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Creative activist roadshow in east-west collaboration

AA EYFA | 30.04.2006 17:44 | Art and Activism Caravan 2006 | Culture | Education

The Art and Activism Caravan is a border crossing project, starting early June, travelling for 3 months from Greece via Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia Herzegovina and Hungary to the eco-activist gathering Ecotopia in Slovakia. Its aim is to support and connect youth, campaign, community and activist groups, their actions and campaigns with creative forms of activism. The participants will share skills in the field of video, creative writing, music and dance, sculpturing, street performance, drawing and painting, samba and screen printing.

Groups involved in the AA Caravan are EYFA (European Youth For Action), Candida TV (video collective, Italy), Rhythms of Resistance (samba), The Mischief Makers (creative activist collective, Nottingham), Undercurrents (UK video collective), Karahaber (video news network, Turkey), Loesje (creative writing), Rebel Clown Army and VideA (video collective, Balkans).

The local organisations and groups hosting the project are Medsos (Greece), Bitola Youth Forum (Macedonia), Mjaft (Albania), Plagus_M (Serbia & Montenegro), In Stage (Serbia & Montenegro), Kulturanova (Serbia & Montenegro), Tuzla Live (Bosnia & Herzegovina), Uruk (Bosnia & Herzegovina) and ZoFi and Valley of Arts (Hungary) and Ecotopia (Slovakia). For more information on the host groups click here. The artists taking part in the project come from Norway, Turkey, Italy, The Netherlands, UK, Ukraine, Germany and Armenia.

Links: AA Caravan website | Map of route | The host groups | The artists

Wikipedia on: Balkans | Greece | Macedonia | Albania | Montenegro | Serbia | Bosnia Herzegovina | Hungary | Slovakia

Local Indymedias: Athens | Belgrade | Croatia | Hungary

Art Activism Links: Design for Social Change | My Dads Strip Club | Northern Arts Tactical Offensive | Movement of the Imagination | The Church of Stop Shopping | The YES Men | The Lab of Insurrectionary Imagination | YoMango | Space Hijackers | videoactivism.org (everything for the video activist)

Background Links: ZNet Balkanwatch (Background articles on the political situation in the Balkans + lots of links) | Transitions Online (Online newsletter covering politics in the Balkans and wider region) | Maknews.com (Macedonian independent news agency) | Abolishing the Borders from Below (anarchist magazine focused around Eastern Europe) | Role of Women in The Balkans War (links) | Balkansnet.org (Balkans anti-war and human rights resources) | Our target is peace (The centre for peace in the Balkans)



What is the AA Caravan?

The AA Caravan Caravan is a border crossing project travelling from Greece (early June) via Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia Herzegovina and Hungary to the annual activist environmentalist gathering Ecotopia in Slovakia (August 6th). The main aim is to support and connect local youth groups, their actions and campaigns with the power of Activist Art. The Caravan artists/trainers are specialized in different fields of art like video shooting & editing, creative writing, music and dance, sculpturing, street theater, drawing and painting. They'll visit host activist/youth groups for a week, to give workshops together with local artists. Participants can be local activists, art students, anybody interested in artivism. Next to this, local artists will travel with the Caravan to the neighbouring country, to join the workshops there and strengthen regional activist and artistic networks. The artists and participants will together brainstorm about ways to put art and activism into practice, using local and international themes. Workshops last up to five days, working toward public creative activism outcome(s) in the end of the week.

Caravan aims

The main objectives of this Caravan project are to


  • promote the use of art and creativity in activism and campaigning
  • create/strengthen the link between artists, art students, and activists
  • strengthen regional and international, east-west cooperation among activists and artists
  • support local groups in their campaigns and activities
  • involve more youth in social, creative activism
  • use art as tool for social inclusion and political participation

Caravan themes

The Caravan first and foremost wants to support local political, social activist actions, campaigns. Participants can bring in issues during the first day of the workshops. In this way the topics worked with in the workshops can be very diverse. Next to this, the Caravan wants to bring in one or more overall themes, as theme that the Caravan finds interesting to prepare and discuss with the participants. These themes can be Art and activism itself, anti-consumerism.

Interested??

Are you interested to participate in the workshops, or join them, just check out the route and the hosts. Please contact the hosts if you have any querys as to what´s going on, and if would like to share your skills, what ever they may be...The caravan is a mad mix of creativity already and it can only get powerful with all our efforts of protest.

AA EYFA
- e-mail: eyfa@eyfa.org

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