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We bring medical clowns to Ukrainian children
who have been displaced and traumatized by the war.
OUR BACKGROUND
I Clown You Project started almost 10 years ago as a documentary film about medical clowns who work in hospitals in Israel. We filmed over the course of several years in hospitals all over Israel and Palestine.
The project has been growing and transforming over the years, our goals became broader. As we were working on the film we came to realize how powerful medical clowning is and how much it can give to people in traumatic situations.
We have created awareness programs, seminars, and collaborative projects involving amazing partners like the International Documentary Association, Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, USC, UCLA, Sinai Temple, the Israeli Consulate in Los Angeles, and even the Israeli Ministry of Health.
supporting Ukrainian refugees
We are a team of Russian-born women who left Russia at different times in the last 15 years. We feel a deep sense of responsibility and grief because of the devastation caused by the brutal war that Russia has unleashed on Ukraine. We want to do our part to help Ukrainians who have lost everything. We want to focus on supporting children who are the most vulnerable in this situation.
We are creating a project that will provide grants to teams of medical clowns who work with Ukrainian refugees and help them coordinate with local refugee administrations to create local programs to provide emotional support to the victims of the war. We also want to support performers, many of whom are themselves refugees and have lost everything.
HOW doeS IT WORK
Medical clowns are proper clowns (red nose, huge shoes ‐ the works, no white face though usually), who work in hospitals and disaster areas to make the experience a little, and sometimes a lot, less traumatic for everyone – patients, both kids, and adults, their loved ones, and also the medical staff. Balloons and bubbles are of course innate to the job but there are many more layers to this seemingly simple play.
Examples of programs that we plan to help put together include teams of clowns going to a refugee shelter three hours at a time, three times a week for six weeks. With this kind of consistency, clowns will be able to establish relationships with children, parents, and center personnel to lift the spirits of those traumatized by the war.
Another example is a team of clowns going to a refugee processing center to help encourage children while their parents deal with the processing of paperwork or details of room and board. These are just a few examples. We hope that with its financial and logistical help, local teams will come up with programs that fit the specific needs of each specific location.
We also will work on growing awareness and creating a sustainable source of funding for medical clowning programs to support Ukrainian children who will be dealing with PTSD in the coming years.
OUR PARTNERS
FINY NOSY (Kharkiv, Ukraine)
We have partnered with Finy Nosy who are originally from Kharkiv, Ukraine, one of the cities that have suffered most from Russian invasion. Finy Nosy is a professional team of clowns that have been working for 9 years. The members of the Finy Nosy team are now spread out over Western Ukraine. Besides organizing individual programs, Finy Nosy will be administrating payments and coordinating teams locally.
DR.CLOWN (Poland) www.drclown.pl
Dr. Clown is a Polish non-profit organization, that will be processing the distribution of funds locally. Dr. Clown is also lending its local network of connections to help us coordinate between clown teams and local refugee organizations. We are also helping Dr. Clown to organize additional training seminars with professional clowns who have experience working in disaster zones.
AGORA PRODUCTIONS (Los Angeles) www.agoraproductions.org
Agora Productions is our fiscal sponsor, a 501(c)3 nonprofit public benefit organization. They are helping us to process tax-deductible donations and helping us grow awareness around medical clowning programs in Ukraine through media to create a sustainable source of funding for them.
HOW TO SUPPORT
DONATE
You can make a tax-deductible donation through our fiscal sponsor, Agora Productions. You can make a donation with a check, bank transfer, or cryptocurrency.
BUY OUR NFT
More on that below but you can register for the allowlist on Premint.
WHO IS YORICK?
Yorick is the jester.
She sees the world as it is. She sees the pain and ugliness as well as the beauty and love. She always chooses to focus on the healthy side and she pulls you in with her. That is her superpower.
Yorick has no ego.
He is a fool. His judgment is poor by definition, so he just doesn’t judge at all. He walks in open to make a very simple, but truthful, personal connection.
Yorick is present.
He lives in the moment, free from the regrets of the past and the fears of the future. He absorbs the moment and turns it into his art.
Yorick is free.
She has nothing to prove because she’s a fool already. An idiot, she doesn’t disobey the rules ‐ she just doesn't know them. She challenges the order without being defiant about it, but by the mere fact of her playful being.
FAQ
WHAT’S AN NFT?
Non-fungible token (NFT) represents a digital asset registered on a blockchain.
HOW DO I GET IN TOUCH WITH YOU?
You can fill out the CONTACT FORM or find us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.