Frank Schaeffer In Conversation with Laura Dawn, exploring the intersection of Art & Activism.
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Laura Dawn is a filmmaker, writer, producer, political strategist, and the founding Creative & Cultural Director of MoveOn.org. She is currently the Founder, CEO, & Chief Creative of award winning social impact agency ART NOT WAR. An 18 year veteran of creating and directing social impact campaigns, Laura’s social justice media content has reached over 1.5 billion worldwide--40 million just this year alone. Laura was the co-creator of Bush in 30 Seconds (2013), the first user generated political ad campaign, a groundbreaking campaign now taught in advertising & communications textbooks across the world. Laura has personally written & directed over 200 online videos and short-docs, and in the past decade served as producer and creative director for over 500 media pieces and produced 2 full length documentaries. She has extensive experience in data driven creative content, digital strategy, producing over 1 billion dollars of earned media for social justice campaigns.
Awarded the Paul Wellstone Citizen Leadership Award of 2004 for the 2004 Staff of MoveOn.org, articles on Laura Dawn & her work as an activist have been featured in Vogue, LA Weekly, the NY Times, Village Voice, Time magazine, Salon, & USA Today. Laura has been a speaker and panelist on the merger of artists and online activism at the Venice Biennale, the Guggenheim Museum, Tokion, the Sundance Film Festival, Carnegie Hall, & many others.
Named one of the nation's Top 100 Creatives by Origin Magazine, as “The Most Important Person in Politics That You Don’t Know About” by MSNBC, and featured alongside Ruth Bader Ginsburg in the book "200 Women Who Will Change The Way You See The World", Laura currently serves as a Creative Consultant for Fenton Communications, and is on the Advisory Boards of not-for-profit organizations including The Climate Emergency Fund, Campaign to Unload, The Climate Mobilization, The Hometown Project, Swayable, Adopt A Kitchen, and The Peace Studio, founded by Maya Soetoro-Ng. Laura is also the co-founder of the Emily’s List Creative Council. In 2021, Laura Dawn was named a 2020 Edmund Hillary Fellow in New Zealand, and is currently a Fellow for N Squared Innovators, aiming creatives, scientists and policy makers at global nuclear nonproliferation.
An accomplished singer / songwriter and performer in her spare time, she appears with long time collaborator Moby on the multi platinum album "Hotel", their psychedelic blues collaboration The Little Death, and has performed as a backup singer with Lou Reed, Kris Krisofferson, Donovan, Bettye Lavette and many others.