One of the reasons behind the founding of Red Poppy is the belief that there can never be enough non-profits—all working together and not competing—that there can never be enough positive projects working on the grassroots level in Latin America or the world.

Words are incredible, but words must lead to action, direct action. We will focus on using art and literature to enrich, empower, and engage, enabling progressive social change.

We are currently planting the seeds of a variety of projects. This summer a team of us are heading to Central America to paint murals with local children (and older artists.) We believe murals are one of the most powerful and public tools to empower and confront social issues.

We are in the process of developing a collaboration with a  collective printmaking studio in Pablo’s old barrio in Santiago, and with casagrande, a group of activist young Chilean poets. Besides producing a dynamic journal in both paper and hyper editions, “neither bought or sold,” they carry on amazing public political activities with poetry. 

Before America's 9/11, there was another one in Santiago, Chile when the dictator Augusto Pinochet bombed the Presidential Palace on September 11, 1973 to remove the democratically elected President Salvador Allende. As a counter reaction to the bombing, Casagrande, which was born during Pinochet’s 17-year regime, rented a helicopter and dropped 100,000 poetry leaflets on the Presidential Palace on March 23, 2001. The group followed with similar poetry bombings in Dubrovnik, Croatia and Guernica, Spain -- both cities bombed in the past during military conflicts. See video below of some of their actions.

In 2004, we partnered with our compañero Todd Brown to help his art house in San Francisco through a critical stage. From the Red Poppy Art House mission statement: "We are dedicated to providing an accessible and intimate experience of the arts. We are convinced that the joy and power of the arts lay in the creative process much more than in the creative product. We are committed to bringing that process into the public light." The art house hosts interdisciplinary arts events, collaborative exhibitions, classes, small concerts, and programs for the children of the community. 7x7 SF magazine named the Art House San Francisco's Best All Around Art Venue, "having established itself as the de facto hub of anything and everything culturally inclined." Visit the Art House here.

We are now in the early stages of a fair trade organic agricultural project in the sacred Valle del Elqui in Chile, where farmers are subjected to high amounts of dangerous chemicals. We are also starting a biodiesel project there.

For more information, please write to us.

Please help us with our projects by joining Red Poppy as a member of our family, our jardín.

The Poetic Bombing of Guernica by three young Chilean poets:

During Pinochet's dictatorship, a major street in Santiago was renamed Avenida 11 de Septiembre, in "honor" of the day of the coup that killed Neruda's companero Salvador Allende. It happens to intersect with the street named "The Old Guard." The Avenue still retains its name today, for many, reminding them of the darkest day in their country's history. See the young poets of Casagrande in action: