Mind the Gap: Creating Digital Bridges to Community Erasmus Project

Project Title

Mind the Gap: Creating Digital Bridges to Community

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 : Partnerships for Creativity

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Creativity and culture; Access for disadvantaged

Project Summary

The participatory arts aim to engage communities and members of the public in the creative process, often with a focus on reaching those who rarely participate in cultural experiences. A number of studies underline the beneficial impact of participatory arts: The Arts Council of England noted that ‘active participation in the arts can have a significant impact on the wider determinants of health such as improving living environments, increasing educational attainment and building social capital.’ (The Arts, Health and Well-Being).

Over the past few years, arts educators have been experimenting new ways to design their projects for and with participants and with the needs of increasingly diverse audiences in mind. Concurrently, RESEO has focused on helping education department staff and teaching artists develop skills and knowledge related to participatory projects, working in intercultural contexts and co-creation with diverse audiences.

A 2015 RESEO study found that cultural institutions were becoming increasingly aware of the need to work with new technologies in order to increase participation and diversity in arts education activities. The study found however that using digital tools for outreach and education activities was easier said than done for arts institutions and companies with limited resources, with educators often lacking the necessary skills to implement activities effectively. Issues that persevere several years later and have been brought to the forefront by the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic.

A survey of RESEO members carried out in the second quarter of 2020 found that a lack of digital skills (technical knowledge, online facilitation skills, online collaboration skills, online management) remains a major issue for many educators working in the artistic, non-formal and social field. At the same time, it has been demonstrated that lower-income communities have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic from an economic, health and psychosocial point of view, with the “digital divide”, or inequality of access to digital tools and resources, further impacting access to participation for those communities.

Members of disadvantaged communities across Europe have suffered disproportionately from the effects of the 2020 health crisis. The Mind the Gap consortium is convinced that the participatory arts’ ability to foster social inclusion, well-being and employability is all the more essential in the wake of the crisis, and that digital upskilling can help education institutions and educators continue to connect to those communities, while contributing to creating innovative, durable solutions to drive the recovery of the European creative sector.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 191388 Eur

Project Coordinator

RESEO- European Network for Opera, Music and Dance Education & Country: BE

Project Partners

• Irish Opera Transformations CLG
• Les Clés de l’écoute
• Garsington Opera
• HOGSKULEN PA VESTLANDET
• CONSORZIO MATERAHUB INDUSTRIE CULTURALI E CREATIVE SCARL