In a world marked by rising authoritarianism, globalized techo-colonialist violence, division and ecological crisis, peace has been co-opted by a dangerous agenda.
In reclaiming and reckoning with what work must get done in the name of peace, we can no longer treat it as a distant aspiration, it must become a shared daily practice rooted in justice.
Around the world, people are demanding change, often without acces to nonviolent civic tools.
PEACE IS A PRACTICE is a large-scale cultural and educational campaign designed to equip communities with tools for collective action and conflict transformation through public art, open-source education, and civic engagment.
Manifesto
Peace is not a destination. It is a practice — daily, deliberate, embodied. Something we cultivate throughout our lives, or we lose it entirely.
We are living through a moment of extreme harm. States enact, and institutions defend, violence in the name of a “peace” that renders the word not only meaningless but dangerous - peace was never their objective, rather the name of their distraction. Relationships fracture under the weight of fear and judgment. We are not asking you to look away from any of that. We are asking you to stay, because the work of building a world worth living in cannot wait for conditions to improve.
Conflict is not proof of our failure. It is proof of our interdependence. We are not at odds because we are broken; we are in tension because we are bound to one another across difference, across history, across wounds that haven't healed. The question was never who is right. The question is always: how do we learn to live together?
We believe justice is the precondition for peace — not its reward. Peace without justice is compliance dressed in the language of status quo. Real peace is active, internal as much as relational, structural, and fought for. It requires us to embrace the opportunities available through conflict and its transformation, to confront and redistribute power.
And like any practice worth sustaining, it requires craft. Peace is a muscle. It must be strengthened before the crisis, not merely discovered inside it. When conflict arrives — and it will — we need systems, relationships, and imagination already in place: not just to resolve harm, but to prevent it, transform it, make something new from it.
This is why Amplifier and UPEACE NY have come together.
We reject the binary of war and peace, conflict and resolution. Sustainable peace is wider than that — it lives in the quality of our attention and intentions, the structures of our institutions, the stories we tell about who belongs and who decides. We are here to expand what peace is allowed to mean.
In partnership with artists, peacebuilders, educators, students, and communities across the world, we are building a global platform for art to lead the way: across difference, across cultures, across the fractures of this moment — practicing, always practicing, the world we mean to make.
Join us.
About Amplifier
Amplifier Art is a design lab that builds art and media experiments to amplify movements. It collaborates with artists and organizations to create open-source campaigns that can be shared widely and activated in public spaces.
Amplifier’s work focuses on making art accessible, actionable, and connected to real-world impact.
GLOBAL TEAM
Campaign Leadership
Cleo Barnett
Executive Director
Amplifier
Melissa Wild
Founder, Executive Director
UPEACE NY
Creative & Design
Jessa Carta
Branding & Graphic Design
Amplifier
Bryce Reif
Video Director
Amplifier
Production & Programs
Julieta Renteria
Program Manager
Amplifier
Isabella Sisneros
Operations Director
Amplifier
Maribel Gonzalez
Education Manager
Amplifier
Cat Mehta
Production Coordinator
Amplifier
Aaron Huey
Innovation Director
Amplifier
Krista Smith
Co-Founder, Program Director
UPEACE NY
Nancy Candel
Program Associate
UPEACE NY
Angelica Sanchez
Program Associate
UPEACE NY
Rebecca Arnieri
Future Peacebuilder Fellow
UPEACE NY
Sophie Raimondo
Future Peacebuilder Fellow
UPEACE NY
Web & Digital
Kevin Meyer
Web Development
UPEACE NY
Contributors
Ruvan Wijesooriya
Film & Photography
Amplifier
Kisha Bari
Photography
Amplifier
Niccolo Aeed
Screenwriter & Film Director
UPEACE NY