THE POINT Comes to NYC For Climate Week 2018

Comics Uniting Nations, Greenpoint Innovations, Hypokrit Theatre Company, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, and UNICEF are collaborating to present THE POINT: a Climate Week NYC (CWNYC) 2018 affiliate event - a series of artistic activations that will use a unique blend of the arts to inspire and inform about climate change and the value of forests, both locally and globally.

For the theatrical performances, Hypokrit Theatre Company, in association with Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, will present Elements of Change, written by playwright Divya Mangwani, directed by Hypokrit Artistic Director Arpita Mukherjee, and coordinated by Rattlestick Managing Director Annie Middleton. Elements of Change is a theatrical event based on "Tré: The Adventures of Brother Earth," the comic book by Sona Sridhar, winner of the inaugural UNICEF Climate Comic Contest. The piece draws inspiration from real-life events such as deforestation in Brazil and floods in India and explores Sridhar's personal journey in creating her climate-saving superhero "Tré." It also highlights similar stories from young people all over the world who are responding to the major environmental issues of today, celebrating the youth movement that is trying to affect change for a better present and future for all. Inspired by the long tradition of Indian street theatre, Elements of Change will travel to several locations over the course of CWNYC, beginning at Kingsland Wildflowers in Brooklyn, following the 3rd Annual Kingsland Wildflowers Festival on Saturday, September 22nd. The event will be free to the public.

Sridhar said, "I am very excited. I love the fact that I use art as a medium to express what people can do for the environment. And I wish through this comic children learn more about climate change in a fun way."

Immediately following the performances, the partners will host post-show panels made up of diverse groups of professionals, creators, and thinkers from both the arts and sustainability and will allow for audience questions.

In tandem with the theatrical portion of THE POINT, Greenpoint Innovations has teamed up with South-Africa based street artist Sonny (http://sonnyonline.com/), and Brooklyn-based artist duo ASVP (https://www.asvp.nyc), to produce thematically-aligned public murals on the walls of Intermediary School 318, a north Brooklyn NYC public school, aiming to engage youth in conversations around leading global issues through in-community artistic expressions.

"Climate change is among the greatest threats humanity has ever faced and children are the most vulnerable to its impacts. Young people are becoming increasingly involved in climate action - but cannot do it alone. It's up to all of us to elevate young voices and action to secure a sustainable future." said Gautum Narasimhan, Senior Advisor- Climate, Energy and Environment at UNICEF.

CWNYC is one of the key summits in the international calendar and has been driving climate action forward since it was first launched by The Climate Group in 2009. This year, shortly following the Global Climate Action Summit in San Francisco, CWNYC will continue the global momentum towards finding the solutions, including the #forgottensolution that forests have the potential to achieve 30% of the climate solution by 2030.

Stephen Donofrio, Principal and Founder of Greenpoint Innovations, said of the project, "Our shared ambition with a project like this is to leverage our combined tools, in this case the arts and sustainability awareness, to inform and inspire the broader public. We want to build the needed bridges to connect local communities to the high-level global discussions, policy negotiations, and activities related to the critical issues of our time, including climate change and tropical deforestation."

PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE:

Date & Time: Saturday, September 22nd, 4:30pm-6:30pm

Location: Kingsland Wildflowers

Date & Time: Wednesday, September 26th, 6pm-8pm

Location: The New School

Date & Time: Friday, September 28th, 4pm-7pm

Location: Castillo Theatre

TICKETING & MURAL INFO

Reserve free tickets to the events, follow the progress of the murals, and learn about our venue partners and supporting organizations: http://www.greenpointinnovations.com/cwnyc2018.

ABOUT THE PARTNERS

COMICS UNITING NATIONS

Comics Uniting Nations is a partnership between UNICEF and NGOs PCI Media, The World's Largest Lesson and Reading with Pictures, to make the Sustainable Development Goals accessible to the citizens of the world through comics. With the help of creative, academic, publishing and technology partners from around the globe we have created a series of comics which address issues from gender equality to plastic pollution. The series leverages the universal visual language and transformative power of comics to educate people in every corner of the globe about the SDGs and empower them to create positive and lasting change in their own communities and worldwide.

GREENPOINT INNOVATIONS

Greenpoint Innovations (GPI), based in Brooklyn, New York, is a purpose-lead company that leverages on-the-horizon data and media collection technologies, the arts, and in-depth sustainability expertise to support sustainability initiatives and deliver compelling insights, unforgettable stories, and unique messaging distribution channels.

Founded in 2014, GPI is a sustainability expertise and creative hub of passionate consultants, academics, storytellers, and directors, working with our partners to tell their stories to support their priorities, and ultimately to raise awareness of both the great challenges we face today, as well as the technologies, tools, and solutions available to solve them.

