Leni Velasco

Leni Velasco is the co-founder and Secretary General of DAKILA, an artist-activist collective in the Philippines, and the Executive Director of its Active Vista Center. Under her leadership, DAKILA was the recipient of numerous awards such as the Amnesty International Ignite Award for Most Outstanding Human Rights Organization, the Freedom Flame Award, and the Human Rights Dutch Tulip Award. She served as Festival Director of the Active Vista Human Rights Festival which organizes social-impact film screenings, workshops, productions, and campaigns. She is a member of the Global Impact Producers Alliance (GIPA) and is part of the Governance Circle of the global network Innovation for Change. Her activism journey started when she was a youth leader at the university and deepened through her experience in the working-class movement. Leni is always in the middle of the hullaballoo in marrying art and activism and innovating civic engagement toward social movement building. She has decades of experience in utilizing art, media, and popular culture for social advocacies. She specializes in strategic communications, creative campaigning, and narrative change-making. When not busy being a task-oriented bitch, she dabbles in writing, travels alone, and attempts to put order in her chaotic life. She lives with two spoiled cats -Yeiztar and Zvezky.

Session:

• Civic and Youth Engagement Panel (Friday, April 12 - 5:30 p.m.)