Kultura Nova Foundation, in cooperation with the Centre for Social Studies from Coimbra and the consortium of partners in the IN SITU project, is organizing the Summer School "Place-based Creative Solutions for Cultivating Caring and Sustainable Communities", which will be held from 20 – 24 September 2024 on the island of Zlarin. The Summer School precedes the international Conference "Sustainability Horizons: The Power of Creative Innovation to Transform the Rural and Non-Urban Future" which will be held from 25 – 27 September 2024 in Šibenik. The Summer School and Conference will explore the transformative power of innovative approaches of cultural and creative sectors in forging more equitable and sustainable communities beyond urban centres.

Aiming to create two-way relations with the context in which it takes place – the island of Zlarin – the Summer School programme is designed to address issues that we consider crucial for their sustainability: community building and engagement, tourism and its adjustments to the needs of the local communities and, finally, care as an organizing principle intertwining all the elements necessary for the growth and well-being of the community.

The working language of the Summer School is English.

The Call is open to students, scholars, cultural and creative operators, cultural professionals and activists who work with and within smaller communities, in rural and non-urban areas worldwide.

The deadline for applications is June 24 2024, and more information, including the registration fee and the application form, are available via this link.

For any additional questions, you can contact us at: in-situ-school@ces.uc.pt.

In order to ensure the participation of civil society organizations' representatives operating in areas with less than 50,000 inhabitants in Croatia in the Summer School programme in Zlarin, Kultura Nova Foundation published a Public call for participation in the Summer School programme on June 6 2024. Through the Public call, the Foundation will select up to 5 representatives of CSOs in the field of contemporary arts and culture from Croatian villages and towns with less than 50,000 inhabitants, to whom the Foundation will cover travel expenses and the costs of participating in the Summer School programme. The public call is available at this link.

The project "IN SITU: Place-based innovation of cultural and creative industries in non-urban areas", supported through the programme of the EU 'Horizon Europe', is focused on the research of cultural and creative industries, their contribution to economic development, innovation processes, planning in non- urban environments and entrepreneurship. Within the IN SITU project, non-urban areas are defined as rural, remote or peripheral environments, including cities, villages and smaller towns (according to EUROSTAT's NUTS3 categorization) with regard to the number of inhabitants per square kilometer. A key aspect of the project is connecting research and practice through IN SITU Labs – hubs for networking, capacity building and monitoring case studies in six sparsely populated and remote regions in Europe – Portugal, Ireland, Iceland, Finland, Latvia and Croatia.