Days after the launch of the Paris 2024 Cultural Olympiad, I have been listening to podcasts on Seoul as a new global art centre and been reminded of the arts offer at the #PyeongChang2018 Winter Olympic Games. This South Korean #CulturalOlympiad was surprising in its diversity, creativity and high quality, ranging from K-Pop concerts to…
Article written for the Arts and Humanities Research Council After a year of on-and-off global lockdowns the need to gather and experience collective joy feels more urgent and pressing than ever. Festivals and outdoor cultural experiences offer us the chance to connect and feel part of a community in positive and inspiring ways. In this…
Final report of the Salzburg Global Seminar I co-curated in 2020, asking the question ‘What future for Festivals?’ The seminar involved weeks of intense discussion with festivals leaders and scholars from around the world. It was an intense and tough process as this event was supposed to take place in Salzburg in March of 2020,…
The Tokyo 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games have been postponed. It is only the fourth time this happens in 125 years, the only three previous occasions being due to World War I and World War II. The time it has taken for the International Olympic Committee to make such decision is indicative of the weight…
In Paris responding to a day workshop on the Paris 2024 Cultural Olympiad. I will be talking to key local stakeholders across la Ville de Paris and the rapidly developing and newly redefined boroughs (établissements public territoriales) surrounding the Olympic Park site in Seine Saint Denis. Plenty to discuss as France gets ready for the…
As the first appointed Culture Advisor to the International Olympic Committee, I am delighted to have started work with the Tokyo 2020 team on their Olympic and Paralympic cultural programme developments. I spent some days in Tokyo assessing progress and observing the wealth of cultural activities taking place and being planned in the lead to…
Tokyo’s Cultural Olympiad: youth, heritage, empowerment and nationwide celebration Article published by Net TAM (Toyota Art Management) In English | In Japanese The Cultural Olympiad has been an essential component of every edition of the Olympic Games since 1912. Despite its long history, the Olympic cultural programme is one of the least well known dimensions…
Find below highlights from our 10 year anniversary symposium, launching Impacts 08 ~ 18 | #Impacts18, the major research programme I have directed since 2006 on the impacts and long term legacy of hosting a European Capital of Culture. The Symposium opened a global conversation about the value of being a ‘‘#cityofculture’ after 30 years of…
Two days into the Winter Olympic Games, my Cultural Olympiad hightlights are as follows: Dual cultural programming: Cultural Olympiad / Culture 2018 Plus Dedicated transport: Cultural Olympiad Shuttle Dedicated colours: Hot pink branding for culture Korean fun: K-Pop Festa Art + Sport links at Games info points Cultural Olympiad / Culture 2018 Plus Cultural…
I am on my way to my eleventh Olympic Games edition, this time in Pyeongchang, South Korea. I will be observing the staging of the Cultural Olympiad and reporting on the Games cultural dimension as an IOC-accredited journalist, based at the Main Press Centre. The focus of my observations will be the official cultural programme,…
I am in Rio this week presenting the results of our one year UK-Brazil research collaboration to explore the immediate legacy of hosting the Rio 2016 Games on the reputations of Rio and Brazil as cultural and creative centres. We have received much media interest in Brazil around our core finding: that the most dominant…
Reimaging Brazilian cities | Urban images and cultural narratives in the wake of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games The British Academy has allocated a Newton Fund grant for a year-long project collaboration between Dr Beatriz Garcia and a team of researchers at the University of Sao Paulo, led by Professor Paulo Nassar. The project assesses…
We need to acknowledge both the black AND the white (plus some grey, also) As academics, we have no choice but to jump onto the sound bite bandwagon if we want to remain relevant in the era of the 140 character statement. Punchy headlines and short articles (“800 words max, please”) have become important vehicles for…
I am in Rio throughout the Olympic Games, as I have done since 1999 across eight Olympic cities (nine if I include the memories of my hometown, Barcelona in 1992). I’ll be documenting and reporting on the Olympic cultural programme or Cultural Olympiad. Highlights so far: The first IOC funded Artist in Residence programme, featuring…
I have been awarded one of only six Advanced Olympic Research Grants by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), for a research project titled ‘The value of global cultural policy-making: Building bridges between Olympic cities and the Olympic Movement through transnational cultural narratives’. The project will document the testing and implementation of the first IOC Cultural Action Plan…
I am in Montreal on 25 and 26 May to discuss the value and impact of large scale cultural events. My contribution takes place during the launch of the Montreal ArtsGames 2018, a new event edition, focused on bringing artists from around the world to present their traditions as well as explore ways of fusing and reconnecting…
I have interrogated cities and event-led cultural policy-making since 1999. I started by revisiting the cultural legacy of the Barcelona 1992 Olympic Games to inform my work on the Sydney 2000 Olympic Arts Festivals. This was followed by research on the legacy of Glasgow 1990 as European Capital of Culture; the experience of Cultureshock – cultural programme for…
After 15 years observing, analysing and offering a critique of the International Olympic Committee Culture and Education Commission, I am now formally part of this highly select group. The Commission has just been revamped to focus on Culture and Olympic Heritage, with an emphasis on the role the arts, culture and creativity can play…
On my way to Sao Paulo to share insights regarging the most powerful cultural legacies of previous Olympic and Paralympic Games. I will present a keynote at the Fórum permanente de gestão do conhecimento, comunicação e memória, a Forum dedicated to discussing the connections between knowledge, communication and memory in order to explore how stories can transform businesses…
On August 5th 2015, Rio marked its final year to go to the opening ceremony of the 2016 Olympic Games. The Cultural Olympiad team was in charge of staging the day’s official ceremony, offering a careful mix of contemporary (Olympic) and vintage imagery about the city. Access below the visual reportage I developed on the main…