WOW - Women of the World İstanbul 2021

The British Council has brought together the WOW Foundation in the UK and the Sabancı Foundation in Turkey to run the first Women of the World Festival in Istanbul on 5-6-7 March, in celebration of International Women’s Day. WOW  is a global movement that believes a gender equal world is desirable, possible, and urgently needed, and WOW Istanbul brought together women across Turkey to be part of this movement. WOW Istanbul festival focused on Seeing the City through Women’s Gaze, and shared women’s stories through music, performance, videos, discussion and debate to give voice to women from all over Turkey being accessible to all on the digital.  The programming of WOW Istanbul Festival has been realised by the British Council Head of Arts Esra A. Aysun, with the collective support of the curation team formed by Sabancı Foundation Programs Coordinator Ayşegül Bayar and Sabancı Foundation Programs Director Özen Pulat, and the advisory board formed by Asena Günal (Anadolu Kültür), Aslı İkizoğlu Erensü (Sabancı University), İpek Bozkurt (We Will Stop Femicide Platform), Özlem Ece (İKSV), Rümeysa Çamdereli (Havle), Ülker Uncu (BGST).

WOW Istanbul aimed to be accessible to all under the consultancy of ‘Erişilebilir Her Şey’ (Everything that is Accessible): it incorporates enhanced accessibility tools for all visually and hearing-impaired audiences. Simultaneous Turkish sign language interpretation, Turkish and English subtitle interpretation and simultaneous interpretation into Turkish is available throughout all broadcasts (except the civil society workshops)

You can still hear from a diverse range of voices on gender equality and watch inspiring performances of music and dance from Turkey and the UK on this page.