Love is Kind: превенция на домашното насилие чрез изкуство

International Youth Exchange

“Love is Kind: Youth prevent Domestic Violence through Art”

Summary

„Love is Kind“ is a Youth Exchange project with participants from Bulgaria, Palestine, Hungary, Serbia and Italy, whereby young people will discuss how to build healthy relationships, learn about domestic and intimate partner violence, as well as create art works to raise awareness and contribute to domestic and intimate partner violence prevention. The project will include preliminary and follow-up activities in each partner country, as well as a 9-day international meeting and art residency in the village of Drugan, Bulgaria.

The Idea

This youth exchange was born as response to the violence that we see and experience in our homes and communities, which we wish to better understand and learn to prevent. At a global level there is a critical gap in terms of our understanding of how to build healthy relationships, how to address interpersonal issues without resorting to violence, and how to enact restorative justice practices to address violence, and uproot it. As young people, we are taught History, Geography, Math, but we are not taught how to love each other and ourselves, how to take care of each other and of ourselves, and how to use our individual and collective potential for good, for peace and for love. We want to address these issues, and contribute to the creation of societies where domestic violence, intimate partner violence – and violence altogether! – have no place.

Our Aims

We aim to create a discussion platform to explore the individual and social factors and consequences of domestic and intimate partner violence, as well as reflect on the necessary elements for healthy relationships. What’s more, we want to equip young people with knowledge and skills on how to utilize artistic expression for advocacy in relation to the project’s topics. To that end, art workshops and art production are built into the program of each day of our program.

What will the YE participants learn and experience?

The main learning outcomes of the youth exchange are distributed under 4 themes:

Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence

♥ learning the main concepts related to DV and IPV, the forms they take and the individual and social factors that contribute to them

♥ learning about Bystander Intervention, and developing into effective bystanders

♥ critically examining societal responses to DV and IPV, understanding the role of community in preventing and addressing violence, and being able to take active part in those efforts

Gender

♥ learning about gender, and being able to recognize and critically examine gender roles and norms

♥ critically examining ideas and beliefs related to gender equality and violence

♥ understanding the role of both men and women in DV and IPV prevention

Healthy Relationships

♥ critically reflecting on our ideas about love and romantic relationships, and being able to recognize patters of thinking that undermine equality

♥ creating personal guidelines to healthy relationships

♥ understanding the factors which lead to „healthy“ versus „unhealthy“ conflicts.

Art & Advocacy

♥ developing skills and knowledge for the effective use of art for advocacy and awareness raising

♥ participating in various workshops, featuring dance therapy, a game design hackathon, poster making, visual and performance art creation

♥ creating art works which will not only be exhibited during public events in Drugan and Sofia, but will also be digitalized and turned into a digital book