Untitled - Narodowe Centrum Kultury

tytuł artykułu 17
Audiostation.Falenica and She Was All Clad in Pixels, artistic
and rehabilitation projects run by Culture Practitioners Association in
a young women offenders facility in Falenica.
http://praktycy.org/
Common Place, Three Poles, Prologue, three projects that combine
ethnography, culture animation and art, run since 2007 in and
around Ostałówek by a group of culture animators from Culture Cathedral
Association, initiated by students’ ethnographic research.
http://katedrakultury.pl/
http://3bieguny.blogspot.com/
I Change Therefore I Stay, an art project run by Lucilla Kossowska,
an artist and English graduate who settled in Suchy Bór, where
she founded Education Through Art Institute.
http://www.ieps.com.pl/
Mobile School, a project of Social Animation and Pedagogy
Group, which works in the Warsaw district of North Praga. As part
of the School, daily education and social animation actives are held in
a number of Praga courtyards between June and October. The Group
also conducts street work with local youth.
http://www.gpas.org.pl/
Model 4: Travel helps to take up
the baton
Travel broadens the mind. That much is obvious. But sometimes it
also helps combine things, such as different models for implementing
local projects. In the models we have described so far, culture animators
come for a short time, carry out long-term work or come to stay
for longer. Let’s now look at a model dedicated to animators or – to put
it differently – leaders who want to start working in their own community
and take part in a project to prepare for this task.
The idea to become a leader is not always consciously realised.
The first inkling of leadership potential often arrives in the form of an
urge to do something – to do something your way, something that will
bring a touch of colour to your everyday existence, allow you to develop
your interests, make people smile a little more and make the surrounding
space a bit more friendly. Most natural born leaders have
a passion, such as film, journalism, street art, cooking, dance, history
or photography, as well as a revolutionary streak and a social
conscience.
This mixture of abilities does not allow them to stand by and
look at the increasing apathy, to calmly nurse the bitterness that prevails
around them or to be satisfied with the available offerings that
often miss the needs of those they are aimed at. They want to make
a difference that will benefit both themselves and others. These budding
leaders, however, frequently lack the requisite knowledge, skills
and tools to consciously, efficiently and independently carry out their
ideas. Therefore, they will benefit from finding a project that will help
them prepare for it.
So-called leadership projects, also known as “take-up-the-baton
projects”, typically involve travel. Leaders join an appropriate programme
and travel to a big city to attend workshops or training where
they are provided with key information on how to run their projects, find
inspiration to help them come up with their own ideas for activities, and
where they are taught creative, educational and managerial skills.
The workshop or training is a one-off event which lasts several
days or a series of meetings spread out over time. Some projects not
only offer training but also the chance to receive partial funding. Others
go on to offer funding and provide leaders with additional support
during project implementation.
Take-up-the-baton projects can be implemented in various
ways, but they share a number of key assumptions. The first is the
conviction that there is a relatively universal, transferable base of
proven knowledge and skills that each local leader should have. The
second assumption is that the role of project organisers is limited
to supporting leaders’ development which is initiated by the leaders
themselves, based on their own internal motivation to attend workshops
and training. Thirdly, leaders take up the baton – they are provided
with a knowledge and skill set which will enable them to work
independently in a responsible way.
This model works indirectly – it transfers tools, not ready-made
solutions. It helps leaders to identify local needs, but does not do it for
them. It offers information on “good practices”, but does not provide
ready-made solutions. It gives advice on how to fill out applications
and find partners, but the final decisions are up to the participants.
Of the models described so far, this one seems to offer the most
independence – it does not stake the fate of the local community on
the arrival of an animator, but assumes that each community has its
own leader – whether they are aware of it or not.
The leader is found or reveals herself through a grassroots process.
When this happens, she should be offered support in preparing
to her role and in the actual work she does. The above assumption,
however, has a utopian element to it – workshops, which typically last