Willa Shalit

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Willa Shalit
Willa Shalit

Willa Shalit (born 1955 in New York City, New York) is a Jewish-American artist, theatrical and television producer, photographer, author/editor, socially-conscious entrepreneur and philanthropist. She graduated from St. Ann's School and Oberlin College. She has said that all of her professional activities are efforts to "use art as a vehicle for social change."

Well-known members of her family include her father, critic Gene Shalit; her brother, Dr. Peter Shalit, author of "Living Well: The Gay Man's Essential Health Guide"; her maternal uncle, former New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis; her aunt, Margaret H. Marshall, Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court; and her cousins, television producer David Lewis, National Public Radio commentator Robert Krulwich, New York Times theater photographer Sara Krulwich, and motion picture production designer Naomi Shohan.

Shalit is married and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico and New York City. She and her husband, Michael Schneider, have one daughter, Natasha Schneider.


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[edit] Artist

Throughout the 1980s, Shalit created "lifecast" sculptures made from molds formed directly upon human faces and bodies. Her casts of five American presidents are in the collections of their respective presidential libraries, and other work is on display at the United States Olympic Committee's training center in Colorado Springs, Colorado, the Fogelson Library at the College of Santa Fe in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the Jewish Guild for the Blind in New York City. In 1994, Shalit and her lifecasting art were featured in the Emmy Award-winning television documentary, "Willa: Behind The Mask".

She was Artist-in-Residence at the College of Santa Fe from 1989 to 1994.

[edit] Producer

In 1985, Shalit produced James Lecesne's play "One Man Band" off-Broadway.

Shalit was the producer of the first anti-violence benefit performance of Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues in February 1998 in New York City and the Off-Broadway run of that play at New York City's Westside Theater from 1999 to 2003, and was the executive producer of the 2002 HBO film of the show. She was an executive producer of Until the Violence Stops, a documentary film about V-Day's 2002 activities.

She co-produced the 2002 Off-Broadway run of Ensler's "Necessary Targets", produced Carol Kaplan's play Jocasta Rising at the Artscape Theatre Centre in Cape Town, South Africa in 2004, and was an associate producer of the 2004 Broadway revival of August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom.

[edit] Photographer

Shalit's photos of Afghanistan, Rwanda and Israel have been published in the Chicago Tribune, The New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, Parade magazine, Marie Claire magazine, O, The Oprah Magazine, and distributed by the Associated Press wire service.

[edit] Author/Editor

Her 1992 book Lifecast: Behind the Mask details her methods and her experiences casting sculptures of the Dalai Lama and other notable persons.

Shalit also edited Becoming Myself: Reflections on Growing Up Female, a collection of essays and reminiscences by notable women that was published by Hyperion in April 2006.

[edit] Entrepreneur

To bring economic recovery to women in post-conflict zones, Shalit has worked to create markets in the United States for products manufactured jointly by Palestinian and Israeli women, and by women survivors of the Rwandan genocide.

Shalit's company, Fair Winds Trading, has become a leading importer of handmade goods from Rwanda; it has partnered with Macy's for the Rwanda Path to Peace project to market handwoven Rwandan baskets in the United States, and produced hand-beaded gemstone and glass bracelets in partnership with O, The Oprah Magazine.

[edit] Philanthropist

Shalit's Touch Foundation created an exhibit of touchable lifecasts of the faces of celebrities and other notable individuals, for the purpose of making those faces accessible to the blind and visually-impaired, which toured American museums from 1990 to 2000, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art in Memphis, Tennessee.

Shalit was a member of the Board of Trustees at the College of Santa Fe from 1990 to 1995.

She co-founded V-Day with Ensler and served as its first executive director. V-day is a non-profit organization that distributes funds to grassroots, national, and international organizations and programs that work to stop violence against women and girls.

Shalit served as a Special Advisor to the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM).

In 2007, Shalit joined the Board of Directors of the Hadassah Foundation.

[edit] Awards

Women's eNews named Shalit one of "21 Leaders for the 21st Century" in 2006.

The Holmes Report, a magazine for public relations professionals, gave a 2006 Superior Achievement in Branding and Reputation Award to Shalit's Rwanda Path to Peace project, which was also "highly commended" by the judges of the International Chamber of Commerce's 2006 World Business Awards in support of the United Nations Development Programme's Millennium Development Goals.

[edit] External links