Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us – Gala 2025
Welcome to the Gala
We’re so glad you’re here.
Join us on Friday, October 25, 2025, at the historic Newberry Library for Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us—an evening dedicated to honoring the power of Native storytelling.
This year’s gala centers Native first voice—stories told by Native people, in our own words, through our own lens. From emotional truth-telling to joyful cultural celebration, the night will highlight the powerful work of our Unstoppable Voices participants across podcasting, photography, videography, oral tradition, and writing.
Expect a seated meal, a pop-up art gallery, a silent auction, community awards, and an unforgettable program that reminds us all how storytelling can heal, connect, and transform.
We invite you to explore the sections below to learn more about the gala, purchase tickets, or become a sponsor. We’ll be adding more information as the evening comes together, so be sure to check back soon.
Because when our voices rise, they become unstoppable.
About the Gala
Event: Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us
Date: Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025 • 6 p.m.
Location: Newberry Library, 60 W. Walton St., Chicago
Attire: Cocktail attire encouraged
Tickets: $150 per person
Telling the Stories That Heal
We come from story. It’s how we remember, how we teach, how we survive, and how we love. Our languages, our songs, our histories, and even our humor—they carry the weight of who we are. Storytelling isn’t a tradition we’re reviving. It’s a tradition we’ve carried all along, even when the world tried to turn the volume down on our voices.
This gala isn’t about nostalgia. It’s not about looking back with longing—it’s about looking around and seeing clearly who we are right now. Native people are artists, filmmakers, culture keepers, teachers, and truth-tellers. We are urban and rural, intertribal and deeply rooted. And we’re telling our stories not because they were once taken from us, but because they’ve always been ours to tell.
For too long, others have tried to speak for us. Anthropologists wrote papers. Journalists dropped in and called it research. Museums locked away our belongings and offered their own interpretations, while generations of our people were told to forget the sound of our own voice.
But we never stopped speaking. Never stopped creating. Never stopped remembering.
Unstoppable Voices is about what happens when we reclaim the mic. When we choose to center Native stories told by Native people—not filtered, not explained, but lived and shared in our own words. Through photography, video, podcasting, oral tradition, and writing, we’re building something powerful: not just a collection of stories, but a movement of truth and connection.
You’ll experience a night filled with meaning—an intimate gathering of community and allies, a shared meal, a pop-up gallery of powerful visual storytelling, live performances, laughter, memory, and love. You won’t just be attending a gala. You’ll be part of something that matters.
This isn’t about brokenness. This is about brilliance. This is about the strength it takes to keep telling stories in a world that once tried to silence them. It’s about healing, yes—but it’s also about joy, clarity, humor, and unapologetic presence.
Every ticket sold helps fund the storytellers, the workshops, the community programs, and the future of Native first voice storytelling in Chicago and beyond. Your presence is not just welcomed—it’s part of the work.
If you believe in the power of art, in the necessity of truth, and in the importance of letting people speak for themselves—then this night is for you.
Pull up a chair. Come listen. Come celebrate. Come be part of the story.
But don’t wait—space is limited, and the stories are ready to be heard.
The Unstoppable Voices Project
For generations, Native people have had to fight to be heard. We’ve watched as outsiders told our stories—sometimes with curiosity, sometimes with care, but rarely with accuracy or permission. Our histories were cataloged. Our languages were studied. Our belongings were taken and displayed. And our truths were filtered through a lens that was never ours.
Unstoppable Voices is how we take that back.
With support from Healing Illinois, the American Indian Center launched the Unstoppable Voices Project to equip Native community members with the tools and support to tell their own stories—authentically, powerfully, and without outside interpretation.
This isn’t just a creative workshop. It’s an investment in narrative sovereignty.
Over the course of this year, participants have taken part in five storytelling tracks—photography, videography, podcasting, oral storytelling, and creative writing. Led by Native artists, journalists, and cultural workers, these workshops are designed to be hands-on and transformational. Participants learn the technical skills to record, edit, and share their work—but more importantly, they connect with their voice, their community, and each other.
Workshops are intentionally intergenerational and inclusive. Youth work alongside elders. First-time storytellers sit with seasoned artists. Some stories are joyful. Others are raw and unflinching. All are real. And every single one is told by someone with the right to tell it.
At Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us, you’ll get to see and hear these stories for yourself. In our pop-up art gallery, you’ll walk among powerful images taken by community members. You’ll hear podcast excerpts layered with laughter, vulnerability, and truth. You’ll experience short films that offer glimpses into lived Native realities—and you’ll meet the people behind the stories.
