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OUR GUIDE to Africa: Kat Kol-Kes
ARTivist | Writer | Scholar | Designer | Performance Artist
Meet OUR GUIDE for the OutRight Challenge, Kat Kol-Kes (Katlego Kai Kolanyane-Kesupile).
Kat will be guiding us to explore human rights, activism and the arts. She is one of four global activists selected to be in the 2019 OutRight Religion Fellowship Program. The Fellowship is aimed to defend LGBTI people from the impact of religiously motivated violence and discrimination. Kat is a Botswana-born Trans* ARTivist, using various art forms for human rights activism and advocacy, bridging the gaps created by jargon and societal insecurities. 
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Kat Kol-Kes is a TED Fellow, the author of the poetry book "On About the Same Old Things," founder and Creative Director of the Queer Shorts Showcase Festival (Botswana), an alumnus of the Young African Leadership Initiative and a member of the Mellon Mays Fellows Professional Network (MMFPN). She has previously served as Curator of the Gaborone Hub of the World Economic Forum initiative- Global Shapers Community, and was a 2016/17 Chevening Scholar.
Kol-Kes is a graduate of Sociology at Goldsmiths University of London, UK, with an MA in Human Rights, Culture, and Social Justice, as well as of the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, with an Honours degree in Dramatic Arts. ABOUT THE OUTRIGHT FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM The OutRight Fellowship Program has been made possible by support from the Global Faith and Equality Fund of the Horizons Foundation. It invests in LGBTI movement building across Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean by training activists to harness the international system for promoting human rights for LGBTIQ people. The program provides direct experience at UN advocacy and expands the networks across the UN system. Furthermore, it aims to increase visibility and engagement of LGBTI human rights defenders from these regions within high-level UN forums in New York. The activists participate in five UN convenings in New York over the 12 months: the Commission on the Status of Women, the High-Level Political Forum on the Sustainable Development Goals, UN General Assembly High Level week, OutRight’s annual Week of UN Advocacy and OutRight’s OutSummit Conference. |
