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Melting Potes
Start date: Jun 18, 2014, End date: Jan 17, 2015 PROJECT  FINISHED 

The youth exchange Melting Potes is the result of a project that started in 2012. This artistic adventure has taken place twice and already many young people from different European countries have gathered and made friends thanks to this project. Linked to the event of a festival, these meetings have given the occasion to exchange within the intercultural perspective. The cultural differences are promoted and used in the practice of art. Even this year Melting Potes gives the opportunity to promote the encounter with others: above stereotypes, by exchanging different cultural identities and in the mode of “do together” in the creative and artistic work, not to mention the collective life together. In 2014 the focus is set to illuminate the creation of visual art through the theme “the wild man/woman”. The emphasis will be the on the folklore of the wild man, connected to his appearance and pagan rituals. As the European countries are rich in these traditions, the participants will primarily learn about and discuss the characters and tales from their own countries. Based on the different folklores with their legends and traditions, the participants will invent contemporary rituals: a collective and imaginary folklore. They also have the possibility to create artistic installations inspired by the traditional characters, from the wild man to the modern man. Their works (such as masks, costumes, sculptures made out of natural and reused materials) are created with the inspiration from each participant and will be presented at the festival in the end of the project. All along the exchange, the participants are immersed in an intercultural bath: times of exchanges around cultural differences, a collective life at the intercultural hosting centre, theme nights etc. And also, some of the workshops give the possibility to promote voluntary work and different types of youth engagement. All along the exchange the participants will become aware of the associative life and of different forms of engagement suitable for young people, especially the different types of volunteering. Besides, by participating in the construction of this cultural event “Melting Potes, festival of diversities” (on the 22nd of August) the participants will become initiated in the editing of the project. This adventure takes place between the 4th and the 25th of August in 2014 in the region of the High Alps (les Hautes-Alps). It gathers 20 young adults from four European countries: France, Iceland, Latvia and Greece. The project is directed at everybody with or without artistic knowledge; the important is to have an interest in a collective experience and a multicultural, artistic adventure. The group will be heterogenetic: a mix of men/women, social origins, open to persons with less prospects etc. During the project the participants can discover the life of the mountain. In this preserved nature they will get particularly conscious of the tools for environmental preservation and of the reflections about the place of the European citizen in today’s ecological questions. The participants will live in tents in the village of Vaunières. They contribute to cooking, cleaning and washing dishes. Vaunières is situated in the High Alps at an altitude of 1200 meters and surrounded by nature and mountains. It was abandoned by its original habitants in the beginning of the 20th century and since fifty years reconstructed by the work of young people. Today the village serves as a social and international hosting centre, welcoming international volunteers, families, young French people coming from socio-educational organisations, and part time volunteers. Melting Potes contribute to transform the image that some of the local young people have towards their area, which they find synonymous to boredom and inactivity. It helps the intergenerational dialogue by offering a place for exchanges where young and less young persons meet to innovate together. Illuminating the richness of the intercultural dialogue favours an open mind and helps working against discriminations. On the local level this artistic meeting contributes in this way by creating a location promoting the young people from the area to get engaged in the social and cultural life. It also helps them to participate to the development of projects with the image of a dynamic area open to differences, being proud of its rural character. The project also has an impact on the European level by enhancing the informal exchanges, which take place between young people and with the different European and local partner associations. Each participant of the exchange can be proactive in his or her circle of fiends and acquaintances at home. To participate in an adventure such as the Melting Potes gives the will to get involved on a local level, to continue this dynamic of projects.

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