This work matters. Not just because it heals those who tell the stories, but because it builds understanding, connection, and change for those who listen.
The truth is, storytelling has always been part of who we are as Native people. We’ve used it to pass down knowledge, protect memory, and find strength in hard times. What Unstoppable Voices does is help restore the space and support to do that work on our own terms—with dignity, intention, and pride.
And we’re just getting started.
With your support, this project can grow. We want to reach more Native storytellers across Chicago. We want to offer deeper workshops, creative stipends, mentorship opportunities, and lasting platforms where these stories can live beyond the gala—on stages, in classrooms, in podcasts, in film festivals, and in communities where they will make a difference.
Because when we tell our stories in our own voice, we do more than reclaim the narrative—we shape the future.
About the Gala
Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us is more than a gala. It’s a gathering of community, culture, and purpose—an evening built around the belief that stories have the power to heal, connect, and transform.
Join us on Friday, Oct. 25 from 6 to 9 p.m. at the historic Newberry Library for an unforgettable night that celebrates Native storytelling and supports the next generation of Indigenous artists, culture-bearers and truth-tellers.
The evening will feature a full seated meal, a curated pop-up gallery with photography and visual art from Unstoppable Voices participants, and a showcase of powerful creative work from our ongoing storytelling workshops—including video, podcast, and oral story excerpts. We’ll also honor community leaders with our engagement awards and hold raffles and silent auctions to help fund the work ahead.
Attire is cocktail encouraged, but we invite guests to come as their authentic selves—including wearing regalia or cultural attire.
While the event is a celebration, it also serves a deeper purpose.
Every ticket, table, and sponsorship supports the Unstoppable Voices Project and the broader work of the American Indian Center to provide Native people in Chicago with access to creative tools, cultural space, and the support to tell their own stories.
This work includes:
Hands-on workshops in photography, videography, podcasting, oral storytelling and writing
Equipment access and mentorship opportunities for Native creatives
Public platforms for storytelling through exhibits, screenings and events
Year-round support for Native first voice storytelling across generations
For too long, our stories were rewritten by others. Museums displayed our objects without context. Books and films reduced our communities to symbols. But the truth is, Native people are still here—and we are the ones best equipped to speak to who we are.
Your support helps make that possible. By attending or sponsoring the gala, you’re not just funding a program—you’re investing in a future where Native people define their own narratives and pass them on with strength, clarity, and pride.
Because healing begins when we speak—and are heard.
Purchase Gala Tickets
Be part of a night where Native voices take center stage — and every story shared brings us closer to healing.
Join us on Saturday, Oct. 25, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Newberry Library for Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us — an evening of food, community, art and truth-telling.
Your ticket includes a full seated meal, access to our pop-up art gallery and storytelling showcase, and entry into the night’s community awards, silent auction and raffles. More importantly, every ticket purchased helps sustain Native first voice storytelling and supports the year-round work of the American Indian Center.
🎟️ Ticket Options
Individual Ticket – $150
One seat, full meal, and access to all programming and exhibits.Couples Ticket – $275
Two seats for you and a guest. Share the evening together while supporting Native voices.Supporter Table – $1,100
Reserved seating for 8 guests. Ideal for organizations, families or friend groups.Sponsor Table – $2,000
Premium reserved table for 8. Includes name and logo placement on our website and in the gala program, group social media acknowledgment, and recognition during the event. A portion of this package helps underwrite seats for community storytellers.Sponsor a Seat – $150
Can’t attend? Purchase a seat for a community member, youth artist or workshop participant.
Space is limited and tables are filling fast — we recommend reserving early.
Sponsorship Opportunities
Support Native storytelling. Celebrate first voice. Stand with community.
Sponsorship of Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us directly supports Native-led storytelling, creative healing, and cultural preservation. Whether you’re sponsoring a full table, underwriting a specific part of the evening, or supporting community participation—you’re investing in something lasting and powerful.
Explore the options below to find the sponsorship opportunity that fits your values and vision. Together, we can ensure these stories are not just heard—but celebrated.
Native people have always been storytellers. But for generations, we were denied the right to speak for ourselves. Boarding schools tried to erase our languages. Government policies made our ceremonies illegal. Our ancestors were arrested for practicing their ways. Our children were punished for speaking the language of their people. Entire communities were told their stories didn’t belong—weren’t welcome—and certainly weren’t worth listening to.
And while that silencing was happening, something else was happening too. Museums were collecting our belongings—regalia, medicine bundles, drums, even hair—and locking them behind glass. They didn’t just steal what was sacred. They claimed the right to tell the story of who we were. They wrote captions. They created narratives. They interpreted our lives through a Western lens and offered those versions to the public as truth. All while the living people those items belonged to were treated as relics, erased from the present.
