The KEA Blog

Get ready for Smart Specialisation Strategies: Supporting cities and regions to raise EU regional funds for culture and creative industries

The European Commission (EC) has recently issued its proposal for the 2014-2020 Cohesion
Policy. With a budget of over € 376 billion for the new funding period, European regional policy represents over one-third of the EU budget. However, access to EU regional funding will be faced with much more demanding requirements and a more result-focused approach than the current one. EU funds will be released to regions and cities subject to performance or on the condition that, among others, Smart Specialisation Strategies^[1](RIS3) exist.

Regions and cities have used 1.7% of structural funds’ budget for the period 2007-2013 to support culture and creative industries (CCIs), either to promote cultural heritage and tourism, to revitalise local
economies or to enhance sustainable urban development.

Verdict: guilty. Criminal law applies to match-fixing

Match-fixing has been the focus of the sport policy agenda over recent months. Betting scandals, sportsmen in the dock, ongoing investigations on the manipulation of sport results[1] but also the determination of betting and sport organisations to fight against this cancer have splashed across the headlines during past months. At  policy level, the Council of Europe adopted the Recommendation on promotion of the integrity of sport against manipulation of results (September 2011), the EU Council the Conclusions on combating match-fixing (November 2011), and the European Parliament the Resolution on the European Dimension of Sport (February 2012). Episodes of match-fixing may concern both professional and amateur sports and usually show a transnational dimension, in particular with regard to betting motivated cases. Indeed, online betting has contributed to the spread of this criminal activity.

In this context, KEA has recently published a study prepared for the European Commission to map the criminal provisions and case law in the 27 Member States. The ultimate purpose was to ascertain the most efficient criminal law mechanism to fight match-fixing. The response is not straightforward.

Grand opening of the Tartu creative center in Estonia. Creative incubation at its best.

Towards Creative Europe - Interview with Philippe Kern - 15/3/2012

by Berk Vaher

Estonian version extracted from Lehter.eu http://www.keanet.eu/docs/interview%20PK%20estonia%20032012.pdf

 - How would you summarise KEA's mission and experience in the context of "creative Europe" to a lay reader?

KEA would like to be considered as a European hub to foster CCIs and culture based innovation.   KEA acts as a research center to build up knowledge and understanding on culture economics, culture and audiovisual policy or intellectual property. We advise governments, associations, NGOs, artists, regional authorities, businesses. KEA is driven by its passion for the arts and culture as well as by its belief in the European project as visionary.

Press Release - KiiCS: a new pan-European project gathering creative people, scientists and young adults in a process of co-creation for innovation

KiiCS (Knowledge Incubation in Innovation and Creation for Science), a 3-year European Commission-funded project (2012-2014), was launched today in Brussels by its 12 partners - including KEA. Led by ECSITE, the European network of science centres and museums, the project aims to build bridges between arts, science and technology by giving evidence of the positive impacts of their interaction for creativity as well as for triggering interest in science. The project will stimulate co-creation processes involving creators and scientists, and nurture youth interest in science in a creative way.

Read full press release here : 

http://www.keanet.eu/docs/KiiCS%20Kick%20Off.pdf

 

Rem Koolhaas and Luc Tuymans share their vision of Europe - video link below

Europe must have resonance beyond the resolution of financial crisis and regulatory issues.  Rem Koolhaas and Luc Tuymans share the ambition to change perceptions of Europe.

At the event from the organisation "Untitled’ (sans-titre)”, which took place recently in Brussels, the world-famous architect and the artist proposed ideas for a new narrative to reflect the values and the meaning of Europe.

Architecture, art and design help to identify and interpret the rooted, relevant and meaningful.  Memory, heritage and symbols should be embedded in the European project, with quality, imagination and artistic sensitivity at its heart.

Europe must fight its way back to the public domain rather than falling victim to the market economy.

Koolhaas and Tuymans make an appeal to European civil servants and politicians to be bold and to stop apologising. Europe has become too focused on political correctness and this “camouflage” strategy undermines the European project. The EU should stop magnifying technology and new media as an isolated wonder and give equal importance to the artistic expression which gives life and meaning to things and technology.

