Donatella Versace is making efforts to help children need get access to art lessons and art supplies. Versace will sponsor the Whitney Museum of American Art's Gala and Studio Party for the second year in a row. The party is on October 19, 2009, and will co co-chaired by Donatella, Penelope Cruz and Liz Swig. Donatella has worked with the museum's education department to create a new global project called Art Unites. The project's mission is to help expose children to art by asking U.S. and Chinese children to draw images using the theme of friendship.
Versace will provide canvases and art supplies to 500 children from the Starlight Children's Foundation in the U.S. and 900 children from Jet Li's One Foundation in China. The fashion house will then turn each of the resulting drawings into a canvas tote, which it will sell at Versace boutiques around the world and through the luxury sample sale e-tailer Gilt Groupe for about $200 to $250 in October. All proceeds from the sale will go to Starlight and the One Foundation.
"I have been blessed with incredible success in my life," Versace said. "And part of that success means being able to give back to people in need. As a mother, children's causes are especially close to my heart, and I am honored to be able to work with the Whitney on the creation of a program that inspires children through the arts."
The initiative will kick off on July 1 with an afternoon event at the Whitney with children from the New York chapter of the Starlight foundation. Versace herself will be on hand, along with an undisclosed artist, to assist these children with their drawings.
Once all the drawings are assembled, a panel of judges, which will be led by the designer and Adam Weinberg, a Whitney director, will pick a winner from each charity. Versace plans to feature the two winning designs on her runway show in Milan in September.
Donatella has also worked with the One Foundation to open a second
Versace One Foundation Children's Centre in Shuimo, Wenchuan, in China's Sichuan Province. The centers help displaced victims of the earthquake that devastated the region. Donatella and Jet Li teamed up to tour the area and
find out what the survivors needed.
