The project’s main idea came up during a job shadowing in Bilbao in October 2017, when Italian and Spanish teachers met up for sharing educational systems and good practices. On that occasion we analysed the city’s history and particularly the impact that the building of the Guggenheim Museum had on the city: twenty years ago, Bilbao was scarred by acts of terrorism and failing industry. The city decided to gamble on Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Museum. Not only did it help to save Bilbao, it also showed the world the transformative effect of art. St’ART - the word we chose as the title of our project, brings along ideas of dynamism, motivation, departure, enthusiasm and, obviously, art. We believe Art has the power to change things, we believe Art is an energy, therefore we want to use its strength to illustrate our cities, to describe their needs, their urgencies, their beauty, their originality, but we also want to tell about their lacklustre and empty parts, where nobody lives or where those who nobody cares about live. We need new ideas, we need to think of cities as communities, as places where to meet and exchange experiences, as people-oriented areas, where it is possible to find one’s own space. Art offers solutions: it ‘wants to live’ the city, it can give the city new life and a new vital impulse. Through this project, four secondary schools located in Italy, Iceland, Portugal and Spain intend to stimulate their students, aged 16-19, to analyse their city realities and try to find possible solutions to rehabilitate them through ART, drawing inspiration from each cultural heritage. For this reason we expect to involve around 250 students attending courses in different fields of art for comparing and sharing didactical approaches with the common aim of strengthening their expressive world. We believe that by sharing cultures, investigations and ideas within different European cities, we can raise awareness about active citizenship in our students. All the schools have experience in European projects and have a range of ICT facilities which will be used in order to benefit all students, especially the ones at risk. With this project we also want our students to understand the importance of life-long learning. We want to improve their linguistic competences, particularly proficiency in English, their digital skills and raise their cultural awareness. Everything intended at helping them with their future careers. St’Art consists of different phases here chronologically listed: 1) A Good St’ART: if I say “city” what comes to your mind? 2) St’ARTing Logo: international Logo Contest among the partnership students. 3) City from the St’ART: creation of a multimedia report in English on the current situation in some identified areas of the four cities involved in the partnership. 4) St’ART in CLIL: Virtual classes about common topics by using CLIL methodology for promoting English communication skills and international cooperative learning. 5) St’ART City Program: The students think over the city through artistic expressions. 6) St’ART UP the city: international performances involving the local communities 7) Ready to St’ART: final exhibition displaying the artistic works carried out during the two years project. 8) St’ART Communication and dissemination of the results. As far as the tangible results of the project are concerned, we intend to carry out: - Logo declined in various materials for creating gadgets to be used during dissemination activities. - Power Point presentations and/or videos - Twin Space - Web-based classrooms - E book recording the CLIL lessons as resource for teachers and students - Performances, Street Art, Designs, Sculptures, Videos, Digital animations, Artistic exhibitions. A range of methodological techniques will be used in order to fulfil the project activities and have the best possible results, such as: basic data information gathering, through questionnaires and observation; focusing on identifying the problematic areas, with regard to the subjects of the project; case studies, allowing deeper exploration on examples of good practices; analysis and reflection, in order to draw conclusions and recommendation; field trips; debates and extra-curricular activities involving students, teachers, and parents. We expect a quite positive impact on all the participating schools, especially among English and Art departments. Moreover, the project will be spread out across schools and Institutions, as a way to transform schools into engaging and exciting laboratories for critical thinking and communication skills. On the extra school level, it is our intention to promote the School as a reality for developing active citizenship where dialogue is possible with the community. For this reason the project can be seen as a starting point to encourage opportunities for meditation, both locally and internationally, on the condition of our cities and on our wishes as citizens.
"What are you taking along with you?", this is what one of the first pages of the St'ART Book asks. The St'ART Book is the logbook that students and teachers have filled in for each mobility of the Erasmus St'ART project. Someone answers "fear", someone "hope", or "desire to meet people", "desire to escape”, someone else freedom, knowledge, curiosity. "And what do you bring home from this experience?" is what the final page of the notebook asks instead: the answers - both from students and teachers - are enthusiastic, they speak of energy, vitality, courage, greater self-confidence: "I come home, but I feel changed ", says Alice, "I feel richer after this week" writes Barbara (a teacher), "I want to travel again, meet new people, visit new countries" is what most of the Icelandic, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese students write. The project, carried out between 2018 and 2020, called four European cities - Pistoia, Reykjavìk, Porto and Bilbao - and their artistic high schools, to discuss the theme of art with regard to the city, in the belief that art is a means of social change, it constitutes a common good. In writing the project, we were guided by the "Bilbao case", the city that was literally reborn after an appalling crisis, thanks also to contemporary art and architecture. We therefore immersed ourselves in the stories, traditions, visions of our cities, highlighting peculiarities that inspired proposals for the cities themselves. The starting point for all of us was the survey titled: "If I say city, what comes to your mind?". In Bilbao we made a site specific intervention, inspired by female figures of local folklore, in Reykjavìk the nature that dominates the city has taken over: videos have been created that mix together sounds, photographs, paintings also inspired by the sagas of the territory. In the heart of Porto, the industrial district of Ilhas do Bonfim challenged us to propose new visual solutions, housing utopias, that resulted from photomontages and assemblages. Pistoia was supposed to be the conclusion of the project with an exhibition, a performance, a conference with politicians and contemporary art experts and, when the pandemic prevented us from carrying out this phase, we decided to transform the entire experience into the website, www.erasmustart.com, where we talked about our two years of work, CLIL lessons, discussions among teachers, exchanges among students, relationships among schools, languages, latitudes, different training and education. The main results of this project were: • The arrangement of a contest for choosing a Project logo among students of the partnership, • The design of gadgets promoting the project, • The creation of Power Points, PDFs, videos, stop-motions, pictures, designs, posters, architectural designs and models. • The provision of school corners dedicated to Erasmus plus: on the website of the schools as well as physically in some areas of the partnership schools. • The creation of an online Twin Space dedicated to the project. • The creation of CLIL lesson plans for the project as a resource for teachers and students. • The ad hoc publication of St’Art book: the book was used by the participants during their mobility as a logbook. It was also useful in the phases of monitoring and assessment of the project. • The creation of a Website, a Facebook page and an Instagram portfolio. The back cover of our St'ART Book shows Erasmus of Rotterdam in the engraving by Albrecht Dürer, 1526; from Erasmus we tried to learn and keep the spirit, in the belief that every project in his name must be aimed at the growth of people free from prejudices. St'ART, which brings along ideas of dynamism, enthusiasm and, of course, art, is based on the idea that culture and comparison can produce an open, peaceful, borderless and fearless world. Partner Countries Italy, Spain, Portugal, Iceland