2018 is the European Year of Cultural Heritage.
Cultural heritage shapes our everyday lives. It surrounds us in towns and cities, natural landscapes and archaeological sites. It is not only found in literature, art and objects, but also in the crafts we learn from our ancestors, the stories we tell our children, the food we enjoy and the films we watch and recognise ourselves in.
Cultural heritage binds us together through our common history and values. It also represents the richness and diversity of our cultural traditions. Our shared cultural heritage is to be understood, cherished and celebrated. Yet cultural heritage is not only a legacy from the past. It also helps us forge the way ahead and design our future. In this respect, Interreg V-A “Greece-Bulgaria 2014-2020” and Interreg V-B “Balkan – Mediterranean 2014 – 2020” contribute to the heritage of the culture of silk with events in the town of Soufli (Greece) under the title “Weaving the future – coloring silk memories”.
The aim is to design experiential actions through a museopedagogical programme for pupils from the local schools specially designed and scientifically coordinated by the Laboratory of Industrial Design of the School of Visual & Applied Arts of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, as part of the Design Lab for Kids initiative to promote the unity between STEM and the Arts & Humanities. The Municipal Museum of Soufli will host the event.  The basic idea is to discover the symbolic meaning of COCOON: A silk worm is a symbol of the spirit of a human being, being soft, impervious to water, permeable to light, a small caterpillar weaves a cocoon with its spiral thread thus in a sense the cocoon is symbolically like a source of creativity. Eventually the cocoon will produce a butterfly, entering into the world of interaction and cooperation!
Our event, organised in the framework of European Cooperation Day 2018, will unfold in two fields, aiming to inform about our programme various groups of people while touching the sensitive subject of education and cultural heritage.
The event will close with a dance performance titled: “The nest / One Route to Freedom” (trailer: https://vimeo.com/185552541) with free entrance for all participants!
