French Spanish and Ukrainian Art Communities Collaborate for Cultural Heritage
French Spanish and Ukrainian Art Communities Collaborate for Cultural Heritage
French cuisine, Spanish photography, and Ukrainian architecture have recently met in the true European Year of Cultural Heritage manner within the international collaborative project Colab Quarter. Aiming to preserve a cultural heritage site in Ukraine, the project empowered a successful collaboration of local art communities.
Launched in 2017, Colab Quarter brought together French culinary designs artists, photographers from Spain, and architecture specialists from Ukraine to explore European cultural connections and support a common cause. On a mission to preserve the art centre of the National Academy of Fine Arts of Ukraine at 33 Soshenko Street in Kyiv, the project involves a French association CRICAO from Tolouse, a community of the town Colomiers, the Mescladis initiative from Barcelona, the Ukrainian organisation MistoDiya, and the artists from Kiev art studio Soshenko 33.
Their teamwork is a great example of cross-border heritage collaboration and an inspiring initiative presenting people as the most powerful agents in transforming the diversity into a common cultural space.
Together for Preservation of a Cultural Heritage Site
Throughout its decades-long history, the Soshenko 33 remained the symbol of a unique and unbiased community of artists. Creative individuals from all across Ukraine and various European countries visited the site to connect, exchange ideas, learn, and create side by side.
Since an agreement on the construction of a residential complex on the site was made in 2012, the local art community has been working towards achieving a status of the international importance in order to preserve the site. The Colab Quarter initiative is one of the projects that aims to help the implementation of this idea.
It also supports the European Year of Cultural Heritage objective to explore intercultural and cross-artistic dimension of cultural heritage. In the words of Stefane Robert, one of the project’s initiators from CRICAO:
“The Colab Quarter will work with local communities because people are the first and the brightest source of cultural wealth. The participation of active residents is the necessary condition for social change, development and innovations. In our project, culture will become the tool for uniting the people.”
With support from the Creative Europe programme by the European Union, the initiative is planning to engage a large number of culture enthusiasts from the three countries in joint events during the course of one year (from spring 2018 to summer 2019).
Continuing the successful season of events organised in France, Colab Quarter has organised the architecture summer school that took place at Soshenko 33 between 25 July and 4 August. The school opened a conversation between local communities, artists, and professional architects on the importance of the art residence, its past function and future possibilities.
The art residency and its local community are also viewed through the lenses of photography and culinary design. A culinary workshop “KatchaKatcha” and a photo archive of the site provided different perspectives of the site and the local community that make up the creative space. These activities helped highlight the site's local and international dimension, helping transform the past contexts into shared, common values.
Photo credits: Soshenko 33 Tumblr