Community Event + Workshop

International Denim Day: Jeans Mending Drop-in Workshop

April 26, 2023
12:00 pm to 6:00 pm

On International Denim Day, screenprint or block print on a patch to mend your jeans with. Photo credit: FWM Education staff. Denim Day logo courtesy of Peace Over Violence.

Originating from Italy in 1999 and occurring in tandem with Sexual Assault Awareness Month, International Denim Day is all about spreading awareness around sexual violence issues, supporting survivors, and educating ourselves and others. Join FWM and Philadelphia Center Against Sexual Violence (WOAR) for this drop-in workshop focused on healing and mending. Bring a denim item to mend with an iron-on patch to decorate with screenprinting and woodblock printing. From 5–6 pm, join a conversation around the healing process for survivors, led by WOAR’s clinicians, counselors and masters level public health professionals.

Learn more about Denim Day at denimdayinfo.org

Organized in conjunction with Henry Taylor: Nothing Change, Nothing Strange.

Event Information

April 26, 2023
12:00 pm to 6:00 pm

The Fabric Workshop and Museum
1214 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107

Suggested donation of $5. Proceeds from this event will go to Philadelphia Center Against Sexual Violence (WOAR).

Register

About Denim Day

Denim Day is a campaign on a Wednesday in April in honor of Sexual Assault Awareness Month. The campaign began after a ruling by the Italian Supreme Court where a rape conviction was overturned because the justices felt that since the victim was wearing tight jeans she must have helped the person who raped her remove her jeans, thereby implying consent. The following day, the women in the Italian Parliament came to work wearing jeans in solidarity with the victim. Peace Over Violence developed the Denim Day campaign in response to this case and the activism surrounding it. Since then, what started as a local campaign to bring awareness to victim blaming and destructive myths that surround sexual violence has grown into a movement. As the longest running sexual violence prevention and education campaign in history, Denim Day asks community members, elected officials, businesses and students to make a social statement with their fashion statement by wearing jeans on this day as a visible means of protest against the misconceptions that surround sexual violence.

About the Participants

Philadelphia Center Against Sexual Violence, formerly known as Women Organized Against Rape, was founded in 1971 and incorporated in 1973. Founded by former FWM Artist-in-Residence Jody Pinto and other women for the purpose of providing support for sexual assault victims and their families and of working with the community to prevent rape, WOAR is Philadelphia’s only rape crisis center and one of the first in the nation. Over the years the organization has grown from a group of volunteers working in a small room of a hospital to an organization that touches individuals across the city.

WOAR’s services include: Counseling Department (Survivor Services): WOAR’s 24-hour crisis hotline, bi-lingual/bi-cultural individual therapy to survivors and their loved ones, group therapy to victims/survivors, forensic exam accompaniment, court accompaniment, direct services are offered for free to all survivors of sexual harassment, sexual abuse, sexual assault, and sex trafficking/ commercial sexual exploitation; Education & Outreach Department: provides trainings within schools, social service organizations, and the community at large, specializes in working within the Latino communities of Philadelphia; and other specialized programs.

Learn more at woar.org

Support

Major support for Henry Taylor: Nothing Change, Nothing Strange has been generously provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, with additional support from Katie Adams Schaeffer and Tony Schaeffer, Hauser & Wirth and Anonymous donors.

In-kind support has been provided by RAIR (Recycled Artists in Residency) and Hauser & Wirth.

Major support of FWM is provided by the Marion Boulton “Kippy” Stroud Foundation. FWM receives state art funding support through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. Additional support is provided by Agnes Gund and the Board of Directors and Members of The Fabric Workshop and Museum.