That harm isn’t history—it’s still happening. You see it in classrooms where Native students are taught more about colonizers than about the people they come from. In philanthropy spaces where our voices are spoken about more than listened to. In media, museums, and nonprofits that want our art and stories—but only on their terms. Native voices are still being edited, misunderstood, and spoken over.
That’s why Unstoppable Voices exists. This gala is not just a fundraiser or a formal dinner. It is a declaration. A refusal to let another generation go unheard. A space where Native youth and elders, artists and activists, speak their truth on their own terms. Through video, photography, writing, oral tradition, and podcasting, participants in our workshops learn how to hold the mic, frame the shot, choose the words, and tell the story—without needing permission.
When you sponsor this event, you’re not just buying a table. You’re investing in healing. You’re helping to create a community space where Native people are seen and heard. You’re ensuring that someone who has never been asked to share their story finally has the tools, support, and platform to do it. You’re making it possible for their voice to reach not just their community—but the world.
Your sponsorship supports year-round workshops that equip Native storytellers with skills, access to equipment, mentorship, and opportunities to share their work. It funds public exhibitions, film screenings, audio stories, and publications that center truth-telling and cultural preservation. And most importantly, it supports sovereignty—not just in land or policy, but in voice. Because narrative sovereignty is power. And Native people deserve that power back.
This work is not symbolic. It’s not performative. It’s real. It’s urgent. And it only happens if people like you step forward to make it possible.
If you care about equity, justice, cultural preservation, or Indigenous futures—this is your opportunity to act. Explore the sponsorship options below. And if nothing fits quite right, reach out. We’ll build something with you. But please—don’t wait. Because we’ve had centuries of silence.
Now it’s time for the voices to rise.
Each sponsorship level is a direct investment in Native storytelling—amplifying voices that have too often been left out or misrepresented. Your support helps ensure Native storytellers have the tools, mentorship, and platform to share their truth, while building space for intergenerational healing, visibility, and joy.
We offer five levels of sponsorship, each designed to recognize your support in meaningful ways—before, during, and after the gala. Whether you choose to become a Storykeeper, a Truth-Teller, or join at one of the other sponsorship levels, you’re not just attending a powerful night. You’re helping make it possible.
View the full sponsorship levels and benefits table below to see how each level offers visibility, connection, and impact. Once you’ve chosen your level, complete your sponsorship through our secure form.
In addition to our main sponsorship levels, we’re offering a limited number of special opportunities to support key elements of Unstoppable Voices: Telling the Stories That Heal Us. These sponsorships are perfect for individuals, organizations, or companies who want to support a specific part of the evening while gaining visibility and aligning themselves with community, culture, and healing.
From sponsoring the community awards or the pop-up art gallery to underwriting the seated meal or media display, each option plays a vital role in making the night unforgettable. Every sponsorship includes name recognition and promotional benefits unique to that opportunity.
Explore the available options in the PDF linked below and choose the one that resonates most with your values and impact goals. These opportunities are limited and may go quickly.
We know that sponsorship isn’t one-size-fits-all. Whether you’re ready to commit or still exploring your options, we’re here to support you every step of the way.
Have questions about sponsorship levels or additional opportunities? Want to customize a package that reflects your values, honors your organization’s mission, or highlights a specific connection to community or storytelling? Let’s talk.
We welcome individuals, businesses, foundations, and community allies who want to do more than just give—we welcome those who want to stand alongside us in lifting Native voices and helping tell the stories that heal.
Whether you’re a first-time sponsor or a long-time supporter of the American Indian Center, we’d love to hear from you. This is more than a single night. This is about shifting narratives and building power—and you’re invited to be part of it.
Reach out directly to:
Jay Young
Co-Executive Director & Director of Media, Marketing, and Communications
📧 jay.young@chicagoaic.org
📞 (773) 275-5871
We’re happy to answer questions, talk through options, or simply start a conversation about what meaningful sponsorship looks like. However you show up—we’re grateful you’re here.
Honoring Our Sponsors
The stories we share, the voices we uplift, and the healing we make possible — none of it happens alone. We are deeply grateful to our sponsors whose generosity makes Unstoppable Voices possible. Their support helps ensure that Native first voice storytelling continues to thrive in Chicago and beyond.
By standing with us, these sponsors are not just funding a gala. They’re investing in a future where Native people tell our own stories, in our own words, on our own terms.
Venue Sponsor
