"Dictionary of Secret Sounds," L'Albero, Italy

Co-creating a new opera language accessible to deaf and hearing audiences.

In Italy, attempts to make opera accessible to deaf people have largely relied on translating works originally created for hearing audiences into sign language. INCLUSIVE OPERA is an artistic research that brings together deaf and hearing artists and local communities to create an innovative opera-performance. INCLUSIVE OPERA proposes a different approach: rather than adapting an existing art form, it places sign language, gesture and deaf culture at the heart of the creative process. Since 2021, a collective of artists, educators and deaf participants has been exploring the relationship between sound and gesture, score and movement, singing and vibration, visual art, Italian Sign Language (LIS) and vernacular visual. Through the Community Opera methodology, the research aims to develop a new inclusive performative language and a “score of the body”, combining gesture, movement and music, bringing together deaf and hearing people in a co-creation process where no language or artistic practice prevails over another. Artistic residencies involved dancers, musicians, students, deaf communities, participants from diverse cultural backgrounds.

The next phases will be the creation of libretto, visual and musical composition, the first study performance and the final production.

© Photo: Action Collective

"Kristoffer on the Edge of the Universe," Ex Voto à la Lune, France

Invite children to become authors of their own world narratives through an immersive journey combining theater, science, philosophy and digital creation.

Kristoffer on the Edge of the Universe invites children and their families to observe, experiment, seek out, and create in order to explore the universe’s great questions, develop critical thinking skills, and discover doubt as a motor of knowledge and dialogue.

The project combines Kant, a show using magic and holographic technologies, with an immersive journey consisting of a virtual reality experience, a cosmogonic labyrinth (augmented reality & digital library) and workshops for collective creation. Children discover how different civilizations, scientific disciplines and philosophical traditions have tried to explain the origin of the world.

Children discover how different civilizations, scientific disciplines and philosophical traditions have tried to explain the origin of the world.

They are then invited to imagine, tell and make short videos featuring their own cosmogony. These audiovisual creations enrich a digital library accessible to teachers, families and other participants.

By promoting experimentation and shared creation, Kristoffer on the Edge of the Universe develops children’s curiosity and ability to collectively take on universal issues. The project thus proposes a new form of cultural mediation where the artistic experience becomes a space for active participation, transmission and common construction of knowledge.

© Photo: Maxime Lethelier

"TRACES," DU Dance (NI), United Kingdom

The project prioritises young people, older adults and local communities, bringing together participants who rarely have opportunities to collaborate through shared creative processes. These groups represent different lived experiences, perspectives and relationships to culture; creating opportunities for meaningful exchange and diverse, collective authorship.

The project builds on DU Dance (NI)’s existing community relationships, using established programmes as an entry point to engage participants in the development of the work. However, the project is intentionally designed to extend beyond these groups. Their contributions will act as a public launch for the digital archive, before widening access to audiences and inviting members of the public to contribute directly to the space through their own movement and interaction.

Key objectives include democratising access to culture and digital tech. Both dance and immersive technologies are often experienced as specialist, institutional or commercially driven tools. This project places them directly into the hands of communities, creating opportunities for people to shape, influence and author cultural experiences that feel contemporary, relevant, accessible and theirs.

By combining community development, public participation and digital innovation, the project aims to reach a broad cross-section of society while ensuring those traditionally underrepresented within cultural spaces remain central to the process.

© Photo: KMPhoto

"Classic for Kids", Classic Unlimited, Romania

Looking to reduce inequalities in access to music and arts education for over 1.500 children, the project reaches 20 rural and small urban communities in Romania, facing ethnic (particularly concerning Roma children) and geographical barriers (isolated villages and small depopulated cities) or dealing with behavioural disorders, learning difficulties or socio-emotional issues.

In these marginalised communities, cultural infrastructure is entirely nonexistent. The vast majority of schools we visit have no specialised music teacher and zero musical instruments, leaving children completely cut off from any cultural interactions.

Since schools lack infrastructure, our "musical van" brings music to them. Travelling with a piano, hundreds of small percussion instruments, and mini-keyboards, we teach children how to listen to and play music. But most importantly, we give them the opportunity to make music as a means of developing creativity, social interaction, and inclusion.

Our musical shows are designed for children aged 6 to 10, featuring both classical and contemporary music written specifically for young audiences, along with a tailor-made musical workshop.

The “Classic for Kids Musical Guide” expands our reach beyond the 20 schools we have visited, providing teachers with valuable resources to enrich their music lessons and parents with digital musical educational resources.

© Photo: Courtesy of Classic Unlimited

"Kino Susidiv (Films by Our Neighbours)", Cinema and Culture Development, Ukraine

Kino Susidiv (Films by Our Neighbours) is a free annual film festival in Uzhhorod, a Ukrainian city bordering Slovakia and Hungary, dedicated to contemporary cinema from six neighbouring countries: Poland, Slovakia, Czechia, Hungary, Romania, and Austria. The festival promotes intercultural dialogue through free public screenings, discussions, and accessible events, including adapted screenings for neurodivergent audiences.

