Are we ready to RESHAPE ourselves?

Einstein allegedly said that 95% of every problem’s solution lies in forming the right question. The weeks prior to the Reshape meeting in Prague, this thought was constantly running in the background of my mind. What is the right question for our work?

Vahid Evazzadeh: On The Role of Art in society

Vahid Evazzadeh, theater director, filmmaker and the chairman of the Counter Institute talk about the role of art in society, socially responsible art, his non-artistic practices and the experience of displacement - from Iran to Danmark.

Laura Roth: Feminisation of Politics and Activism

Feminism seems to be gaining momentum in many countries, but most organisations and groups are still working based on patriarchal standards. The “feminisation of politics” includes different elements, which all aim to change the way activism and politics (in a broad sense) are done.

Workshop in Edinburgh: How can art radically imagine new forms of citizenship and empower us to act?

A university created and run by refugees > Social enterprises forged through vulnerable street children creating a circus > Historic injustices and everyday niggles aired and shared through joining a complaints choir > An energy cooperative developed from street parties > A nation-wide exchange economy fuelled through independent music festivals > Urban transport nightmares tackled through graffiti vigilantism > An inclusive cross-generational school fashioned collaboratively inside a recently re-opened nuclear exclusion zone ...

Art and Citizenship: What's Inspiring Us

The discussion of Edinburgh workshop started with sharing practices that are inspiring for the topic of Art and Citizenship. These are just a few of projects, organizations and people that fueled our talks.

Viviana Checchi: Curating public engagement

Viviana Checchi, a public engagement curator at the Center for Contemporary Art in Glasgow talks about practicing citizenship through art, engaging audience in the cultural sector and bringing a global perspective into a local cultural context.

Jana Svobodová: On Theatre in Social Context

Jana Svobodová, a theatre director from Prague, talks about theatre in social context and involving ordinary people into the teatrical processes and .

Art and citizenship workshop in Barcelona

Under Power. Care. Municipalism. Creativity. Feminisation. Conviviality. Commoning. Activism. Ethics. Solidarity. Empathy. Internationalism. Citizenship. Generosity. Decolonisation. Collaboration. Storytelling. Agency. Systemic Change. Hope. Non-violence. Learning. Humour. Sociality. Invention. Listening. Diversity. Humility. Resistance. Horizontality. Poetry. Cooperation. Discovery. Artivism. Migration. Rebellion. Vulnerability. Courage. Justice. Sharing. Struggle. Civil Imagination. Lived Experience. Joy...

Working with the Community: RESHAPE on Art, Culture and Citizenship in Barcelona

A video filmed during the Reshape workshop in Barcelona that was focused to the topic of Art and Citizenship.

Artists are citizens: active, creative and responsible

To be an artist without a political responsibility is also a statement. The artists gathered in the group emphasize their citizenship; social and political dimension of their individual, as well as collective work. The main focus of this group is to find that space of creativity, where they could use the imagination in the most expandable manner, but also keep active. Due to the recent COVID 19 crisis, the artists stress the importance of their activist work, but also of collaboration/empathy as one of the most powerful tools of art in general.

Creating the Department of Civil Imagination — An interview with Peter Jenkinson and Shelagh Wright

Shelagh Wright and Peter Jenkinson, both based in London, have been supporting creative and cultural work for progressive social and political goals throughout the world for many years. Their current projects include ODD, an action research ad/venture exploring positive deviance within socially-engaged cultural practice and creative activism. They are also involved with the pan-European Laboratories of Care programme and with investigating the contribution of cultural and creative activists to the new global Municipalist movement. In the context of RESHAPE, they have been the facilitators of the Art and Citizenship trajectory, asking the question: How can art radically reimagine new forms of citizenship and empower us to act? Here, active citizenship is a central connecting point, on which we expound in this conversation.

The Art Institution as a Hole in the Ground

According to the author, art institutions mirror today’s dominant powers. Sarah Vanhee wants a plurality of institutions connected to different, heterogeneous forms of living and being. A longing for a feminization, decolonization and queering of the art institutions. Looking for art institutions that do politics instead of presenting art programmes about politics, that take care of the people who work there and engage with them, support them on the basis of equal dialogue and lend themselves as tools.

From Freehouse to Neighborhood Co-op: The Birth of a New Organizational Form

About twenty plus years of urban development and artistic research efforts initiated by artist Jeanne van Heeswijk in her native Rotterdam. The challenge of a neighbourhood culture that is organized through cooperative methods is to be exceedingly aware of how it changes and why. It must always be questioning what agendas are driving it forward and whether it is living up to its values.

The RESHAPE project was presented for the first time offically to a wider audience in Bulgaria

An online conference organized by ACT Association (Bulgaria) took place on the 10th of June in Sofia. The multilingual event presented for the first time in detail the RESHAPE project to general Bulgarian audiences.

Workshop 1: Value of art in social fabric

The first workshop in trajectory Value of art in social fabric.

Introduction into RESHAPE: Imagining alternatives

Joris Janssens (Flanders Arts Institute) and Milica Ilić (Onda) introduce the what, the why and the how of the project.

Cancelled // Fieldwork: Activism & Municipalism in the Trešnjevka Neighbourhood

A walking tour around Trešnjevka will lead you through key locations of this traditionally working-class neighborhood.

Workshop 2: Value of art in social fabric

The workshop in Ghent will continue with the discussion about the value of art in social fabric: How is society shaped (and reshaped) with art and how is wider community benefiting from it.

Workshop 2: Art and citizenship