THE POINT represents the third consecutive year that GPI is coordinating a Climate Week NYC affiliate event. In 2016, the team produced The Greenest Point - collaborating with dozens of partners and internationally-acclaimed artists to produce murals and illuminate Greenpoint's iconic water tower with solar-power green lights, and in 2017, presented a short docufilm, Stewards of the Forest, with Forest Trends, the Yawanawa indigenous people, and USAID. GPI has worked with a number of other leading non-profits, including Environmental Defense Fund, National Wildlife Federation, and The Nature Conservancy, corporations, and also local political leaders and community organizations such as North Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, NYC Together, and Town Screen BK.

For more information visit http://www.greenpointinnovations.com/.

HYPOKRIT THEATRE COMPANY

Hypokrit (n.): Actor (Ancient Greek)

At Hypokrit Theatre Company, our mission is to encourage artistic inquiry by providing artists from minority communities a platform for their voices and work. We work towards shaping and molding the artists of tomorrow by encouraging original and groundbreaking voices that bring an innovative approach to the arts.

Founded in 2014 by Arpita Mukherjee and Shubhra Prakash, Hypokrit made waves by bringing a radically reimagined Bollywood version of Romeo and Juliet to Access Theater, earning the company a certificate of special recognition from Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney. Since then, Hypokrit has produced How to Succeed as an Ethnically Ambiguous Actor starring Zenobia Shroff from The Big Sick first at Paradise Factory and then in co-production with The Castillo Theatre and Eh Dah? Questions for my Father at NYMF. Eh Dah? was named one of the top 10 musicals at NYMF by Playbill and Time Out, and was reviewed by the New York Times as "a celebration." It is slated for a run in Spring 2019.

Hypokrit strives to embody the rich cultural complexity of the world we live in through our work. Our work is culturally specific, but ultimately about the universality of the human experience. We are a company exclusively run by and wholly dedicated to minority communities.

For more information, visit www.hypokritnyc.org

RATTLESTICK PLAYWRIGHTS THEATER

Founded in 1994, RATTLESTICK PLAYWRIGHTS THEATER is an Obie-Award winning theater that has created, developed, and produced over 100 World Premieres. Our mission is to present diverse, challenging, and provocative plays that might not otherwise be produced and to foster the future voices of the American theater. Rattlestick's Managing Director, Annie Middleton, is lead coordinator of the theatrical production of THE POINT.

When we take on a playwright, we guarantee them a second production, regardless of the reception of the first. We have produced the first plays and early works of some of today's leading voices, including Annie Baker (The Aliens), Sheila Callaghan (That Pretty, Pretty), Jesse Eisenberg (The Revisionist), Roberto Aguirra-Scasa (Dark Matters), Martyna Majok (Ironbound), Adam Rapp (The Hallway Trilogy), Lucy Thurber (The Hilltown Plays), Jonathan Tolins (Buyer and Cellar), and Craig Wright (The Pavilion). We have also produced works by some of our nation's most important playwrights, including Craig Lucas (Ode to Joy), Dael Orlandersmith (Horsedreams), and José Rivera (Massacre, Sing to Your Children). We produce theater to inspire empathy and provoke conversations in response to the complexities of our culture. For more info visit www.rattlestick.org.

UNICEF

UNICEF works in some of the world's toughest places, to reach the world's most disadvantaged children. Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, to build a better world for everyone.

Last year, UNICEF and Comics Uniting Nations implemented a Climate Comic Contest, asking children and youth to submit a planet-protecting superhero for a chance to produce their very own comic book. After thousands of submissions and votes on the top heroes, the book 'Tre: Adventures of Brother Earth' was written, illustrated and produced by the young winner, Sona Sridhar, a 21-year-old from Chennai, India with the support of Comics Uniting Nations and DeCheser Media.

Follow UNICEF on Twitter and Facebook

DIVYA MANGWANI

Divya Mangwani is a playwright from Pune, India, based in New York. She was the founder and Artistic Director of Moonbeam Factory Theatre (MFT), where she wrote and directed plays that were staged all over India, Singapore and Glasgow. MFT used theatre as a tool for education for underprivileged students and conducted workshops in high schools. Her plays include Yes, Uncle (semi-finalist,Page 73 Playwriting Fellowship 2018; finalist, Leah Ryan Fund for Emerging Women Writers 2018), Rise of the River (Pipeline Theatre Company), For Sale (Theatre East; Dramawallah Theatre), Turn off the Lights (Earth Day, Blue Frog), Sometimes, Stillness (a dance drama with djembe music) and One, Two, Three (best script, director, play and audience vote, Short+Sweet Festival; World Theatre Day, Khichidi Theatre). Before theatre, Divya worked as a journalist and editor for media houses like ESPN, Times of India and Crisis Response Journal. Her grandparents are from Sindh and she has grown up listening to stories about the Partition. She is currently working on a three play cycle about Sindh. She is currently a 2050 NYTW Fellow. MFA: Tisch, NYU.