Creating Beautiful Trouble: A Workshop for Activists

Facilitated by Mora Fernández and Hannah Brancato

Co-hosted by the Stamp Gallery and CARE

November 12, 5:30-7:30 p.m.

Creating Beautiful Trouble is a workshop that draws from an open-source toolkit of the same name. After viewing examples of “artivism” from the toolkit, and Mora Fernández’s research in Latin America, the facilitators will lead students in ideation about their own artistic strategies to resist sexual violence. The workshop will invite students to reflect on their lived experiences, analyzing the problems and possibilities that they face in constructing a supportive culture for survivors and in building consent culture.

This workshop is in conjunction with the current exhibition at the Stamp Gallery, We Will Not Be Silent: Art Transforming Rape Culture, on view from October 30 to December 15, 2025.

About the facilitators:

Mora Fernández (she/her) is an author for the “We Will Not Be Silent” catalogue, where she is writing about how activism is remembered and memory is built. She is a Mexican ARTivist, consultant, human rights defender, survivor, and advocate for victims of child sexual abuse with 25 years of international experience creating innovative, disruptive and radical advocacy and artistic projects to fight against sexual violence, heal trauma, reclaim joy and pleasure, and change public policies. She is the Founder and CEO of La Casa Mandarina AC (LCM), and co-director of FORCE: upsetting rape culture . She became involved with the Monument Quilt when LCM led the Mexican branch and focused primarily on the experiences of undocumented migrants and Latinx survivors. Mora is the co-investigator of a research project between LCM and the University of York, UK: “From feeling to resisting: artivist impact, resistance and knowledge on sexual and gender violence in Mexico.” 

Hannah Brancato (she/her) is the curator of the exhibition, a current PhD student in American Studies at the University of Maryland, and an artist. Her research focuses on memory work and the role of art in anti-sexual violence movements, and is informed by her role as co-founder FORCE: Upsetting Rape Culture, an art/organizing collective active from 2010-2020, that produced a range of creative interventions to create a culture of consent. FORCE is best known for the Monument Quilt , a collection of 3,000 stories from survivors of sexual violence, written, painted, and stitched onto red fabric. Her current collaborative artwork, Dreamseeds, is currently on view at the Baltimore Museum of Art.

This exhibition is supported by a Do Good Institute Campus Fund Grant, Arts For All, and the Maryland State Arts Council. Programming is supported by the LGBTQ+ Equity Center, the Student Experience and Disability Culture Initiative, and CARE to Stop Violence. 

Support for the Monument Quilt final display in 2019 was provided by many supporters, including Open Society Foundation, Robert W. Deutsch Foundation, Jane Brown, Eva Fury, Catharine Kappauf and Clarke Hitch, Shelley and Charles Kappauf, Gretchen Rohr, Doreen Bolger, Twig George, Robbye Apperson, Cricket Arrison, John and Virginia Hitch, Rachel Smith, the DC Mayor’s Office of Victim Services and Justice Grants, The Baltimore Community Foundation, Fury Donor Fund, Zanvyl and Isabelle Krieger Fund, William G. Baker, Jr. Memorial Fund, NoVo Foundation Move to End Violence, Maryland Institute College of Art, National Museum of Women in the Arts, T Rowe Price Foundation, Susan Hayes Enterprises, Lanningsmith Studios, Hopeworks of Howard County, and National Women’s Law Center.