In 2027, Kino Susidiv will launch the Neighbourhood Cinema Academy, a new audience engagement programme for 15 teenagers from frontline regions and de-occupied territories of Ukraine. During a week-long residency in Uzhhorod, participants will discover contemporary European cinema, meet filmmakers and cultural professionals from across Central and Eastern Europe, and receive practical training in audience development, film curation, and cultural event organisation.

Upon returning home, each participant will organise a free public screening and discussion in their community, becoming a local cultural ambassador. The project transforms young audiences into active cultural organisers, expanding access to European cinema in war-affected regions while creating a replicable model of youth-led cultural participation that can be adapted across Europe.

© Photo: Courtesy of Cinema and Culture Development

"Safe Passage," THEAMA, Greece

Safe Passage explores the enduring power of a promise: an obligation that connects people across distance, separation and even death. The project creates an accessible digital museum that positions refugee makers and disabled artists as authors of cultural production and materialises the promise through their craft and performance. Refugee and local makers transform salvaged life jackets and boats, materials that once carried the promise of safety at sea, into handcrafted bags that open the museum through a QR code. Disabled and non-disabled artists embody the same promise through a filmed performance of the Greek and Balkan song Tou Nekrou Aderfou, presented in the museum’s first room. The bags will be distributed through European cultural institutions, connecting the museum and its creators with audiences across Europe.

© Photo: Courtesy of THEAMA

"LIVING REGIONAL NEWSPAPER," RAMAGU, Slovakia

Transforming residents of an isolated region into active co-creators of art by combining local journalism with site-specific documentary theatre.

The geographically isolated Zamagurie region suffers from a lack of cultural infrastructure and the marginalisation of local minorities. Our project changes this by directly engaging vulnerable and specific communities – Roma, Gorals, and Rusyns across all generations. They will not merely be passive spectators. Utilising the resources of our independent monthly Zamagurské noviny, we will train them as "community reporters". Directly in their villages, they will collect oral history, intergenerational testimonies, local myths, and everyday issues.

This authentic documentary material will then be collaboratively transformed with the award-winning RAMAGU Theatre into a site-specific theatre performance. The piece will not be staged in traditional halls, but in unconventional locations – courtyards, squares, and village streets – completely breaking down the barriers between artists and audiences.

Because this innovative model has huge potential, we will create an international methodological guide (Toolkit) in English based on our process. Our goal is to provide other European rural regions with a blueprint on how to strengthen social inclusion and cultural accessibility through co-creation.

© Photo: Courtesy of RAMAGU

"Boundless Horizons," Frequenz__​, Germany

The project seeks to transform the city into a vibrant resonance space, inspired by the upcoming 800th anniversary of Lübeck’s "Seven Towers," a UNESCO World Heritage site. Residents are invited to dedicate 30 minutes during a day to simply listen to the city’s five principal organs, fostering moments of reflection and connection.

A commission will be exclusively awarded to create an innovative work that reflects the project’s forward-looking character. This initiative expands the listening experience by making it accessible in public spaces, extending beyond traditional indoor venues.

Following the main event, a series of interactive installations will be open to all social groups in the five churches and eventually in public spaces. Workshops will be offered several weeks prior to the event, enabling a wide range of residents to engage with innovative digital tools and create their own soundscapes. These activities harness digital media as a powerful means to encourage broad participation, raise environmental awareness, and strengthen social cohesion and community spirit.

The entire program is designed to unfold within a single day, with workshops scheduled in advance at various cultural locations throughout the city. This approach enriches the cultural experience and attracts a larger audience.

© Photo: Courtesy of Frequenz__

"Touch Beyond Sight", Jazdaa Polska!​, Poland

Touch Beyond Sight seeks to lay the foundations for a tactile choreographic technique rooted in blind perception. Building upon our artistic work with blind and visually impaired participants, the project explores touch as a source of movement, creativity, attention and embodied knowledge. Rather than adapting artistic practices for blind audiences, the project positions blind and visually impaired people as experts, knowledge holders and co-creators expanding choreographic language. Through artistic laboratories, blind-to-blind transmission sessions and collaborative research, participants will identify, test and partially codify tactile movement exercises, touch-based partnering, body memory practices, kinesthetic listening and non-visual spatial orientation methods. A choreographic performance based on participants' histories of touch will function as an artistic laboratory where the technique can be embodied, observed and refined. Beyond the artistic outcome, the project aims to establish a knowledge base on dance, touch and non-visual perception. Through podcasts, interviews, open-access publications, documentation and a transferable toolkit, Touch Beyond Sight will preserve sensory experiences and create resources for artists, researchers, educators and blind communities. Participants may strengthen self-confidence, body awareness and social belonging, while principles may later inspire neurodivergent communities, children and intergenerational learning. The project will support research and development of tactile choreographic practices across Europe.

© Photo: Bartosz Seifert