The Kizo Art Gallery in Gateway was teeming with Maris Stella pupils, parents, staff and sponsors for the “Five 2 Midnight” Art Exhibition in association with The Sunflower Fund. The noisy and festive event took place on Thursday, October 14 and R48 000 was raised for The Sunflower Fund.
See our picture gallery below
Thanks to corporate sponsors ARB Electrical, Baby City, Consolidated Financial Planning, D&A Timbers, The Hardy Boys, Netcells, Primed Health Services and Sumner Signs, 48 new bone marrow stem cell donors will be included on the South African Bone Marrow Registry. This will directly give hope to patients diagnosed with leukaemia and in need of a bone marrow stem cell transplant.
The sponsors bought a sunflower painting for R3 000 created by a Senior Primary Maris Stella pupil. Each painting depicted the urgent need for The Sunflower Fund to recruit bone marrow stem cell donors in order to give leukaemia sufferers the hope of finding their 1 in 100 000 life-saving donor match. Smaller paintings were sold to parents and guests for R200 each and 10% of the sale price of Kizo’s “end of lease” stock made up the total.
More art with the Sunflower Fund: Nourish Eat & Art
The Sunflower Fund was inspired by “The Sunflowers of Hope” Painting created by the CEO’s son Chris Corlett at the age of 17 before he lost his battle with leukaemia. He believed that because sunflowers stand tall always seeking the sun for warmth and comfort, they are the perfect symbol of hope for all leukaemia sufferers. A sunflower also contains hundreds of seeds and so, when it comes to the end of its days and its head turns down to face the ground, it spreads these seeds to create hundreds more beautiful sunflowers.
The Sunflower Fund would like to thank everyone involved in this fundraising initiative for helping them “sow the seeds of hope”.
For more information phone toll free 0800 12 10 82 or visit www.sunflowerfund.org.za. For more information on the Kizo “end of lease” sale contact Barbie Mark on 083 778 6644.