Representatives of 9 cities in Portugal, Lithuania, Romania, Hungary and Great Britain participated to the third annual meeting of Culture Next, the network of cities candidate to the title of European Capital of Culture (ECOC). The meeting was hosted by Aveiro city in Portugal, and brought together representatives from the cultural sector and the public administrations of the member cities – among which 3 cities from Portugal, the country that will hold the ECOC title in 2027: Aveiro, Braga and Faro.
Since its foundation in 2017, two meetings of the Culture Next network took place, both of them in Cluj-Napoca, in September 2017 and May 2018. Therefore, the meeting in Aveiro, which took place on October 1-2, 2018, was the first hosted by the network members.
The event was an opportunity for the participants to meet with professionals at local level and to visit organizations, spaces and initiatives from the cultural scene in Aveiro and the region: the Museum of Aveiro, Teatro Aveirense, Orquestra Filarmonia das Beiras, VIC – Aveiro Arts House, the historical complex of the porcelain factory Vista Alegre or the Creative Science Park, a hub and design centre of the University of Aveiro.
The meeting agenda included workshops for the network members and invited experts, discussions and planning sessions to plan the network’s activities for the next 2 years.
On the agenda, a public discussion was organized at the Aveirense Theater on the “Cultural Development Strategies in Cities – sharing good practices”, among the guests being Mattjis Maussen (independent expert) and Ștefan Teișanu (Director of Cluj Cultural Center). Over 60 representatives of the cultural scene, and of public and private sectors in Aveiro participated to the event.
Following the meeting, the network members prepared a plan for the activity of Culture Next in the next two years, including as priorities the establishment of a program for developing the capacities of its members, formulating an international standard for cities that put culture in the center of urban development, and attracting new members in the network.
The next meetings of the network were also scheduled, and will take place in May 2019 in Debrecen, Hungary (candidates to the ECOC title 2023) and in September 2019 in the Lithuanian cities of Klaipeda, Plunge and Neringa (candidates to the ECOC title 2022).
Culture Next. The Candidate Cities Network was founded in 2017 based on the need for a structure able to reunite European cities former or current candidates to the title of European Capital of Culture (ECOC). Its mission is to support the cities in implementing programs and strategies of urban development through culture, participatory processes and collaborations resulted from the process of applying for the ECOC title.
