The Power of Culture

Never before has the Columbian government organised a dance project as large as Montajes Coreográficos. For three months, international artists worked with 52 young dancers on three choreographies to stimulate Columbian dance.

Nowadays, Núcleo de Arte's old villa serves as a meeting-place for painters and sculptors. The artists' collective has been responsible for an artistic revival in Mozambique since the end of the war

In November, three Islamic thinkers were awarded the Erasmus Prize 2004. They are Sadik Jalal Al-Azm from Syria, Fatema Mernissi from Morocco and Abdulkarim Soroush from Iran. The theme of this year's award was 'Religion and modernity'. The prizewinners are all very involved in the modernisation processes going on within Islam.

The French artists’ collective Du Zieu dans les Bleus will conduct workshops in the summer of 2004 under the name ATELIER #3 in the Baddawi Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon.

The Brazilian development project RODA, which organises cultural activities for problem youth, has recently acquired a Dutch sister organisation with the same name. The financiers are ICCO and Solidaridad. They launched their collective initiative during the Festival Mundial, on Saturday 19 June.

How do the new media influence contemporary Moroccan art? And how can this art play a part in social change in this society? These questions were the starting point for the Media Art Workshop, held from 12 to 24 April 2004 in the Institut Français in Agadir, Morocco.

In Ethiopia, the circus is more than performing feats. Street children and AIDS orphans there are trained as performers, and their songs deal with topics including AIDS and children's rights.

With the exhibition 'Cabin Baggage', artists protested against the reappearance of discrimination after the attacks of September 11 th , 2001 during the World Social Forum in India in January.