Date: Monday 19 February 2018 Contacts: [email protected] / 020 7921 0967 ​ ​ [email protected] / 020 7921 0678 ​ New names and events announced for Southbank Centre’s WOW - Women of the ​ World festival ​ Southbank Centre today announces new events and artist appearances for its WOW - ​ Women of the World festival, supported by Bloomberg, including a Clarence House ​ ​ ​ International Women's Day reception with the Duchess of Cornwall, performance from Laura Mvula as part of Women on the Move Awards, an exclusive Tatty Devine partnership and ‘How to change the world in a day’ event for more than 200 London school girls. ​ From 7-11 March, Southbank Centre’s annual flagship festival, WOW - Women of the ​ ​ ​ ​ World, brings together leading voices across culture, business, politics, art and activism for a ​ packed programme of enlightening talks, debates, music, comedy, poetry and networking, ​ celebrating womankind. New names featured in this year’s line-up include: Diane Abbott, Sughra Ahmed, Nazeem ​ Akhter, Diane Atkinson, Dane Baptiste, Cally Beaton, Hermon and Heroda Berhane, ​ ​ ​ Sophia Blackwell, Malia Bouattia, Rosie Boycott, Nina Brochmann, Victoria Adukwei ​ ​ ​ Bulley, Christine Burns, Gemma Cairney, Jen Campbell, Angela Clerkin, Michelle ​ ​ Daley, Caitlin Davis, Stacey Dooley, Reni Eddo-Lodge, V.A Fearon, Janie Galloway, ​ ​ ​ ​ Emma Gannon, Carrie Gracie, Professor Jacqui Gibb, Ayesha Hazarika, Afua Hirsch, ​ ​ Dame Vivian Hunt, Libby Jackson, Mariéme Jamme, Baroness Helena Kennedy, Anna ​ ​ ​ Kessel, Vanessa Kingori, Rachel Krys, Samara Linton, Ayan Mahmoud, Laura Marks, ​ ​ ​ ​ Francesca Martinez, India Martin, Catherine Mayer, Zara McFarlane, Louise Marshall, Pat Mitchell, Michelle Moore, Ayesha Mustafa, Laura Mvula, Sue Nelson, Lola Olufemi, ​ ​ Cressida Pollock, Jack Rooke, Esmeralda Conde Ruiz, Alice Russell, Julie Siddiq, ​ ​ Jackie Simmons, Anna Soubry MP, Ellen Støkken Dahl, Jo Swinson MP, Halla ​ ​ ​ Tómasdóttir, Sophi Tranchell, Katharine Viner, Sophie Walker, Natasha Walter, Jenny ​ ​ ​ ​ Waldman, Helen Walmsley-Johnson, Deborah Williams and more. ​ ​ ​ This year’s festival celebrates the seismic changes brought about by women and men historically on gender equality, and identifies the future solutions still needed to overcome modern day challenges for women and girls. The wider WOW London 2018 line-up includes Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Laura Bates, ​ ​ ​ ​ Munroe Bergdorf, Josette Bushell Mingo, Vicky Featherstone, Janice Galloway, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Hyeonseo Lee, Kathy Lette, Li Maizi, Dame Helena Morrissey, Dr Helen Pankhurst, Angela Saini, June Sarpong, Ahdaf Soueif, Jordan Stephens, ​ Sandi Toksvig and Ruby Wax. ​ ​ View the full listings for WOW London 2018 HERE. ​ ​ ​ In the100th anniversary year since the first British women won the right to vote, WOW ​ London 2018 celebrates those who have broken silences and changed the world throughout ​ ​ history, and provides space for those still finding their voice. ​ ​ ● Dr Helen Pankhurst, great-granddaughter of Suffragette leader Emmeline, explores ​ women’s rights, then and now; ● Women on the frontline of global movements, such as Patrisse Khan-Cullors, ​ ​ ​ co-founder of Black Lives Matter, and Laura Bates of Everyday Sexism, join those ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ making a change in their neighbourhoods, like Women for Grenfell, who share their ​ ​ perspective nine months on; ● Leading voices such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Reni Eddo-Lodge, Dame ​ ​ Helena Morrissey and June Sarpong and politicians Sophie Walker, Diane Abbott ​ ​ ​ ​ MP, Anna Soubry MP and Jo Swinson MP take a candid look at the position of ​ ​ ​ women in society, from the home to the boardroom, the prejudices still present there and how to make change; ● Southbank Centre will host Make a Stand from the Mayor of London’s ​ ​ #BehindEveryGreatCity campaign, an exhibition of life-sized images of key figures ​ ​ from the suffrage movement and pioneering contemporary women, united across time by courage in their convictions and the strength to stand up for change; ● Outstanding performances from Sandi Toksvig’s Mirth Control: Arts over Tit, and ​ ​ Gemma Cairney’s Margate club night Gem’s Jam, to EVE Female Pro-Wrestling a ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ jaw dropping wrestling and stunt show fueled with cabaret, comedy and more. International artists and thought leaders bring their personal reflections from Li Maizi, one of ​ ​ ​ ​ China’s ‘Feminist Five’, detained by police on the eve of International Women's Day 2015 for protesting sexual harassment on public transport, and Gulalai Ismail, a Pashtun human ​ ​ rights activist and recipient of the 2017 RAW in WAR ‘Refusing To Be Silenced’ award, to ​ ​ ​ survivor activists Silke Grygier and Winnie M Li. ​ ​ ​ ​ Women’s sexual, reproductive and mental health will be widely