Revolution and uprisings in Europe, the
Middle East and North Africa are creating
an inherent imbalance in the way the
cultural sector operates. Some realities
were born out of rebellion. Then, they
quickly slipped into a turbulent social
and legal environment. Many cultural
workers can relate to the increasing
political and economic pressures across
geographies and disciplines. Artists,
practitioners, and organizations are
facing intimidations. Their spaces of
expression are shrinking. Restrictions on
groups and stressful working environments
are hindering artistic endeavour. Entities
face risks of bankruptcy or are being
weakened by the lack of funding and
permits.
The war in Ukraine is resulting in a wave
of refugees in Europe, bringing additional
pressures to the Arts and Cultural scene.
This forced several actors to leave trying
to recreate their homes and civic spaces
where possible. Driven by the will of
protecting their own existence, those
actors multiply the mediums to raise and
channel their voices. Therefore, cultural
actors face ethical, emotional and
existential questions. Some of them must
migrate towards more centralized locations
in search for opportunities. Others move
to find refuge or seek support elsewhere
because of war and violence.
While migration and traumatic events
are challenging the balances in our
contemporary societies, creators of
independent critical narratives are
getting less room for exercise and
expression. However, the sense of urgency
and care is showing more grounds of
action, alternative forms of mobilization
and artistic practice. Where these
territories are frail, sensitive and
humanly consuming, cultural actors are
finding motifs to enhance their efforts.
They are gaining nuanced ways to approach,
understand and transform these pressures
into media and productions to relief the
burden, reveal the truths and advocate for
their causes.
How to preserve the forces of change?
How to resist and connect with fragile
individuals or groups experiencing trauma
or pressure? What happens when entities
become the community to save? They
become the ones under threat, jointly
with the people they serve. What are the
transferable responses and mechanisms
to strive against and thrive again in
difficult and uncertain times?
This third edition of Arts and Culture
Under Pressure is to hear from artists at
risk in Europe, MENA and beyond. It aims
to create a space to exchange strategies
and practices of resiliency for overcoming
pressures. This publication presents five
stories of transition, Profiles of cultural
realities that are deploying actions to
keep running despite challenges, conflicts
and unrests. Even with the limited number
of stories showcased, their consistency
embraces the complexity and diversity of
responses. This highlights their common
ground too.
You will read about Egypt, Poland,
Sweden, Sudan and other European and
MENA communities. You will dive into the
contexts of practitioners operating under
high risks, yet with a growing sense of
urgency and social duty. They are the most
relevant proposals we have selected through
an open call. We tried to be respectful of
the voices of peers and their strategies.
Therefore, we share the words and images
they chose to invite you to their world(s).
“Sense it”, “Noise it” and “Be it”
represent the three relations we identified
to tell the stories of pressures. These
human capacities in the stories shared
represent attitudes towards the forces
that disturb and disrupt us in the social
and political environment we operate in.
These three choices are supporting the
consciousness of the threat’s origin, the
planning of response, the capacitation
and transformation of resistance into a
suitable alternative. When coming together,
these 3 actions can shape a pathway to
preserve the energies of independent arts
and cultural practices despite the turmoil.
SENSE IT
The profile under “Sense it” brings us to
Egypt with El Madina for Arts to speak about
critical pressures turning into an imminent
danger for the organizational vitality
and existence. These can be structural
obstacles like a change in law or financial
regulations and operations permit, forcing
entities to no other choice but closing
and changing operational routines. Sensing
these pressures, recognizing their levels
and their consequences becomes essential
to make informed choices for facing and
overcoming them.
NOISE IT
Here, pressures go hand in hand with human
urgency to act and have a say. A call for
the social responsibility of each person
and reality disagreeing with abuse or being
aware of the resources they can bring to
assist whom in need. Cultural actors direct
their channels and invest their abilities
to support the refugee and displaced (Letter
to Mom from Ukraine and Germany), the
forgotten (Mind the Gap stories from Sweden
and Egypt), and the human vulnerability
(Resilient creatives from Sudan). They
make noise to tell important truths about
injustice or weakness to assist and face
these criticalities in solidarity and by
connecting across boundaries. They play a
role in shaping safe spaces, homes to heal,
or experience the fear, the fatigue, or
grow the courage together. They make noise,
making their voices louder in critical
issues in public domain. Cultural and
creatives approaches unfold into valuebased
missions and civic spaces where to
exert their own capacities and emotions;
where to reinvent own processes to adapt in
new changing realities; where to resist,
relief, survive, and reconnect with
dignity, safety and human rights.
BE IT
Last, pressures are forces carried out by
someone wanting to exert power to influence
the course of other realities against their
own choice. Pressures and influence are a
relation and a communication between two
poles: the power and the counter-power.
“Be it” represents the attitude of some
cultural actors who existed as a “counter
power” to ruling pressures. In Poland,
Arts and culture melt into activism with
Heartbreaking Performance Art Group. They
challenge the status quo and denounce
cruel practices facts publicly and
creatively.
This publication shares actual threats
for the existence of democratic creative
space. Happy stories and endings are
certainly not the dominant tone of this
publication. Rather, you will experience
“determination”, unpopular choices, and
pragmatic approaches so it hopefully be
contagious and inspiring for you, for your
search of solutions or a critical friend.
The following pages give access to
authentic stories. Feel them, share them
and maybe reach out to their heroes to
bring yours. The more we share promising
truths and clues, the more our solidarity
world can come closer. The more we express
our struggles, the more we can relief the
burden of carrying them alone. And the
more we share the ideas and instruments to
overcome obstacles, the more we can grow
together and influence the world we want
to live in and experience.
**
Arts & Culture Under Pressure initiative is
implemented in the framework of Bosch Alumni
Network by International Alumni Center Berlin
in collaboration with MitOst e.V. We present
for you a publication with stories around
.pressure. in the Arts and Culture sector.
Through an open call, we gathered voices of
cultural realities in Europe and the MENA
region. With 5 of them, we try to depict the
diversity of responses actors are bringing to
thrive.
These visual and textual narratives wish to
reverberate with their daring voices. We share
them in the same words the artists and actors
have chosen to narrate their vital impulse
preserving their freedom(s) and cause(s).
