Category Archives: Projects

The DISCE Project, of which CUMEDIAE is a partner, keeps traveling around Europe to investigate the dynamics of cultural and creative economies in specific case study city-regions, providing in-depth understanding of issues of growth, inclusivity and sustainability.

On November 20th-21st DISCE and its Stockholm School of Economics in Riga reserachers, brought the Community Forum format to Liepāja, Latvia. These events give the possibility to CCIs professionals and stakeholders living in the same area to meet and confront, creating an environment that also enables potential collaboration.

“We were glad to greet people representing diverse relations to creative community and occupations–artists, representatives of arts and sports organisations, tourism agency, activists, local municipality representatives, creative entrepreneurs, researchers and teachers” comments Inga Gleidzane, lecturer in Stockholm School of Economics in Riga and researcher for DISCE.

“During the forum the participants shared the goals and mission of their activities and identified assets that support their effort. These aspects are interlinked more than we initially thought, and more could be achieved in terms of quality, quantity, creativity and satisfaction if they would cooperate, and create and execute activities together”

Next week (2^nd-5^th December) DISCE will return to Enschede to build on the contacts and knowledge that it developed during the last visit in October.

Researchers will be conducting interviews with stakeholders including creative and cultural workers, policymakers, educators and audiences, and a Community Forum will be held on Tuesday 3rd, at the Assyrische Mesopotamische Vereniging Enschede (AMVE) Community Centre.

Tamsyn Dent, DISCE researcher from King’s College London: “This is a great opportunity to engage with more citizens of Enschede to talk about their participation in creative activity, and we’re looking forward to developing relationships and extending our knowledge of Enschede’s creative economy”

Thanks to the partner’s dedication, this project travels from city to city, with new forms, transforming itself, becoming a unique production, and above all, offering new content and reflections.

On the 21st of November we were pleased to attend the presentation of the Pau Casals Foundation at the Embassy of Spain in Belgium, together with many representatives of international culture-related institutions.

The event was opened by Sergi Farré Salvá, Cultural Counsellor of the Chancellery of the Spanish Embassy in Brussels, who introduced Jordi Pardo, Director of the Foundation. Pardo presented the Foundation, its history and its many activities and initiatives in the field of solidarity and music. More importantly, during his speech we were able to discover more about who Pau Casals was and what he did to promote peace.

Pau Casals was one of the 20th century’s greatest cellists, internationally recognised as one of the finest performers and orchestra conductors of his times. He was always a staunch defender of peace and freedom. His numerous benefit concerts, his commitment to humanitarian actions and his various speeches at the United Nations characterised him clearly as a man of peace. His foundation now aims at implementing these values through the different actions carried out throughout the year.

Institutions as Pau Casals Foundation teach us the power we have through culture, in this case music, and the great positive impact that we can create in society to foster tolerance and education.

On October 28th, CUMEDIAE’s Chairman Ignasi Guardans will participate in the UNCTAD Ad Hoc Expert Meeting on Creative Economy and Sustainable Development in Geneve, Switzerland.

Dr. Guardans will join leading experts from government, business, academia and international organizations to discuss the development opportunities and challenges associated with the evolving creative economy.

The day aims to raise awareness of the importance of the creative economy for sustainable development, advance the development agenda connected to creative economy, and create and strengthen networks and partnerships for the advancement of key related issues including those related to statistics related to creative economy, intellectual property, market access, entrepreneurship, digital economy and innovation.

The Horizon 2020 DISCE Project, of which CUMEDIAE is partner, also contributes to the event with the working paper Developing Inclusive & Sustainable Creative Economies: Joining Up Cultural Democracy, Ecological Leadership, and Caring for Cultural Freedom developed by the King’s College London researchers Nick Wilson and Jonathan Gross.

The expert meeting will provide an opportunity to discuss challenges at hand, current developments related to creative economy and implications for developing countries, and to formulate recommendations.

One of our main aim as CUMEDIAE is to promote culture in Europe in order to achieve more tolerance and better coexistence among citizens. For this reason we are very happy with the success of our project Parallel Traces: A new lens on Jewish Heritage and of its first event in Girona!

The exhibition was held on October 1st, 2019 at the Museum of Jewish History of Girona, and saw the participation of the Project’s Artistic Director Rosa Juanco, together with some of our Guest Artists.

We want to thank all the people and partners who made it possible for the event to be a success. Besides, we would like to recognize the fantastic works of our speakers and their contribution for an inspiring round table, where we were able to learn and discuss on this fascinating and huge issue that is Jewish heritage in Europe.

if you missed the exhibition, check out here the pictures of the event!