To further enhance audience participation, the project includes the initiation of 5 socially-engaged art interventions in five countries (Cyprus, Bulgaria, Spain, Italy, Greece).
Each project partner will invite one established artist that works on this artistic genre, to collaborate with the organization and local people, communities and/or university students to initiate and implement a socially engaged art intervention, tackling specific problems related to sustainability and the promotion of circular economy practices. All the processes leading to the interventions will be documented and presented in short films in the project’s platform.
This short documentary film serves as a visual narrative of the artistic process and its positive impact on local communities and provides insights into the participating artists and how their involvement with the EMPACT project has influenced them in their artistic practices.
Coming soon on June 2024
The following socially-engaged art interventions are envisaged to be organized:
| Socially Engaged (Collective) Art Intervention: «The Nature Outside and Inside Me» (A theatrical performance – Social action) | Bulgaria | National Academy for Theatre and Film Arts “Kr. Sarafov” | 20 October 2023 |
| Socially Engaged (Collective) Art Intervention: «The Future is Already Present» | Cyprus | Cyprus University of Technology | 26-27-28 October 2023 |
| Socially Engaged (Collective) Art Intervention: «Weaving links: Days of Artistic Creation and Ecology» | Spain | Espacio Rojo | October-November 2023 |
| Socially Engaged (Collective) Art Intervention: Coming Soon… | Italy | Fondazione Lamberto Puggelli | October-November 2023 |
| Socially Engaged (Collective) Art Intervention: Coming Soon… | Greece | Vorres Museum | October-November 2023 |
National Academy for Theatre and Film Arts “Kr. Sarafov” (NATFA)
In collaboration with Dance & Art Company “SOFISTIK-JIVO” and “Unseen Theatre”
The Nature Outside and Inside Me (A theatrical performance – Social action)
Author and Project Lead: Prof. Velimir Velev
Artistic directors of the Dance and Art Company «SOFISTIK-JIVO»: Elina Topalska and Nikoleta Ilcheva
20 October 2023
This action was a performative form of artistic expression that sort to direct impact and provocation by involving the audience directly or random people in what is happening. The artistic action was a short-term behavioral intervention in the public space. With it, the artists try to make direct contact with the attendees by involving them in an unusual situation. The performance involved an interdisciplinary form of artistic expression that has the potential to bring together the means of expression of all arts in any combination. There were no restrictions on duration and places of realization. The only constant was the living presence of the artist, at the basis of which are placed the expressive possibilities of the body and behavior in natural or intentional situations. The simplest definition we can provide is: presenting an idea through a live public performance.
Cyprus University of Technology (CUT)
The Future is Already Present
26-27-28 October 2023
The Socially Engaged Art Intervention “The Future is already Present” is an artistic project by the renowned artists, Anna Lytridou and Benjamin Deakin that took place in the CUT Fine Arts international Research Center in Agios Ioannis Pitsilias. The project aimed to engage local community and student participants by asking them to repurpose and re-contextualise the scrap metal and fabrics that they contribute to the project. Using the installation pieces as inspiration, the artist worked with them to combine their items into communally created “framing devices”.
Espacio Rojo (ER)
Weaving links: Days of Artistic Creation and Ecology
Artists: Alejandra Díaz-Guerra, Rebeca Sforzani, AL FRESCO Museos Efímeros (AL FRESCO Ephemeral Museums) Collective
Associated partners: The Lourdes Hernández Equality Space
October-November 2023
Espacio Rojo´s proposal worked closely with the Lourdes Hernández Equality Space (Carabanchel district) consisting of an artistic intervention and workshops facilitated by artists around the concepts of art, design, crafts and ecology. The outstanding feature of this action within our project was its group nature and empathy. The active participation of diverse groups, social agents and artists in a creative process, which was developed to make culture as accessible as possible. Promoting people’s well-being, sharing experiences and understanding each other. It also focused on specific groups, and their needs. Target groups included women from different collectives working with vulnerable women. It also aimed to reach people with little affinity to standardized art and culture. The artist, too, occupied a different place from those in the professional artistic sphere. His standardised and individual role is configured in such a way as to link art, social context and people. His or her figure is diluted in such a way that the lines of division between personal and social action converge at a certain meeting point. His work is co-created together with artisans, artists and the community. He also cooperates and is involved in the organisation of the project and in the training through open and participative workshops. The relationship between contemporary art, design and ecology is present under the concept of Sustainable Crafts placing value on manual skills, intangible cultural heritage (UNESCO 2003) as an important part of the process given that the use of materials used are usually renewable and guarantee environmental sustainability.
EMPACT – Empathy and Sustainability: The Art of Thinking Like a Mountain CUT Socially Engaged Collective Art Intervention The Future is Already Present 26-27-28 October
EMPACT – ЕMPACT Project: Socially Engaged Art Intervention The Nature Outside and Inside Me (A theatrical performance – Social action) By the National Academy of