Burma / Myanmar - Human Rights Watch / 2100 in 2010 - (2010) 1:45 (USA)

Nice to have a case study with the proper soundtrack to go with it, to really get a feel of how this worked. The beauty is that for each pen taken, a bar is removed from the prison windows. People who took a pen did get the tactile feeling of actually helping, it's not just a scribble on a piece of paper, it's the steel-file that will get people out of there.

On June 22, 2010, Human Rights Watch, in collaboration with the advertising agency, JWT, launched 2100 in 2010, a public outreach and education project in Vanderbilt Hall, in the historic Grand Center Station to raise awareness about Burma's 2,100 political prisoners. The installation-- a massive mock prison of 200 miniature cells, each framing a photograph of a Burmese political prisoner inside a prison cell of detachable pens--allowed supporters to remove the pens, thus removing the bars of the cell, and sign a petition calling upon Burma's military rulers to free the political prisoners.

JWT, New York