discussed. Author Angela ​ Saini, Gina Rippon, Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Neuroimaging and Adam Rutherford, ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ scientist and BBC broadcaster, discuss how science got women wrong; the myths of the vagina are debunked with scientists Nina Brochmann and Ellen Støkken Dahl authors of ​ ​ ​ ​ The Wonder Down Under: A User’s Guide to the Vagina which will be published on ​ International Women’s Day. International Women's Day activities, on 8 March, see more than 200 London secondary ​ ​ ​ school girls amass at Southbank Centre for a ‘How to change the world in a day’, WOW ​ Schools Day. Girls and teachers attending will write a protest-song with Girls Rock London, ​ learn about the Suffragette Centenary with Fawcett Society, become Future Inventors with WOW supporters AIG and Greenlight for Girls and join a mass celebratory dance with Myself UK dance and female DJ collective Born and Bread. The same day,The Duchess of Cornwall, President of WOW - Women of the World ​ ​ ​ Festival, will host a WOW reception at Clarence House to celebrate this year's festival and ​ ​ ​ the growing WOW movement of women and girls, attended by a glittering list of influential ​ ​ women. For WOW London 2018, Southbank Centre is working with long-time partner, independent ​ ​ British jewellery company Tatty Devine, on an exciting new range. Tatty Devine have ​ ​ collaborated with artist Poppy Chancellor, of Poppy's Papercuts, to interview six amazing women, and created jewellery as a response. The women are: founder of Hackney Gazettes Bwalya Newton, Gemma Shiel, Director and Designer at Lazy Oaf, artist Lakwena Maciver, Hula hooper extraordinaire and author Marawa Ibrahim, artist and prop maker Rosy Nicholas and performer and writer Rhyannon Styles. The new range will launch on 1 March at Southbank Centre's Royal Festival Hall shop, and be on sale there exclusively for the first week of a month-long Tatty Takeover, in celebration of WOW - Women of the World. The ​ ​ ​ WOW Market is also returning, showcasing the best of female entrepreneurship and those ​ British businesses working towards a more gender-equal world. ​ WOW London 2018 also sees the return of the Women in Creative Industries Awards on 7 ​ ​ ​ March, recognising the women progressing equality in the arts and creative industries, with judges including Tate Director Maria Balshaw CBE; Anne-Marie Curtis, Editor-in-Chief of ​ ​ ​ ​ ELLE Magazine; Martin Green, CEO & Director, Hull City of Culture 2017; Amy Lamé, ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ London’s first Night Czar and co-founder of Duckie; and Dame Julia Peyton-Jones DBE, ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Senior Global Director of Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac. View the Women in Creative Industries Awards shortlist nominations here. The Women in Creative Industries Day will feature ​ ​ networking and keynotes curated by Creative Industries Federation, including, announced today, Cressida Pollock, CEO of English National Opera, on Being a Leading Lady, and ​ ​ ​ ​ keynotes from comedian, writer and actress Francesca Martinez and Vanessa Kingori ​ ​ ​ MBE, the youngest and first female publisher of British GQ, the first black publisher in Condé ​ Nast UK history and the new UK Vogue publisher. Further topics explored across the festival include: disabled motherhood, deafness, ​ childlessness, childcare, endometriosis, sexual pleasure, the dating game, pensions and power and women in politics and homelessness. Additional subjects covered will be, women in space, women in business, China’s two-child policy, sexual consent, ‘code switching’ survival strategies for black women at work, women and alcoholism and if women dream of a different future, celebrating women in science fiction and the bicentenary of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Founded by Southbank Centre Artistic Director Jude Kelly in 2010, who announced in ​ ​ ​ January that she will leave the arts centre in May 2018 to further globally develop the festival, WOW is now the world’s largest convener of women and girls, with more than ​ ​ 480,000 visitors during WOW London 2017, and over 2 million participants globally. ​ ​ WOW - Women of the World festival founder and Southbank Centre Artistic Director, ​ Jude Kelly CBE, said: “There has never been a more timely need for our WOW festival, an ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ unsparing but lively public examination of the untapped potential of women and girls and how we can fulfill it, buoyed by a riotous celebration of what we are and how far we’ve come. “It’s 100 years since the majority of women in the U.K. finally won the vote and as those women showed it’s only by standing together side by side that we can produce the seismic societal shifts we saw last year. But in the intervening years, so much has remained unjust,