Art in Action - Artistic Coworking in Duhok, Iraq

ITALIAN VERSION

Walking Arts - Art, Culture & Heritage initiated the opening of the first Artistic coworking in Iraqi Kurdistan in Duhok.
The space conceived as a place for socializing, training and sharing knowledge, ideas and common projects will allow young artists and artists to create positive synergies.
Different areas are to be equipped inside: one for the production of video and one for the production of audio products, as well as various computer stations for multimedia activities.
Coworking, in addition to being able to host training courses, will also be used for the realization of cultural events related to the various arts.

Coworking will be a work in progress path, a new bet for Walking Arts, for its volunteers and activists: to give a reference point to the itinerant nomadism that feeds the many paths opened by the Iraqi NGO.

Coworking with its many activities will represent a sort of junction, a hub to which suggestions arrive and from which stimuli start. With the idea that the experience can also be reproduced in other Iraqi realities.
The first steps of Coworking will be in synergy with the other projects curated by Walking Arts, in particular with the training courses, based on learnig by doing, aimed at expanding the technical knowledge of young artists in different fields: the creation of the multimedia box that will contain the new CD of the Mshakht Assembly accompanied by a short film within Here, Now, Together and the path on music therapy with the next stages of Artistic Works.

The start of Coworking is supported by CCFD - Terre solidaire, within the Art in Action Project.

Project with the contribution of CCFD - Terre solidaire

The difficult situation in Iraq, a country marked by 30 years of wars, has further worsened with the worsening of the social and economic crisis, accompanied by the health crisis caused by Covid 19. In this difficult context, strengthening social cohesion becomes even more as important as promoting the leadership of the new generations also through the construction of innovative employment opportunities.

With the international support through the financial support of Lush, CCFD, FAI Foundation (Project Here, now togheter still in progress) and Otto per mille della Chiesta Valdese (Project La Musica as therapy still in progress), the NGO Walking Arts - Art, Culture & Heritage was founded and started a vast program of activities, to enhance artistic expressions as a vehicle for social cohesion, the promotion of rights and the development of new employment opportunities in Iraq.

The NGO with its registered office in Baghdad and Erbil is developing numerous initiatives:
* training related to music therapy, which began in 2019 with the Art for Social project funded by CCFD;
* training in audio techniques accompanied by the opening of a recording studio in Duhok;
* animation activities with the weakest members of society, in particular elderly centers;
* musical and artistic events in Iraq and Italy.

The aggregation of young people, including many girls, is growing around the many initiatives and the recognition of the importance of this innovative artistic path by associations, realities, NGOs, communities and local, national and international institutions.

Strengthening the NGO, through the opening of an artistic co-working space, the continuation of training courses and the national and international enhancement of the activities in progress, is essential to give Iraqi young people the opportunity to build a positive and a hope in the future.

General objectives
Promote youth leadership by developing the NGO Walking Arts, with the opening of a space for artistic sharing and the deepening of training relating to the use of artistic languages ​​for employment purposes
Contribute to social cohesion by enhancing the potential of artistic languages ​​in the expansion of rights and freedoms for the new generations.
Specific objectives and activities
A- Strengthen the NGO Walking Arts through the opening of an artistic co-working space in Duhok, which is a place for socializing, training and sharing knowledge, ideas and common projects.
B- Deepen training in audio and video techniques, through a learning by doing course with international experts for young Iraqis.

The Project acts in synergy with the Here, now together - Social Arts Project funded by the FAI Foundation

Coordinated by Association Ya Basta Caminantes ODV and Walking Arts - Art, Culture & Heritage NGO