Webinar “Role of artists-activists in building social resilience through participatory methods”

The webinar on 9 April will focus on practical benefits of extending public participation and dialogue in the processes of collecting ideas and implementing decisions of how to overcome and solve common problems. The important role of artists-activists in building such communal capacities by empowering and enabling people to take responsibility for their common well-being will be highlighted. Gaining such capacities, would substantially increase social resilience to overcome actual and future crisis situations.

Programme

4 brief presentations (10 minutes each, followed by 5 minutes of Q&A) about practical methods and techniques of constructing effective public dialogue:

1. Contemporary rise of social inter-subjectivity (as a result of individualisation of society) with its implications on performance and well-being of communities (15 minutes) – Agnieszka Wołodźko
2. Reaching public agreements by participative building of social knowledge (15 minutes) and by networking – Roman Sebastyanski
3. Roles of artists-activists in local capacity building; relational aesthetics, site specific and participatory arts, etc. (15 minutes) – Agnieszka Wołodźko
4. Case study of the artists-activists’ role in the transformation of the former Gdansk Shipyard (15 minutes) – Roman Sebastyanski and Agnieszka Wołodźko

The presentations will be followed by a discussion of the challenges faced by the four cities awarded the “BSR Cultural Pearls’ title 2024” – Jakobstad/Pietarsaari (Finland), Kiel (Germany), Rūjiena (Latvia) and Svendborg (Denmark). The workshop will be aimed at optimizing potential positive effects of the planned solutions.

Invited experts

AGNIESZKA WOŁODŹKO [Gdańsk, PL]

Artist, curator, and cultural researcher, President of the Foundation „Cultures Beyond Culture”. Education: Academy of Fine Arts, Gdansk: Faculty of Interior Architecture and Industry Design; Faculty of Painting and Graphics (MA) and A. Mickiewicz University in Poznan: Faculty of Social Sciences (PhD), thesis Encounters and Microutopias. Participatory art in Scandinavia in 1990-2010, defended in 2014. Produces art in public space, engaged art, photography, installation, ceramics, sound works and actions, as well as implements workshops for various social groups. Writes texts on contemporary art and culture. In 2000-2015 she worked as a curator at the Laznia Centre for Contemporary Art in Gdańsk. In 2014-2018 she was a member of the international Think Tank Transbaltic. In 2017-2018 and in 2020 she was a curator at rum46 in Aarhus [DK].

ROMAN SEBASTYAŃSKI [Gdynia, PL]

Architect and urban planner with 20 years’ experience of cooperation with the local authorities, the property owner, artists and activists engaging in  the post-industrial waterfront regeneration and the legal protection of the cultural heritage of the Gdansk Shipyard (Poland). He has also coordinated the “Memory of Water/Shipyard Anew” project (2019-2020). Apart from being an expert on the Gdansk Shipyard heritage, he also worked at the Solidarity’s Heritage Institute and has been a Member of the Board of INTBAU Poland (International Network for Traditional Building, Architecture and Urbanism) since 2018. Currently finishing PhD study on public participative urban planning at the University of the West of Scotland [UK].

The webinar is organised by the Danish Cultural Institute in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in cooperation with partners in the BSR Cultural Pearls Project which aims to strengthen social resilience in Baltic Sea Region cities and regions by harnessing the potential of local assets of culture and creativity.

The project is co-funded by the Interreg Baltic Sea Region programme.