Freedom-to-Write Literary Festival Program”

  • NoPassport Dreaming the Americas Conference, Nuyorican Poets Café, NYC 

  • Culturehub, Artalk, “Maricia Jean, Haitian Activist, Co-Founder of FAVILEK, Fanm Viktim Leve Kanpe, Women Victims Get Up, Stand Up, A performance and panel discussion to honor and remember Haitian women and girls on the anniversary of the earthquake”, NYC

  • Yale University, School of Drama, New Haven, CT, International Theater Practice

  • Kean University, International Conference on American Drama, Union, NJ

  • Rutgers Newark, The Center for the Study of Genocide, Conflict Resolution, and Human Rights, “Art and Disaster: Hurricane Katrina Five Years Later”

Cat at LaMama_edited.jpg

Catherine Filloux with LinDa Saphan and Angel Gil Orrios, Photo by Logan Reeder, La MaMa Theatre, New York City

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  • Facilitator/Curator/Co-Planner, TWB Conference - Acting Together on the World Stage: Theatre and Peace Building in Conflict Zones, La MaMa, NYC 

  • Fordham University at Lincoln Center, Theater Department, “Theatre & Peace Building in Cambodia Symposium,” NYC

  • Panelist, Fordham Law School, Leitner Center for International Law and Justice, “Brown Bag Lunch Series on International Human Rights,” NYC

  • Women’s History Museum, San Diego, CA 

  • Amnesty International Human Rights Art Festival, Silver Spring, MD

  • Wesleyan University, Cosponsored by Wesleyan's Mansfield Freeman Center for East Asian Studies, Middletown, CT, “A Talk: The Making of Where Elephants Weep”

  • Left Forum, Pace University, “Playwrights Rekindle the Radical Imagination” NYC

  • Dalton School, Assembly Sponsored by the Human Rights Club, “A Talk and Excerpt from Dog and Wolf,” NYC

  • United Nations, 54th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women, “IPJ Women PeaceMakers Program”

  • NoPassport Conference, Nuyorican Poets Café, “Applied Theatre: Genocide Drama in Community,” NYC 

  • Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) Young Leaders Event, NYC

  • “ReOrient Forum, Golden Thread, Middle East Center Stage, Theatre and Peace-building,” San Francisco, CA

  • Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, NYC, The Program in Holocaust and Human Rights Studies, “Panel Discussion on Genocide and Human Rights for the Book Launch of Silence of God and Other Plays”  

  • DePaul University, College of Law, International Human Rights Law Institute, Chicago, IL, “Advocacy, Expression & Education, Exploring Human Rights through the Arts: Picture This”

  • Keynote Speaker, Southern Connecticut State University, 10th Annual Interdisciplinary Research Conference, “The Wake of Memory Lemkin’s House: Remembering Genocide,” New Haven, CT

  • Amnesty International, Mercer County Group, Princeton, NJ

  • The Bushwick School for Social Justice, Brooklyn, NY; Multiple Sclerosis Society, Seattle and New Orleans Chapters in conjunction with The Breach, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Seattle, WA, and Southern Rep, New Orleans, LA 

  • Youth Culture Arts Network International Conference, “Shared Spaces,” Sligo, Ireland

  • Rideau de Bruxelles, Théâtre Marni, co-sponsored by RCN Justice & Démocratie, Brussels, Belgium, “Colloquium Devoir De Voir, in conjunction with La maison de Lemkin”

  • California Institute of the Arts, “Arts in the One World: Culture and Identity Conference,” Valencia, CA

  • Claremont McKenna College, Claremont, CA, “Lessons and Legacies Conference on the Holocaust, Lemkin’s House”

  • StageSource, “The Artist as Citizen: the Boston Theatre Conference,” Boston, MA

  • International Peace Research Conference, Calgary, Canada, “Theatre and Peacebuilding”

  • Smith College, Northampton, MA, “Women and War in Performance”

  • Theatre Without Borders at New Dramatists; NYSF/Public Theater, “Imagining Chinatown: Dramatizing Cultural Spaces,” NYC

Host Dave Will interviews Catherine Filloux about her work as an artist activist, for EO 360°, top podcast made by entrepreneurs, for entrepreneurs:

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Podcasts:

Art Heals All Wounds by Pam Uzzell

Arts Calling

Death in Cambodia Life in America

Women Who Dare

EO 360 by Dave Will

First Online With Fran

The Unpredictable with Host Onder Deligoz

Steve Cuden StoryBeat

Words First: Talking Text in Opera​

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