Real Expressive Artistic Learning Erasmus Project

Project Title

Real Expressive Artistic Learning

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 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Creativity and culture; Disabilities – special needs; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

‘Reflective Expressive Artistic Learning’ (REAL) was a partnership project with a focus on the exchange of good practice. It explored, and continues to explore, the experiences of learning disabled young people in the creative sector and reflect on inclusive practice, bringing best practice to the fore and raising the aspirations of young disabled artists so that they are more able to compete in the mainstream.
Throughout the project we explored the concept of quality in learning disability arts, what this is and how it impacts on the experiences of young learning disabled people; how we identify, attain and maintain quality in the creative process when working with learning disabled young people and how important it is and how it helps improve participation and inclusion? Through practical explorations of the work of partner organisations and initiating conversations between partners we were able to:
• explore the concept of quality in creative work by/for young learning disabled people.
• explore process or product – where does the quality begin?
• explore the process and value of critical thinking.
• learn new methods of evaluation, self evaluation and critical thinking that are accessible and meaningful.
• recognise the importance of quality work with/for young learning disabled people and raise the aspiration of young learning disabled people
Thus enabling young learning disabled people to develop critical thinking skills which will enable them to make good choices about their future. Learning Teaching Training Events ran alongside the explorations in order for youth workers to look at the reflection/evaluation/critical skills techniques used. These activities took place in each partner country with the aim of targeting youth workers, disability workers and those working in the arts and disability from within the partner organisations Including those artists with disabilities who have ambition to lead groups or who are already doing so. The LTT events were attended by 80 people from partner organisations and a further 422 were involved within the host countries. The transnational meetings of managers and coordinators (those who participated in the meetings who are in a position of influence within their organisations) also participated in the LTT activities (with costs covered by the partners) adding value to the project.
Through a combination of transnational workshops working with learning disabled artists from the host organisation, conversations, learning events, online discussion and evaluation the project explored current approaches, experiences and models, investigated what is important and what isn’t, explore what works and what doesn’t and critically evaluated each others work. Only from this feedback and critique can we make our work better and stronger.
From our meetings we identified how we can use different art forms to overcome barriers to inclusion. A large focus of the project was dance as this was appropriate for many of the participants who were able to use this non verbal art form for expression and communication. We realised that issue based work needs the right audience in order for it to be effective but that learning disabled performance rarely has that audience which takes us to a need for different platforms. Whilst it is important that learning disabled people can perform within their own community there is also a need to explore other platforms, although the benefits need to be explored further. Beyond this we identified some of the requirements that can be seen as quality: good and true facilitation; empowerment and ownership; the embedding of reflective practice into the process fro the outset and the dangers of ‘trainer intrusion’.
The impact on those involved who were involved in the project have been substantial with all participants feeling positive about their experience:
“it has helped me develop as an artist”
“it has pushed me to do new things”
” I don’t feel more or less able to dance than anyone else”
and we have developed a a strong European arts and disability community working for the benefits of learning disabled people which will,
in the current and longer term, add value to the existing debates on quality and learning disability in the arts.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 119253 Eur

Project Coordinator

Headway Arts & Country: UK

Project Partners

• Ad astra
• JAUNUOLIU DIENOS CENTRAS
• ASSOCIACAO VO’ARTE
• ANTIGONE KENTRO PLIROFORISIS KAI TEKMIRIOSIS GIA TON RATSISMO TIN OIKOLOGIA TIN EIRINI KAI TI MI VIA ASTIKI MI KERDOSKOPIKI ETAIRIA