#FASHION FILTER: Perceptions of Beauty

Image courtesy of Jen Kiaba

#FASHION FILTER:  Perceptions of Beauty
Monday, April 7, 2014 from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM (EDT)
Wix Lounge 235 W 23rd St New York, NY

An inspiring conversation about the perceptions of human beauty through art and design. We are proud to feature an amazing group of panelists each with their own perspective and artistic discipline.

Fine-Art Photographer, Jen Kiaba  

Choreographer,  Jennifer Montoya of Touch Theory

Fashion Designer, Tabitha St Bernard-Jacobs

Author, Illustrator and Parsons Teacher, Laura Volpinesta

Journalist and ethical fashion advocate, Bianca Alexander, Esq.

Moderator:  Francisca Pineda, EthicalFashionAcademy founder 

In addition, we believe in action and encourage you to bring one unique item of clothing that you are ready to part with for a very special swap exchange following the panel discussion. 

$5, FREE for students
 RSVP here:
http://www.eventbrite.com/e/fashion-filter-tickets-10829392003

This event is sponsored by Wix Lounge, the easiest way to make a professional website or online portfolio.


Jen Kiaba is an award winning fine art photographer based in Hudson Valley, NY. Her work seeks to examine and reclaim the soulful beauty and sensuality in the female form by addressing cultural mores and structures that both society and her culture of origin place upon women. Her newest body of work, "Burdens of a White Dress" recently received the Julia Margaret Cameron Award for Women in Photography.
Fine art: http://www.jenkiaba-fineart.comCommissioned Portraiture: http://www.jenkiabaphotography.com

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"At the Helm" Jen Kiaba Fine Art Photography

Bianca Alexander, Esq. is an EMMY© award winning TV journalist, yogini and ethical fashion advocate. She is currently the Director of Communications for Fashion Revolution USA, a global campaign in 30+ countries mounted after the Rana Plaza sweatshop factory collapse in Bangladesh to bring more justice and transparency to the global fashion supply chain. In 2007, Bianca launched Conscious Living TV, a digital media platform  covering the people, places and pioneers on the front lines of sustainability and evolution. Bianca has curated and produced several of the top eco-fashion shows in the U.S., including Vert Couture and THREADS, and has covered the ethical fashion movement from the runways of Paris to New York and L.A. Bianca has presented around the world as an expert on sustainable fashion, including at the World Congress on Organic Cotton in Interlaken, the Textile Exchange, and Green Festivals across the U.S. Bianca is a graduate of Princeton and the University of Virginia School of Law. Connect with her on twitter @ConsciousTV or Conscious Living TV’s facebook fan page.
http://fashionrevolutionusa.org

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Tabitha St. Bernard is the co-founder and designer of Tabii Just, a zero waste clothing line designed and manufactured in New York City. Drawing on Tabitha's rich Trinidadian heritage, the aesthetic of Tabii Just is a marriage of Caribbean flair and Brooklyn edge, resulting in vibrant prints done in stream-lined silhouettes. Tabii Just has been featured on NY1, Style Blazer and Essence Magazine among others. Tabitha is a graduate of the Fashion Institute of Technology. She honed her skills while interning at Vivienne Tam and working at Tahari ASL. She left the corporate fashion industry to launch Tabii Just, which is committed to supporting New York-based labor and resources. Tabii Just clothing is manufactured in facilities that uphold fair labor practices in Brooklyn and the Garment District. Tabitha also blogs for various outlets about fashion and beauty with a focus on sustainability. 
http://tabiijust.com/

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Laura Volpintesta, BFA 1995 Parsons School of Design (NY and Paris), has been teaching since 1997 (BFA Fashion pattern/draping/sewing) and 2000 (AAS Fashion drawing, design, portfolio).  While on the full time faculty, she developed Parsons Fashion's first fully online fashion studio art and design class in 2008 which she still teaches. Only now, she refuses to teach the unrealistic body proportions that she learned to draw as a fashion student.  Founding Fashion Illustration Tribe, shecreates and guides online fashion art and drawing courses to foster "fashion in our own image": fashion and portfolio courses that offer an alternative to expensive, university programs by encouraging study from home that embraces sustainability, diversity and inclusion, integrity, honesty, and small business models in a non-competitive, encouraging community environment more aligned with a sustainable lifestyle. This is founded on the belief that the kinder we are to ourselves, the kinder we will be with the outside world.  She just published her first book the Language of Fashion Design on Rockport featuring designers and models from all continents and biographies of men and women with unique approaches to design, materials, and business.  She is also a homeschooling mother, doula, and  singer, primarily of Brazilian jazz and MPB, who believes celebration, affirmation, craft, color, joy, and positive energy are fundamental to fashion.  "True Fashion is both a personal and a public service".  
http://www.fashionillustrationtribe.com/

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Choreographer, Jennifer Montoya, formed Touch Theory Dance and uses her background in improvisational dance to create movement which caters specifically to the strengths of the dancers. I often ask the dancers to "see each other," in rehearsal because there is a lot happening in the dance musically, technically, spatially and it can frazzle a performer. It takes focus to create great dance and when the dancers take the time to see each other it has an instant calming effect on the whole piece.
Read more at http://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwdance/article/Touch-Theory-Dance-Presents-PANDEMONIUM-214-15-20140211#osf1dV6Fv6jPOYaJ.99

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Theresa VanderMeer is an American tech-professional and the founder of social enterprise, WORK+SHELTER, an ethical outsourcing solution and a safe space where women in India receive training and earn a fair wage. Theresa is a graduate of the University of Michigan and currently lives in Brooklyn. NY. She is interested in women's empowerment, how technology can be harnessed for social change, and deeply identifies with the statement, "Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity."
www.workshelter.org 

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Tamara Leacock is an artist and blogger who uses the vocabulary of fashion to explore themes of environmentalism, social justice, and imagination. Her current fashion line, ReciclaGEM, is a line of unique unisex pieces of wearable art, constructed from recycled materials, and designed with the idea of transcending domineering cultural design values in mind. Through her designs, blog, artistic collaborations, and travels, Tamara seeks to galvanize people around exploring how fashion can be a vehicle, and think tank, for addressing critical social issues to enact and inspire positive social change.
Website: www.reciclagemny.com
Blog: www.reciclagem-themovement.com

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