How it started

Jeremy Gilley is an actor turned filmmaker, who in the late 1990s became preoccupied with questions about the fundamental nature of humanity and the issue of peace.

He decided to explore these through the medium of film, and specifically, to create a documentary following his campaign to establish an annual day of ceasefire and non-violence.

In 1999, Jeremy founded Peace One Day, a non-profit organisation, and in 2001 Peace One Day’s efforts were rewarded when the member states of the United Nations unanimously adopted the first ever day of global ceasefire and non-violence on 21 September annually – Peace Day.

With the day in place, Peace One Day is working to institutionalise Peace Day, making it a day that is self-sustaining, an annual day of global unity, a day of intercultural cooperation on a scale that humanity has never known.

Peace Day has already been proven as a window for life-saving activities; in 2007, Gilley and Peace One Day ambassador Jude Law travelled to Afghanistan to spearhead an initiative that has resulted in the vaccination against polio of 4.5 million children following Peace Day agreements by all parties in the region in 2007/8/9. This work forms the culmination of Gilley’s feature documentary The Day After Peace.