THE UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS EXHIBIT
UDHR show in Manhattan
UDHR show in Manhattan
Exhibit at the Surrogate Courthouse, lower Manhattan, 1998. 1998 Exhibit at the Surrogate Courthouse, lower Manhattan. Foreground: artist's daughter with tiara.
UDHR paintings - William T. Ayton & Diana Ayton-Shenker
UDHR -- Ayton & t-shirt
William T. Ayton and his wife, Diana, in England in 1991, soon after the paintings were created. Ayton wearing his own art (in t-shirt form) in the patio, Instituto Frances, Seville, Spain, 1992.
Diana & UDHR posters UDHR paintings
Diana poses in front of a wall of posters for the Seville show (part of Expo '92), Spain, 1992. Detail of Articles 1 & 2, from the Seville show, Spain, 1992.

Click here to see the UDHR paintings on the udhr.org site.

History of the exhibit:
1990: The original 30 black-and-white drawings were completed and exhibited in England (University of Essex), The Hague, Netherlands (The Peace Palace) and Krakow, Poland (The Jagiellonian Institute Summer School).
1991: The color paintings (acrylic on card) were created: the first 20, in Yorkshire, England; the final 10 in Paris, France (this accounts for the slight discrepancy in size between the paintings - standard paper sizes vary between the UK and Europe).
1992: The paintings are shown for the first time in The Instituto Frances (French Institute) Seville, Spain (August, 1992), as part of World Expo '92, then tour the province. The images are also featured on Canal Sur TV in a segment on a local news program, with a live interview with the artist and a montage with the paintings interspersed with archival footage relevant to the subject matter.
1993: The exhibit is shown at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, as part of the celebrations of the 45th anniversary of the UDHR.
1997-98: The paintings go on a 5-city tour of the US (Chicago, Washington DC, San Francisco, Minneapolis and New York) for the 50th anniversary of the UDHR. They are also projected at a symposium at the National Arts Centre in Ottwawa, Canada, and broadcast in Dec. 1998 by the CBC as part of a documentary on human rights, "Beauty For Ashes".

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