(CTM) Cultural Transformation Movement project

Committing to advancing diversity, equity, inclusion and access in arts and cultural organisations and the broader arts and cultural sector is crucial.

Cultural Transformation Movement (CTM) project is a context-based process to diversify artistic production and its destination starting from within the organisation. It is led by Trans Europe Halles with four of TEH members, Brunnenpassage from Austria, VIERNULVIER from Belgium, Zo centro culture contemporanee from Italy, IZOLYATSIA. Platform for Cultural Initiatives from Ukraine. With the Cultural Transformation Movement project, we are taking real steps, making genuine commitments and openly sharing experiences with the other TEH members about how to make social justice a priority in arts, culture and creative industries.

Funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union, the Cultural Transformation Movement project is designed for four years (2023-2027) and aims to transform the participating cultural organisations, so they include and reflect the full range of backgrounds and perspectives to be found in European society today. The CTM partners are dedicated to ensuring that leaders, staff and audiences of arts and cultural organisations manifest the diversity we see and feel in our societies today. The project culminates in a significant shift in cultural organisation’s landscape reflecting an increased presence of underrepresented communities (URCs) in leadership roles, staff compositions and audience demographics.

This will be achieved by the CTM project designing and implementing new strategies of cultural management and creative processes. The strategies will be developed around and within the local context of the four participating cultural institutions, known as centre-of-change or #CoC. Underrepresented communities relevant to each context will actively engage in this process with bridging efforts of local artists/agents-of-change or #AoC, together with the CTM artistic transformation facilitator.

Who is involved into CTM project?

CTM project is piloted by the frontrunners:

TEH – project coordinator and lead;

and 4 #CoC:

together with:

CTM artistic transformation facilitator Laura Camacho Salgado
CTM project researcher Israel Aloni

and #AoC:

in Brunnenpassage: Araba Evelyn Johnston-Arthur
in VIERNULVIER: Dounia Mahammed and Mira Bryssinck
in ZO: Elie Laucher and Emanuele Miceli
in IZOLYATSIA: Ksenia Ulianova

What are CTM project major activities?

CTM is woven with a tapestry of activities unfolding in two dimensions:

locally - at the premises and within the contexts of each CoC;
collectively on a transnational level - where partners collaboratively engage with each other.

On the local level, workshops, artistic residencies and mentorship programs will take place. Simultaneously, at the collective level, annual meetings, knowledge production and sharing, artistic manifestos as well as the final CTM project publication, will be components of the collaborative efforts.

Take a closer look at CTM project-related activities.

Workshops

Each CoC, operating at the local level, is dedicated to enhancing its competence through transcultural development workshops, inviting creative professionals and decision-makers from the vicinity to engage in diverse leadership capacity-building workshops. With a vision for dialogue between artists from underrepresented communities (URCs) and local stakeholders, each CoC initiates awareness workshops and mobilization campaigns, aiming to inspire action against social inequalities in arts and culture. CTM's goal is to empower participants to address these issues effectively.

Mentorship Programme

In the CTM project, we believe in the power of mentorship as a tool for knowledge transfer, skills development and career guidance, network opportunities and personal growth. Therefore, CTM mentorship programme connects mentors to mentees at each CoC.

Knowledge Hub

At the collaborative level, TEH ensures knowledge exchange through knowledge roundtables facilitated by CTM researcher - Israel Aloni, and collective reflection workshops led by CTM artistic transformation facilitator - Laura Camacho Salgado at TEH annual meetings such as TEH Camp and TEH Conference, providing a space for CTM project partners to meet, share ideas, and reflect on their transformative journey. CTM project concludes with the release of its final publication.

What is to be achieved with CTM project?

The societies, in general, are more diverse than the European arts, culture and creative sectors. With CTM, we want to challenge this by leading the cultural transformation movement towards a fairer and more inclusive society both within its realm of 5 partner institutions, and beyond.

The major focus extends to shaping plural and diverse leadership pathway nurturing the rise of leaders from underrepresented communities (URCs), as well as attracting diverse staff and audience.

To make a collective impact, partners and participants will join forces to regularly share knowledge and wisdom about the learning of the project and their own transformation, as a result of it.

Cultural Transformation Movement project people

CTM project partners and participants at TEH Camp Meeting 96 in Tbilisi, 5-8 October 2023 (from left to right): Ksenia Ulianova (AoC, Ukraine), Laura Camacho Salgado (CTM artistic facilitator), Dounia Mahammed (AoC, Belgium), Elie Laucher (AoC, Italy), Araba Evelyn Johnston-Arthur (AoC, Austria), Ségolène Le Contellec (Zo, CTM project partner from Italy), Elisabeth Bernroitner & Fariba Mosleh (Brunnenpassage, CTM project partner from Austria), Marieke De Munck (VIERNULLVIER, CTM project partner from Belgium), Ceyda Berk-Söderblom (TEH CTM project coordinator), Tine Theunissen (VIERNULLVIER, CTM project partner from Belgium)