American NGO Les Couleurs Charity will hold its first Christmas Gala in Lithuania

Les Couleurs Charity is an NGO founded by Aura Copeland and Raminta Lilaitė, two Lithuanian ex-pats living in the United States. Aura is a former Lithuanian model currently residing in Miami, Florida. At the same time, Raminta is the Director of Communications and PR expert who is back in Lithuania and now living in Vilnius. The American NGO created by Lithuanians will celebrate its first Christmas Gala in Lithuania on December 8th, 2022, at the lovely Artis Hotel in Vilnius old town starting from 7:00 PM.

The NGO was born when Aura and Raminta went to Haiti for the first time. During their first trip to Haiti, they visited several schools and orphanages, spoke with their principals, and tried to acknowledge how they could change the lives of the most vulnerable kids.

This is how the idea for their CREATE program was born. A few weeks later, Aura returned to Haiti, where she began teaching art herself at two orphanages. In due course, she started recruiting and training local tutors, expanding their curriculum to enrol more orphanages into CREATE, their arts, design, music, and dance program.

The NGO aims to inspire, educate and empower children who come from underprivileged socio-economic backgrounds through arts education and creativity. Their CREATE Program gives vulnerable children the tools to unleash their creativity and teaches them skills that will help them get artistic opportunities or even careers. You can learn more about their CREATE Program at: https://lescouleurscharity.org/

How do they raise funds? First, they raise funds by collecting donations of artworks (paintings and sculptures) directly from artists and private collectors. Since the most important thing is to help children, the organization accepts pieces from all styles and all kinds of artists (amateur, emerging, and internationally renowned), as long as the artwork is original and of a certain quality. Then the NGO organizes galas where they auction the art pieces, and the money they obtain is used to fund their CREATE program in Mexico, Haiti, and Nepal.

Les Couleurs Charity is an organization that has worked only in Miami and New York. Exceptionally, in 2015, a benefit gala was organized at Grand Hotel Kempinski in Vilnius together with Rimanto Kaukėno paramos grupė. However, they did not organize any other events in Lithuania after that event. Since June 2022, Liudvikas Jakavičius has been the representative and ambassador of Les Couleurs Charity in Lithuania and aims to organize three charity galas annually.

Les Couleurs Charity and Liudvikas Jakavičius are excited to invite the Lithuanian public to their first Christmas Gala in Lithuania, which will take place on December 8th, 2022, from 19:00 to 23:00 at Artis Centrum Hotel in Vilnius’s old town.

They will be exhibiting and auctioning twelve paintings donated by their benefactors. During the event, the guests will be able to enjoy a pleasant art exhibition while being delighted with live music from the Lithuanian band ”Terapija” (some of their members were in Lietuvos balsas this year) and one DJ. The auction will be a silent auction, meaning that the public will be able to place a bid on the painting (s) they liked by filling out a bid form that will be located next to the painting. When time’s up (end of the event), the highest bid wins the artwork, and the winner will be notified to proceed to donate the agreed amount to Les Couleurs Charity via their official website (lescouleurscharity.org).

At this auction, there will be paintings by amateur Lithuanian artists, professional Lithuanian artists, and artists of international stature from other countries. Among the well-known names that will be showing and donating their works are Brianda Fitz-James Stuart (Spain), Julija Jankelaitytė (Lithuania), Leonardo Nierman (Mexican with Litvak roots – a piece donated by art collector Liudvikas Jakavičius). Also, Linas Kaziulionis (Lithuanian who won the prize as Best Young Baltic Artist in 2022 – a piece donated by art collector Ornela Ramašauskaitė), Rolandas Žigonis (Lithuania), and Skaistė Semenikė (Lithuania). Other lesser-known artists but also talented and eager to support this good cause are Andželika Bilytė (Lithuania), Austė Kavaliauskaitė (Lithuania), Daiva Šuminė (Lithuania), and Greta Skya (Lithuania).