About the Foundation

The Illustrated Books for Visually Impaired Children Charity Foundation was established in 1994 for the World Decade for Cultural Development Project of the UN and UNESCO.

 

Charity Foundation Mission

• to create custom-designed books illustrated in colour with embossing and toy books for visually impaired children;

• mainstreaming of visually impaired children in the system of universal cultural values;

• engaging visually impaired children in the world of literature and arts through reading;   

• residual vision improving and maintaining in visually impaired children.

    

Foundation Highlights

Over 100,000 kits of custom-designed books illustrated in colour with embossing issued to be donated;
91 book titles.

450 settlements within Russia where children receive the book kits.

800 children facilities participating in the “Pro Donate Books” programme.

72 libraries, over 100 children in families.

Over 2,000 letters of acknowledgement from parents and children’s facilities.

229 media publishing articles; 61 TV shows; 33 broadcasts.

Events

• On November 4, 2005, A. G. Degen, Chairman of Board of the Foundation, in his capacity as a manager of the acknowledged charity institution, was invited to a state reception to celebrate the Day of National Solidarity held at the Office of the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin.

• The Illustrated Books Charity Foundation was a winner of the open competition arranged by the National Charity Foundation in 2008.

In 2009–2010, His Holiness Kirill the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia donated twice the books issued by the Foundation to children in special care centres in Moscow. In His address during the ceremony of the book handover at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, the Patriarch said: “I would like to kindly thank everyone who made the publishing of these wonderful books happen – the beautiful books that are designed to be read by the little ones with disabilities”.