Creative Network for Culture Erasmus Project

Project Title

Creative Network for Culture

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for youth

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Entrepreneurial learning – entrepreneurship education; Creativity and culture

Project Summary

In a 21st century Europe characterized by exponential corporate organizations, the preponderance of the digital, and the upcoming automation for most of existing jobs, we believe that our competitive advantage in the world will be how we manage to leverage what will be left to us as human beings and active citizens: our potential for creativity, for curiosity, for expression.

We see every day how culture is the essential – and too often missing – link in human communities. Culture and the arts are “useless” insofar as they have a tenuous rapport with most of our mundane, concrete, day-to-day basic needs. Yet, as such art and culture are indispensable because they bring meaning, offer entertainment, and accomplishment for us all and lift us above material concerns. Culture and artistic activities therefore need to be nurtured and developed, at same level as literacy, especially in this time of challenging developments for Europe.

In today’s transitional context Europe’s creative and cultural sector remains exceptionally resilient, especially in the Union’s most advanced economies. According to a 2013 report by the French government agency for Finance (Inspection Générale des Finances) the contribution of cultural activities and industries to the nation’s GDP is seven times that of the car manufacturing industry. The report goes on to highlight extensive evidence supporting a strong positive correlation between cultural initiatives and local development: even in the most remote territories, cultural projects and events yield a multiplier coefficient that ranges from 1.3 to 1.8. In other words, the cultural sector is (1) a serious – and growing – national contributor to economies nationwide, and (2) opens up new opportunities locally, that can help kickstart new businesses in other sectors (services mostly).

But if cultural projects can be vectors of empowerment for Europeans, help develop European identity, and spread significant beneficial ripple effects, we as practitioners, organisations with on-the-ground experience, see how the current situation in terms of knowledge & skills acquisition in this field is problematic. Hence this Cultural Entrepreneurship training programme. It’s time to adapt the way we get project know-how, build networks in culture, establish sustainable models that can stand alone and continue to produce, disseminate and enrich Europe’s cultural offer.

The Cultureship project focuses on cultural entrepreneurship as a promoter of development, community building, and intercultural dialogue. Our goal is to meet the needs and challenges of cultural entrepreneurship, and increase the attractivity of this domain. The Cultureship project builds an educational programme that provides young European talents with the tools, the skills, the network, and the life experiences that make them into unique European cultural entrepreneurs.

Cultureship also develops a methodology that optimises learners’ experience through blended learning (online and presential) to increase chances of success for risky ventures in an uncertain, transitional environment. The tools developed under the Cultureship programme are: – a series of comprehensive reports and proposals on cultural entrepreneurship training opportunities available in Europe; – a large, free and open participative pedagogical platform built in the light of these reports and proposals, with online courses, a selection of existing MOOCs – a set of video case studies documenting successful cultural ventures that can serve as models for cultural start-ups; – a set of Handbooks to facilitate knowledge dissemination in the domain of cultural entrepreneurship and improve pedagogical methods for self-organised learning communities; – an open, resilient and expandable community of local cultural hubs.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 220039 Eur

Project Coordinator

CREATURE & Country: FR

Project Partners

• HOLDEN SRL
• Saalbau Neukölln Kultur & Veranstaltungs GmbH
• Fundacja Galerii Czulosc
• ON-THE-MOVE.ORG AISBL
• PUBLIC ART LAB E.V. – PAL