BCC (BalcanCanContemporary)
Arts Information Environment
BCC is an international arts information environment, which has the goal to support, connect, present, empower and raise visibility of artists and arts organizations involved in contemporary and innovative performing arts from the Balkans. Giving space to young and emerging as well as established artists who are interested in researching and questioning different models of producing, creating and presenting their work is at the core of our attention.
Each issue of the magazine is the result of cooperation between several arts organizations, practitioners and theorists from across the Balkans. Cooperation and information sharing are the keys to sustainability of the independent arts scene in this region and beyond and we are filling the communication gaps between different stakeholders (be it between performers and their audiences or even between arts organizations in different countries).
BCC is distributed free in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Slovenia and Serbia.
Supplement of MASKA, Performing Arts Journal
ISSN 1318-0509
Published by: Maska (Institute for Publishing, Production and Education)
Metelkova 6, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia
Phone: +386 1 4313122 Fax: +386 1 4313122
E-mail: info@maska.si
For the publisher: Janez Janša
Subscription and distribution: ana.ivanek@maska.si
Issue edited by Zvonimir Dobrović
International Editorial Board: Draga Alfirević, Una Bauer, Andraž Golc, Ivana Ivković, Janez Janša, Davor Mišković, Nevena Redžić, Milan Vračar, Ana Vujanović, Jasmina Založnik
English Language Editor: Kat Bowman
Art Director: Andre von Ah
Print: Printera
Circulation: 5000
Maska, Performing Arts Journal is financially supported by the Slovenian Book Agency.
BCC is financially supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia.
Climate Change is one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century. For the eleven arts organisations making up the IMAGINE 2020 – Art and Climate Change network, 2020 is a realistic date to work towards for making changes necessary to stabilise the climate and secure a sustainable future.
“Artists of every kind have one overriding moral duty, which is to do their work as well as possible. But since that work partly consists of responding to what the world itself is up to, it would be strange if the best work being produced didn’t take some account, in some way, of what’s happening to our climate. Art is not only about beauty: sometimes it has to warn.” – Philip Pullman, novelist
What role can the cultural sector play in the necessary transition process, to drastically reduce carbon emissions, to mitigate climate change and increase resilience to the effects of peak oil? Artiststraditionally confront issues of such societal importance head on and often act as a catalyst for societal change. Art, as Philip Pullman puts it, is about beauty, but sometimes it has to warn. Can it do both? And more?
These are questions for the IMAGINE 2020 network members. They share a sense of responsibility to rise to the challenge and want to use their passion, their expertise, and their connections within the art world and beyond to engage the European cultural sector and use its creative potential to raise awareness, involving the general public both as audience and as participants.
Art should provide a physical and imaginary spacewhere people can take a step back, away from the corporate, the commercial and the educational, to exchange and engage with each other. It can address and involve more targeted audiences, such as young people, in playful yet serious ways. And above all it can create a positive energy and momentum for change through a sense of common purpose and hope.
The IMAGINE 2020 network will also research new ways of producing and presenting exciting artworks with minimal environmental impact, and share its learning in order to get the European cultural sector as a whole to include climate change concerns in their everyday working practice.
The network spreads across nine European countries and brings together eleven diverse, highly motivated and experienced cultural institutions:
Kaaitheater, Brussels, Belgium as the project leader;
- Artsadmin, London, UK;
- Bunker, Ljubljana, Slovenia;
- Domaine d’O, Montpellier, France;
- Domino (Perforacije Festival), Zagreb, Croatia;
- Kampnagel, Hamburg, Germany;
- Le Quai, Angers, France;
- LIFT, London, UK;
- New Theatre Institute of Latvia, Riga, Latvia;
- Rotterdamse Schouwburg, Rotterdam, Netherlands;
- Transforma, Torres Vedras, Portugal.
