Competition “Don’t Label Others!”: Elena Pinchuk Foundation and «Vsi. Svoi» launch campaign against gender stereotypes
The idea of the project is based on the results of the gender stereotypes in Ukraine research, which was led by the international research company Ipsos, commissioned by the Elena Pinchuk Foundation project "I Can!" and "Vsi. Svoi” project.
The online poll defined the attitude of the respondents towards the most common stereotypes about women, which become the real social labels in the society. It turned out that the gender stereotypes issue in Ukraine still exists, and it is quite acute. 65 percent of respondents believe that the main role of a woman is to care for home and family. Ukrainians are still inclined to think that women are a weaker sex. Blond-haired women are considered intellectually limited, the women's initiative in the relationship is perceived as “easy”, a woman driving an expensive car is considered to have “a sugar daddy”, and her success is attributed to the support of her man.
"Why did we decide to talk about this using this exact format? For us, as a project that promotes Ukrainian producers, it is important that clothing does not turn into a subject of uncontrolled consumption. On the contrary, fashion is a powerful socio-cultural phenomenon that allows you to draw attention to important issues. Such as gender stereotypes. We want to help Ukrainians get rid of prejudices about women, which are widespread in modern society. We want women to be respected regardless of their appearance, financial circumstances, job, marital status, etc. And, of course, the organization of this competition will promote the development of an intellectual design - when things make you think and change something ", - says the author and the project manager "Vsi. Svoi" Anna Lukovkina.
"Our first line of T-shirts “with purpose" was a series of prints on safe sex. Putting on this kind of clothing item, a person became part of a major campaign to fight AIDS. Now we want to enable creative young people and designers to propose their own ways of protest against the most common stereotypes in the society. We hope that the T-shirt line "Don’t label others!" will be the beginning of a great discussion about stereotyping of one gender or another and will help women and men get rid of the labels. It is also important to note that this will be the first statistically well-founded line, because Ipsos conducted a sociological survey to select the main stereotypes about women in Ukrainian society," says, Olga Rudneva, Director of the Elena PInchuk Foundation.
Terms of the competition
The task of the competition is to create a capsule line of five unique uniformed T-shirts. Each T-shirt should contain a text/image of five "labels". Any designer or manufacturer of clothing can participate.
The winner of the competition will receive a targeted grant of 100,000 UAH, which can be used for training or business development. The line of the winner will be presented in the largest store of the Ukrainian brands "Vsi. Svoi” at the 27, Khreshchatyk Street, Kyiv and in the online store vsisvoi.ua.
You can submit your work to the competition by March 1, and the results will be announced on March 14. The winners will be selected by a jury consisting of the Co-founder and Chairwoman of the Ukrainian Fashion Week Organizing Committee Iryna Danylevska, the Founder of the LITKOVSKAYA brand, the five-time winner of the Best Fashion Awards in the "Best Women's Clothing Designer" nomination Lilia Litkovska, as well as the team from the Elena Pinchuk Foundation and “Vsi. Svoi" project.
You can find detailed information about the competition online on notags.design.
Vsi. Svoi – the largest platform of the Ukrainian brands
Vsi. Svoi – is a project that brings together about 2,000 local producers. It was founded by Anna Lukovkina in 2015 and started as a clothing, footwear and accessories market. Currently the project has six themed market trends: clothing and footwear, home and decor, ceramics, gastronomy, children's goods, jewelry and gifts.
In 2016, the team also opened the world’s largest Ukrainian brands store of clothing and footwear on 27, Khreshchatyk Street that represents over 250 manufacturers. In 2018, the second store on 34, Khreschatyk Street, which has 150 brands of home decor and interior: ceramics, textiles, decoration items, furniture, lighting, gifts and souvenirs, opened its doors.
The "I Can!" project
The project is designed to enable women who became famous through their successful work in politics, business, fashion, social and charity projects to share their success stories and achievements and support young women who are just beginning their journey. The project is being implemented with the assistance of the Coca-Cola Foundation.
Elena Pinchuk Foundation
Elena Pinchuk founded the Foundation in September 2003. In December 2017, the Foundation announced that the fight against AIDS would no longer be its only direction. Therefore, the word "ANTIAIDS" will not be a part of the name of the organization any longer. However, countering the HIV/AIDS epidemic will remain one of the priority issues of the Foundation. The main areas of focus are the fight against HIV/AIDS and a healthy lifestyle; mentorial and educational projects aimed at young girls and women; attracting the best international experience in the humanitarian sphere to Ukraine.
For more information, please contact Tetyana Fischuk, Director of Communications "Vsi. Svoi", [email protected], or Pavel Piminov, Communications Director, Elena Pinchuk Foundation: +380 44 490 4805, [email protected].
Design competitions and special lines of T-shirts: history
In 2010, the Elena Pinchuk Foundation announced the Naked Street Fashion Graphic Design Competition on safe sex. The task of the competition was to develop texts and inscriptions/images designs to draw on T-shirts and underwear. 617 participants from 11 countries participated in the competition. The competition’s prize fund was $ 16,000.
In 2011, the Foundation together with the restaurant network "Kozyrna Karta" has issued a special line of T-shirts "We are what we wear." Safe sex T-shirts were sold in the most popular Kyiv network’s restaurants - including those created by visitors themselves, to collect donations for the safe blood circulation materials in Kyiv hospitals. In the same year, a joint project with the PUMA brand was created - five young Ukrainian artists from the twenty nominees for the PinchukArtCentre 2011 Award presented their own versions of the design for the famous PUMA T7 sweater. Designer versions of T7 were sold in brand stores, and the funds raised were aimed at purchasing donor blood purification equipment at the Kyiv regional blood center.
In 2015, at the initiative of the Elena Pinchuk Foundation, young Ukrainian artists, nominees for the PinchukArtCentre Award, created art prints under the Fashion AID brand to raise money for the HIV-positive children, who were supported by the Foundation. Next year popular Ukrainian DJs created a special charitable line for the Fashion AID project in partnership with the Ukrainian Music Week. It was presented along with the Buro 24/7 Internet resource.
In 2016, on the Ukrainian Writing and Language Day, the Elena Pinchuk Foundation Fashion AID Project released a line of T-shirts devoted to the uniqueness and sexiness of the Ukrainian language. The collection "Your Language" was presented in conjunction with the Internet publication "Ukrainska Pravda. Life". The designer Sviatoslav Kobzenko created the T-shirt, which embodied his idea, based on letters and letter combinations, which are unique to the Ukrainian language.
In 2017, along with nuBEKh (designer Masha Bekh), in the framework of the One Night Stand project, a T-shirt “Before Sex” was added to the fashion kit containing condoms and HIV tests. The project was implemented in partnership with the TSUM.
In addition, in 2018 - the year of the Istanbul Convention Anniversary, the Foundation has issued a capsule line of zmist & forma T-shirts devoted to gender equality. Moreover, a year before that the Foundation issued a special T-shirt "I have the right to say NO!” that proclaimed the right of modern Ukrainian women to independently manage their lives and demand that society respect their actions and feelings.
