Insights from the kick-off meeting

What is CultureLabs?

CultureLabs is an Horizon 2020, funded under the Societal Challenges pillar, with the aim to develop novel methodologies and ICT tools that can facilitate the organisation and wider deployment of participatory projects for social innovation through cultural heritage.

CultureLabs’ case studies and pilots focus on different immigrants communities and seek to build bridges between their grassroots living culture and institutional cultural heritage.

How to build and encourage social innovation? A brief “cooking” lesson

The first step is to identify the needs of institutional stakeholders as well as of immigrants and the kind of resources – “ingredients” that will be collected in the CultureLabs and experimented/implemented during the pilots.

After collecting ingredients, the project envisages to define what a “recipe” should comprise and what kind of digital services can assist the succesful organisation of such recipes. How do partecipatory activities enable social inclusion? How to encourage it through cultural heritage?

Of course, there are “chiefs” that have already made existing recipes. In this regards CultureLabs would thank the participants of our kick-off meeting, speakers representing REACH project and Greek organisations active in the Cultural Heritage and social innovation fields:

• Neil Forbes – Coordinator of the REACH project (www.reach-culture.eu)
• Dora Vougiouka – Onassis Cultural Centre Athens (www.sgt.gr)
• Christos Papamichael – Liminal organisation for inclusive art (www.liminal.eu)
• Eleni Zacharopoulou – Krama multicultural theatrical team (www.facebook.com/theatrikiomadakrama)

Follow our magazine section to know these and new recipes for social innovation!