Connect and Create by Shades of Brown Girl

Shades of Brown Girl Family,

We’re FINALLY back with an in-person event and YOU’RE INVITED!

Join us for a night of colourful artistic expression, writing, chai, snacks and community building!

What's this event about?

We're exploring race, gender and identity by combining writing, poetry and performance with visual art-making.

We'll tell and share our stories through writing, open-ended prompts and conversation, collaging, and by playing with colour!

Co-facilitated by:

Amrita Kumar-Ratta and Hemangi Shroff (see their bios below!)

Questions we'll explore...

What's your story?

What does being a "good" brown girl mean to you?

What does "identity" mean to you?

What colours represent your experiences as a "brown girl"?

Event Flow

Create & Connect will have three parts…

1. Writing + Visual Art Workshop

Co-facilitated by Amrita Kumar-Ratta & Hemangi Shroff

2. Open Mic

Share your creations if you feel called, and support others who share

3. Mix + Mingle

Connect with your fellow brown sisters!

What’s included in the ticket price?

We are offering sliding scale pricing from $45 to $65 – please feel free to select the price point that works best for you.

Included in the ticket price are:

1. All needed art supplies

2. Chai, non-alcoholic refreshments & snacks

3. A surprise treat to take home!

A cash bar will also be open if you’d like to have an alcoholic beverage!

Proceeds from this event will fund our work at Shades of Brown Girl so that we can honour our ideas and energies as the creators and storytellers behind-the-scenes while honouring our vision to create a living community of storytellers that continues to gather season after season, year after year.

What else should you know?

If you choose to participate in the open mic portion of the evening, please feel free to bring something to share — whether that's something you're working on, something that's complete, or feel free to share what you create during the workshop.

The evening requires no prior writing, visual art-making, or performance experience, please come as you are.

Come play with words & colour

Let's Connect & Create!

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About Shades of Brown Girl:

Shades of Brown Girl is a creative community brown women storytellers. We are guided by a core belief in poetic resistance and reclamation. Born in 2017 as an autobiographical solo performance piece, SOBG has evolved into a global sisterhood - a platform for explorations of transnational South Asian femininity, for creative self-expression and for community healing. Our goal is to create, share, learn, and heal together. We are based in Toronto, Canada.

About Amrita Kumar-Ratta:

Amrita is a multidisciplinary professional. She is a trained theatre and dance artist working at the nexus of social research, creative storytelling, and healing justice. In addition to being a writer, creator and community facilitator, , Amrita is currently a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto. She is passionate about creating socially inclusive societies and focuses her creative work around themes of intersectional feminism and gender equity; migration, mobility, and the diasporic experience; and sustainable community development.

Amrita is the Founder & Creator of Shades of Brown Girl. She also works as a Research Consultant for Voice of Purpose, an industry platform for community transformation, personal empowerment, and social change through arts education.

Amrita's philosophy as a writer, creator, educator, and strategist is guided by principles of intersectional feminism, anti-racism, transformative justice, emergent learning, and empathetic leadership. She draws upon theories and frameworks of anti-oppressive practice, colour psychology, and other modes of psycho-somatic learning in order to make connections between the writing/creation of poetry and monologue, the experience of performance, and individual as well as community healing and social justice.

About Hemangi Shroff:

Hemangi began her career as an Artist Educator in Dubai where she worked as a facilitator with a studio called The Jam Jar. There she designed and facilitated school visit workshops for all ages. Her teaching practice is grounded in an authentic studio approach with a breadth for freedom to create. Her own artistic practice was spurred when she became a mother in a new country and art became her therapy. She was inspired by her Indian heritage and Indian folk art to make cultural mandalas and zentangles with a variety of inks. Her most recent artwork is a series of mixed media Cultural Abstracts inspired by the wide variety of textile patterns and weaves of India. Her work is also influenced by her upbringing in a progressive but conservative Indian family and constantly questioning gender roles defined by the society she grew up in. Find out more at https://hemangishroff.art/.

Host or Publisher Shades of Brown Girl