Eva Lewis

The I Project (United States of America)

Eva Maria Lewis is a nineteen year old teenage black girl superhero, activist, and artist from the south side of Chicago, Illinois. Eva’s work is an intersection of activism, art, and academia aimed at advocating for Black and Brown people in America’s disenfranchised communities. She is motivated to do this work because she herself comes from a disenfranchised community, and is passionate about making it so that the next generation of people in her community don’t have their human rights violated like she did. She created The I Project, which combines art and activism to advocate for equity through a lens of intersectionality. In the summer of 2016, she and three other Black girls founded Youth for Black Lives after leading thousands through the streets of downtown Chicago to protest police brutality. She’s spoken and performed at many places, including the United Nations in New York City twice, for the Commission on the Status of Women and the International Day of the Girl.  In March of 2017, she received the Pioneer Award from the Chicago Foundation for Women. In April of 2017, she received the Princeton Prize for Race Relations. In June of 2017, she received the Rising Star award from the DuSable Museum, at their Night of 100 Stars. In March of 2018 she was named a 2018 ‘The Root’ Young Futurist. She’s appeared on the cover of Nylon Magazine’s ’25 Gen-Zers changing the world’. Most recently, she received an award in philanthropy from the African American Legacy. Eva has works published for Teen Vogue about social justice and equality for all peoples, specifically people of color. She is a second year student at the University of Pennsylvania on a full ride with the Questbridge College Match Scholarship. She aims to use her passion and education to secure a bag for her community.