V-Day New York City, KOREATOWN 2011 presents...THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES

ABOUT THE SHOW:

The Vagina Monologues, written by playwright and activist Eve Ensler, broke ground, offering to the world a piece of art like nothing it had seen before. Based on dozens of interviews Ensler conducted with women, the play addressed women’s sexuality and the social stigma surrounding rape and abuse, creating a new conversation about and with women. The Vagina Monologues ran Off-Broadway for five years in New York and then toured the United States.

The Vagina Monologues could be more than a moving work of art on violence; Ensler divined that the performances could be a mechanism for moving people to act to end violence.”

OUR SHOW: After each performance, there will be a reception where photographer Gil Seo will feature work from our recent V-Day campaign photoshoot, and visual artist Chang-Jin Lee will exhibit some of her work on comfort women. There will also be areas for our sponsor organizations to provide information to the audiences/community about their work and dedication to end violence in the Korean community.

WHY KOREAN: “The Vagina Monologues” has been performed all over the world in various different languages. There has yet to be a production specifically by and for the Korean-American community produced in New York City.

As the central melting-pot of the world, it is shocking to see how our community is still silenced by overall aspects of female sexuality. Even the term “vagina” has often been an immense source of shame and secrecy for many of us because of tradition and assumptions of Korean femininity. With V-Day: Koreatown, 2011, our team hopes to unlock some of this silence, and encourage audience members and the Korean community to empower our women. The show has successfully generated broader attention and funds to end violence against women and girls all over the world, and we feel that now more than ever there is a need to bring this attention closer to home and even closer to our ancestry.

The goal is not to just perform. The goal is to participate to the best of our abilities to move audiences to act and re-think Korean female sexuality . With the collaboration of actual Korean community organizations that support this cause, we wish to spread awareness also of the existence of the organizations themselves and their commitment to end violence against the women of the Korean community.

V-Day New York City, Koreatown 2011 presents

a benefit performance of

“The Vagina Monologues”

Directed by:

Elena Chang & Kate Russell

CAST:

Juyoun Ahn, Sora Baek, Elena Chang, Youri Cho, Gina Kim

Soomi Kim, Eunjee Lee, Sunny Lim, Sam Yim

PERFORMANCES:

Sunday, March 20th ——8PMhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfAviZuLES4

Monday, March 21st —– 8PM

Abingdon Theater

312 West 36th Street

Tickets are $25 and can be purchased at

http://www.theatermania.com/content/show.cfm/show/178502

or by calling 212.352.3101

* All proceeds benefit KAFSC (Korean American Family Service Center) and the International V-Day movement