National governments act too much as a “machine of denigration”. They should also stop erecting cultural frontiers between people.  They should give Europe the means to abolish mental barriers.

These prominent cultural figures call on the EU to do an “overt cultural operation” to promote its leading creativity in a world where innovation and creativity are in demand.

They appeal to fellow artists and creative professionals to take the risk of developing a narrative for Europe and for politicians to encourage creativity. They share the belief that Europe remains an extraordinary “futuristic” project.

Rem Koolhaas and Luc Tuymans are prepared to act as ghost writers for the European Union.

  

VIMEO: http://vimeo.com/34511512    YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA0cy4XinSQ

 

Join KEA Creative Europe on Facebook and Linkedin

Untitled (sans-titre) is about allowing "lateral thinking" on societal issues. It is a platform for divergent thinkers, essentially artists and creative professional s, to address decision makers and fee in a different perspective or disruption through dialogue. Untitled (sans titre) is about mingling and networking at the highest level, bringing art and culture to influence thinking processes.

For more information please contact Allison Reekie, KEA European Affairs, areekie@keanet.eu, +32 2 289 26 05.

EU/China Year of Intercultural Dialogue - Launch Conference

Philippe Kern will be a key-note speaker at the launch conference of the EU/China Year of Intercultural Dialogue taking place in Brussels on 2 February 2012 at Bozar

Programme

How EU Member States deal with Orphan works: KEA publishes a new survey on planned and implemented solutions to the orphan works question

KEA has conducted a study on behalf of the British Film Institute (BFI) on audiovisual orphan works in Europe. This study provides a general overview on how the different EU Member States deal with the problem of orphan works. The research revealed that the majority of the European countries (EU27 and Norway) do not have mechanisms in place that allow the use of orphan works and in particular of audiovisual orphan works. Only the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries have implemented solutions to deal, at least partly, with orphan works.

Seasons'greetings from the KEA team

Welcome to the world of “Creative Partnership”

Creative partnership sounds very much like a marketing or religious slogan, the promise of a better world where “creativity” mingles with altruistic behaviours “partnership”.  Both words “creative” and “partnership” trigger positive feelings in our mind. They make a promising combination.

Creative refers to the world of Creation which is after all the domain of the Gods.

Partnership refers to collusion, empathy, altruistic and social behaviours (as opposed to egoistic or selfish conducts).

Rendons l’ Europe empathique et altruiste!

 L’Europe est un acquis institutionnel. Elle reste à devenir une réalité socioculturelle. Le philosophe Jürgen Habermas, dans son texte « Rendons l’Europe plus démocratique ! » publié dans Le Monde du 26 octobre, identifie deux obstacles majeurs à la construction européenne : la fragmentation politique, en particulier l’incapacité des politiciens à dépasser les modèles de gouvernance du 19^es  ; et l’affirmation, par ces mêmes dirigeants, que l’Union politique ne peut se faire  car « il n’existerait pas de peuple européen ».

The meaning of Europe? The meaning of a European Cultural Forum?

The European Cultural Forum has just taken place in Brussels on 19 and 20 October 2011.  Every year the Forum gathers institutions and organisations involved and interested in the making of cultural policy at European level. The themes of the Forum are linked to the EU 2020 strategy of the European Commission.

The near collapse of the financial system and the sovereign debt crisis are testing the limits of Europe’s solidarity and as a consequence the essence of the European project.  The cultural movement at the Forum was behaving as if nothing was happening to Europe, or worse that it did not care.  

This was the opportunity for the Cultural Forum to calls on Head of States and Governments to work towards Europe’s unity[1] and keep the European utopia alive.  Culture activists have a special responsibility to keep alive the perspective of a Europe where all Europeans, despite their cultural differences and mental barriers, work for a common destiny and for the promotion of shared values such as democracy, human rights, social solidarity, cultural diversity and tolerance.