One Million Bones To Lay 50,000 Bones in Congo Square This Saturday

By Molly Oehmichen

This Saturday, April 7th, 2012, One Million Bones will lay 50,000 handmade bones in New Orleans’ Congo Square.

One Million Bones is a project founded by artist-activist and former TED Senior Fellow Naomi Natale to raise awareness of genocide in Somalia, Sudan, and Myanmar. The project has previously completed an installation in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and the New Orleans installation will mark the official launch.

In a recent Huffington Post article, Naomi wrote, “Out of this work come hundreds of conversations about what we value, human rights, our global connectedness, and personal responsibility. In New Orleans, many of these conversations reveal stories of personal encounters with violence — unnecessary and unexplainable violence that individual students are left to consider and confront every day in their own communities.”

Bones for the event in New Orleans were created locally through the Students Rebuild challenge. Every bone created generates a $1 donation, up to $500,000 total, from the Bezos Family Foundation to support work on the ground in Somalia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Bones have been created all over the country as part of the challenge including cities such as Phoenix, Tallahassee, Detroit, and Charlotte.

One Million Bones is aiming to complete a collaborative installation of 1,000,000 bones on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. in the spring of 2013.

The event on Saturday in New Orleans is being filmed for a documentary and One Million Bones is still seeking community members to participate in laying the bones. Volunteers are asked to wear white to represent solidarity and peace. For additional information or to register, contact nnatale@onemillionbones.org.

Molly is the current Editor-In-Chief of Silicon Bayou News. Molly’s interests include start-up culture, financial modeling, and psychology. In addition to editing for SBN, Molly blogs at her personal website and you can dive into the conversation with her directly on twitter. View author profile.