From 23 to 27 September 2024, the Cerveira Art Biennial Foundation will host the third ‘EuroFabrique Art Camp’, co-funded by the European Union’s Creative Europe programme, as part of the XXIII Cerveira International Art Biennial. The initiative will bring together 33 students from 11 European art schools in 7 different countries to explore and create around the continent’s major contemporary challenges.
A Creative Immersion in Vila Nova de Cerveira
From 23 to 27 September 2024, Vila Nova de Cerveira will host a European curatorial laboratory in which 33 students from 11 European art schools in 7 countries will explore the idea of Europe through artistic practices. The aim will be to collectively reflect on how art and design can be used to address the European continent’s most pressing issues, based on the biennial’s theme ‘ARE YOU FREE?’.
“We are delighted to welcome this creative camp in Vila Nova de Cerveira, which will provide young people with the opportunity to critically reflect on emerging issues in Europe through artistic practices“ says the Mayor of Vila Nova de Cerveira and FBAC’s President, Rui Teixeira.
Coordinated by the artists and researchers Susana Gaudêncio and Sofia Gonçalves and the team from the Cerveira Art Biennial Foundation, the ‘EuroFabrique Art Camp’ will be based on a methodology consolidated in the concepts of reverse flow and situated knowledge. This approach is intended to favour a relational and intuitive creative process, based on field explorations in the parish of Covas, creative moments and meetings with art professionals, curators and political and social activists.
The ‘EuroFabrique Art Camp’ will thus represent a stage in the construction of a European creative community that is committed to and reflective of the challenges of the 21st century. The results of the week’s creative immersion will be presented by the participants in the Auditorium of the Cerveira Cultural Forum on Friday, 27 September, at 4.30pm. The session will be public and open to the community. The programme also includes the performance ‘Malandro | Sem culpa’, by the artist Flávio Rodrigues, starting at 6pm.
At the same time, a seminar will be held on the 26th and 27th of September, bringing together all the project’s partners to work on prospects for its future.
Supported by the European Union’s Creative Europe programme, to the tune of 200,000 euros and with a co-financing rate of 80%, the project aims to raise awareness of the role of artists and designers as drivers of social, political, economic and cultural development and social resilience, participating in a more inclusive and tolerant society.
It should be noted that the event takes place as part of the XXIII Cerveira International Art Biennial, which runs from 20 July to 30 December under the theme ‘Are You Free?’ and features 160 works by 120 artists from 20 countries. Marking 46 years of existence, the oldest art biennial on the Iberian Peninsula invites artists, thinkers and the public to reflect on the theme of Freedom, problematising issues associated with the democratic values won in the April 1974 Revolution and on which the historical and cultural legacy built by the Cerveira International Art Biennial is thus established.
About ‘EuroFabrique’: a European project on the move
‘EuroFabrique’ is a nomadic international programme launched in 2022 by the Association nationale des Ecoles supérieures d’art (ANdÉA), RMN-Grand Palais and the École des Arts Décoratifs de Paris. This project regularly brings together students from European art schools to devise new forms and creative narratives that represent the European continent. After its first edition at the Grand Palais Éphémère in Paris, followed by an edition in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, EuroFabrique has established itself as an adaptable event, designed to integrate any network of art schools in Europe.
To structure and perpetuate this programme, the Cerveira Art Biennial Foundation, ANdÉA, Le Signe, Centre National du Graphisme (France) and the Transylvanian Creative Industries Cluster in Cluj-Napoca (Romania) have obtained European funding to co-organise three EuroFabrique Camps. The aim of these collaboration capsules is to formalise EuroFabrique’s transmission methods, visual identity and curatorial content.
It should be noted that two creative camps have already been held as part of the project: the ‘Think Camp’ in Cluj (Romania) in December 2023, which defined the EuroFabrique concept and explored its formats, and the ‘Design Camp’ in Chaumont (France) in February 2024, which brought together 42 graphic design students who worked on creating the graphic identity.
Participants
11 institutions, 33 students, 7 countries
- Escola Superior de Design – Universidade Politécnica do Cávado e do Ave (Portugal)
- Vilnius Academy of Arts (Lithuania)
- Campus Caraïbéen des Arts, école supérieure d’art de Martinique (France)
- Art Academy of Latvia (Latvia)
- Institut Supérieur des Beaux-Arts de Besançon (France)
- Cluster Industrii Creative Transilvania (Romania)
- Royal Academy of Art (KABK), Hague (The Netherlands)
- Köln International School of Design (KISD), TH Köln (Germany)
- École Nationale Supérieure d’Art de Dijon (France)
- Escola de Arquitetura, Arte e Design da Universidade do Minho (Portugal)
- Escola Superior de Educação, IPVC (Portugal)