The Power of Culture

ISH is an Amsterdam theatre group that combines skate, breakdance, hiphop and dance into a new type of expressive art. At the end of June 2007 the first overseas ISH Institute was opened in Bangalore (India), under the name of W-ISH.

During the sixth Theatre Festival in Santa Cruz, Bolivia in April 2007, Red LA para la Transformación Social, the Latin American network for social change, organised a symposium on the strategies cultural institutions can use in order to gain more influence on social developments.

Development organization Hivos has established a cinema award: the Hivos Cinema Unlimited Award.

Odisea20, established in 2005, is a cultural project in the largest shantytown of Buenos Aires, Villa20/Lugano. The project is intended to give the inhabitants an artistic platform.

Theatre group Malayerba from Ecuador has been active for nearly thirty years. Their production Tirenle Tierra (Let's forget it) addresses male-female relationships and domestic violence.

The Foundation for Contemporary Art focuses on promoting and developing contemporary art inside and outside of Ghana. In November 2006 the Foundation organised a workshop for artists from Ghana and Ethiopia in cooperation with the Alliance Française and the French Embassy in Accra.

Exploring borders and spotlighting the social chaos of today are the objectives of La Otra Orilla (LOT). The Peruvian multidisciplinary theatrical group's objectives are making it an international hit. Actor Rafael Freyre: “Artistic freedom comes first and foremost for us.”

“Community art often finds its origins in social dissatisfaction and the will to do something about it.” Initiator Eugene Van Erven about the community theatre festival 'Art in my backyard' to be held in Utrecht from 23 to 26 November.