OUR MISSION

RISE believes in the power of art to change people and people to change the world.

Using art as a catalyst, our objective is to intersect art and activism to fund anti-trafficking organizations fueling conscious-raising actions and innovative, effective solutions. The promotion of personal transformation, resilience, community solutions, and agency are core values in our mission.

Our vision is to use artistic collaborations and actions to spread the message that we all have a responsibility to build a world where human beings do not own human beings and to end trafficking. To achieve our mission, we have garnered a team of revolutionary activist artists and influencers, and partnered with the largest and most established programs working to end global human trafficking, namely Voices4Freedom, Apne Aap, and Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW).

All profits from proceeds will directly support survivors and benefit these anti-trafficking organizations and their efforts.

Naima Penniman, Climbing PoeTree

Layla does not shy away from taking on the heaviest topics or the darkest corners of our society. Art is our weapon, our medicine, our voice, and our vision. The metamorphic process of the butterfly is what Layla creates as she travels the world to bring awareness and light.

Love was deeply impacted by the work ethos and grassroots mobilization as she accompanied Climbing PoeTree and provided documentation for this 50 city tour.

Layla Love, Founder

Our vision is to use artistic collaborations and actions to spread the message that we all have a responsibility to build a world where human beings do not own human beings and to end trafficking. 

"My whole point is to shock people into action and then to have a means of action available to them, Love says of her work, most recently aimed at ending human trafficking. A series of new shows and images compel viewer confrontations with stark slavery and desecration alongside elevated visions of liberated woman-defined sexuality. Any resulting dissonance among viewers is answered with a means to resolution as well, and it is here that Love’s work surpasses former explorations of horror. Rise of the Butterfly, a non-profit dedicated to combating human trafficking and to supporting its survivors, will benefit from the photography, as will any who see it and who contribute by purchasing works or a Rise of the Butterflybook. Founded by Love with feminist icon Gloria Steinem, Rise of the Butterfly empowers viewers beyond simply discomforting them even as the work empowers its subjects by bringing their suffering out of shadows. From the gallery walls, the viewer is given the honor and the means to bring the work outside again, back into the world transformed into change, and that makes the show satisfying as well as provocative."​

Layla Love

PRESS

&PRAISE

Rise of the Butterfly brings us art and purpose. What can be better than that?

Gloria Steinem, Mentor