Lights On 2022: Innovation and Community Development
The focus of the 2022 edition of Lights On is Innovation and Community Development.
We made a call for those who feel the urge to bring new qualities and values to their communities, so affected by the consequences of Covid-19. We asked to hear from junior cultural operators to whom culture matters. We believe cultural centres can be drivers for community change and territorial development and the role of cultural operators is crucial.
This year, Lights On will offer 11 selected young professionals a funded training and mobility experience around the topic of Change for Innovation and Community Development. The multilayered programme will be focused on tools that can support our fellows in these challenges, with a view to finding solutions that will resonate within their organisations and communities.
We will experiment with creative ways for community development and rethink together the role of each organisation. On an individual level, the fellows will learn how to take themselves and their needs into account in difficult professional situations, and how to best translate their talents and competencies into satisfying results as cultural operators in a challenging context. The cultural management training will be enriched with soft skills coaching.
Lights On 2022 will experiment with many formats, both digital and live: experiential learning, self-directed learning, study visits, discussions, group and individual work, theory vs. practice, and democratic moderation.
Beyond the cultural management and soft skills training, the fundamental aim of the programme is for its alumni to become part of a supportive community of European cultural practitioners who exchange experiences, learn together and establish friendships and cooperation.
This edition includes preparatory online training; individual preparatory work; a 5-day live meeting in Irun (Basque Country, Spain); a 7-day exchange with another cultural organisation, and an online evaluation meeting.
Discover more about the Lights On programme here
Laura Diez Garcia Laura is the co-founder of the cultural association ANTespacio, which generates experimental initiatives within contemporary cultural production. She investigates new possibilities for specific projects that take into account the current local context in which they are generated, considering art and meditation essential elements for social transformation. The projects are based on a collaborative work that, through contemporary art, generate critical judgement and bring positions between the public and the artist. She is also the founder and coordinator of Artoteka (Artoteka.org), a platform that offers loans of works of art and mediation activities with artists and different communities
Dagna Gmitrowicz is a visual artist, facilitator, therapist and process designer who creates meaningful learning spaces at conferences, workshops and in her studio. A true believer in supporting a collaborative work culture – one that uses the potential and strengths of everyone and taps into the collective creativity of the group. She has worked, among others, with Erasmus + National Agencies across Europe, Euroguidance, Bundesvereinigung Kulturelle Kinder- und Jugendbildung (BKJ), Cabuwazi-pedagogical circus in Berlin,Naturkultur.EV. and recently The International Society for Self-Directed Learning in the US. She co-manages her own cultural foundation in Poland, even though she lives and works in Berlin, Germany. Her field of expertise is Self-Directed Learning and Life-Long Learning in the context of visual expression.