A.N.T.Y.G.O.N.E. aims at using theatre and performing arts as positive mechanisms to engage, connect and empower young people and to trigger new processes in youth policies implementation. The project had three overall objectives : 1/ to increase the social inclusion of young people through theatre, building on the European values of acceptance of diversity and tolerance, and the promotion of intercultural dialogue as represented by Antigone and Aeneas' Greek myths; 2/ to give young people a space where they can use theatre to foster self-esteem, self-consciousness and confidence in a new and stimulating environment; 3/ to offer staff working with youth in theatres and NGOs a tool (the A.N.T.Y.G.O.N.E. toolkit) which enables deeper understanding of their target groups, and increases their professional skills in the field of art and social inclusion.
"Arts aNd Theatre for YounG peOple NEeds" (A.N.T.Y.G.O.N.E.) was a two-year Erasmus+ project focused on theatre and performing arts as tools to foster the social inclusion of young people, based on an innovative theatre method developed in other EU-funded projects by La Guilla theatre (Italy). It gathered 4 partners in France, Italy, Serbia and Slovakia. A.N.T.Y.G.O.N.E. has been driven by the principle that innovative training spaces form part of broader integration strategies that can actively help tackle issues of exclusion and support social inclusion of youth across Europe. The needs that the project addressed are related to the post-pandemic society we are living, which requires new training tools and innovative methods to support young people in this particular moment: theatre is a powerful non-formal way to empower disadvantaged youth and youth workers, who need "updated" tools to face this situation which has completely changed our societies and ways of living. A.N.T.Y.G.O.N.E. also wanted to satisfy the need for the systematization of the method expressed by youth workers involved in previous projects.