1 / 2013

THE GEOGRAPHICAL ISSUE

VIEW
PRINCE CLAUS FUND
2012 SOUTH EAST
AND CENTRAL ASIA
CALL FOR PROPOSALS

RE
EVIEW
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Azerbaijan Liquid Land photo monograph © Rena Effendi
Left page and page 65: The Philippines The Last Pine Tree © Kat Palasi
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The Philippines First Filipino-Amerasian Fashion Rallies © Michael Lorenzana
Bangladesh Chobi Mela Festival VII, ‘Fragility’ © Wahid Adnan

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Nepal Kolor Kathmandu © Suraj Ratna Shakya
Cambodia Asia Told by its Photographers © Nge Lay, image courtesy Punctum magazine

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Azerbaijan Liquid Land photo monograph © Rena Effendi
Cambodia Asia Told by its Photographers © Nge Lay, image courtesy Punctum magazine

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Cambodia Tiny Toones Next Generation © Stuart Isett
Myanmar Beyond Pressure Festival of Contemporary Art ©Thu Rein

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Myanmar Beyond Pressure Festival of Contemporary Art ©Thu Rein
Previous page: Tajikistan International Child Festival: Smile 2012 © DePamiri
Vietnam Skylines with flying people © Ban Ga

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Uzbekistan Crossroads: Ethno Photo and Street Dance © Igor Ten
Bangladesh Shaupno Jatra (The Journey of Hope) © Dr. Khandakar Farhana, Sazid Khan, Sheik S. I. Rajib

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Nepal The Kathmandu International Art Festival: Earth | Body | Mind © Naag Bahal
Azerbaijan Liquid Land photo monograph © Rena Effendi

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Uzbekistan Laboratory for Young Directors of Central Asia © A.Raevskiy
Myanmar ‘The Rendezvous’, Second South East Asia Urban Art Event © Thet Naing (Studio K)

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Nepal Kolor Kathmandu © Alok Serizawa Bastakoti, artist: DAAS
Previous Page: Nepal Retelling Histories / Photo contributed by Sanjay Sthapit to Photo Circle Nepal, unknown photographer
The Philippines Promoting Literacy Through Art © Dely Fernandez and Marco Lazatin for CANVAS

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Nepal The Kathmandu International Art Festival: Earth | Body | Mind © Naag Bahal
Cambodia Asia Told by its Photographers © Dow Wasiksiri, image courtesy Punctum magazine

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Uzbekistan The Movement of Reviving the Traditional © Muhayo Aliyeva
The Philippines What’s Cooking in the Philippines? © WeGovern Institute

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Bangladesh Britto International Artists’ Workshop © Tayeba Lipi
Tajikistan International Child Festival: Smile 2012 © DePamiri

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Cambodia Tiny Toones Next Generation © Stuart Isett
Uzbekistan Crossroads: Ethno Photo and Street Dance © Igor Ten

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Bangladesh Longitude Latitude 5 © Shehzad Shahriar Chowdhury

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Intro
By Christa Meindersma,
Director of the Prince Claus Fund
The challenge of the modern era is to maintain the
vibrancy of individual communities as well as of the
multiculturalism.The spread of the economic globalization,
of world media, and the invading global market, are
introducing changes to the culture as well as ‘multiculture’
of Southasia in such a way that the drift is towards
monoculture… Just as the movement towards cultural
monochrome was the result of technology and market,
same forces must be used to protect and win back
the vibrant plurality of the humankind.
Kanak Mani Dixit, journalist, activist, Nepal
It is precisely this plurality that the Prince Claus Fund
for culture and development has been supporting,
protecting and awarding for the past sixteen years.
The Fund believes that culture is a basic need and
an important driver of development.
The Prince Claus Fund functions through three
main programmes, supporting artists, critical thinkers
and cultural organisations in spaces where freedom
of cultural expression is restricted by conflict,
repression, marginalisation or taboos. Annually, the
Fund grants eleven Prince Claus Awards to individuals
and organisations for their outstanding achievements
in the field of culture and development. The Fund
also provides first aid to cultural heritage damaged
by man-made or natural disaster.
In 2012, the Fund was able to support 100 creative
endeavours by artists and intellectuals in 45 countries,
to give first aid to cultural heritage in 36 emergency
situations and to present Awards to 11 outstanding
pioneers in the field of culture and development.
2012 was a year of innovation; for the first time,
the Fund issued two targeted calls for proposals.
These calls, one geographic and one thematic, were
in collaboration with local funding organisations,
which made it possible for the Fund to receive
proposals in local languages. The Fund’s network
partners have now become an integral part of
the selection procedure.
33
The first call – the subject of this Review – closed on
15 March 2012 and welcomed project proposals for
cultural initiatives from CAMBODIA, EAST TIMOR,
NEPAL, LAOS, BANGLADESH, BHUTAN, BURMA,
TAJIKISTAN, KYRGYZSTAN, UZBEKISTAN,VIETNAM,
THE PHILIPPINES, THAILAND, MONGOLIA,
TURKMENISTAN and AZERBAIJAN. This call was
made in collaboration with the following organisations
from the Fund’s network: Art Network Asia, Singapore;
ArtHub, China; Drik, Bangladesh; Reyum Institute
for Arts and Culture, Cambodia; and Hri Institute for
Arts and Culture, Nepal. These organisations helped
to disseminate and translate the call into eleven local
languages. Once they had received the proposals,
they then made an initial selection. This collaboration
enabled the Fund to receive proposals in a greater
number of languages.
Keeping the call thematically open allows for a
variety of projects in a wide array of disciplines, while
narrowing the scope by focusing on a particular geo-
graphic region, the Prince Claus Fund can hone in
on projects of innovation and quality within a region
where other funding organizations have ceased
targeting, and where the Fund has had less involve-
ment in recent years. Furthermore, the chosen
countries in South and Central Asia reflect the Prince
Claus Fund’s over-arching themes, namely develop-
mental relevance, freedom of expression, conflict and
post-conflict struggle.
For the last sixteen years the PCF has worked as
a unique organisation, straddling culture and develop-
ment and working with a worldwide network of
individuals, cultural organisations and communities.
Central to the Fund’s approach is an awareness
of the individuals behind these projects, and their
personal approaches to their projects.
In the words of the Prince Claus Fund’s founder,
Prince Claus:
The decisive factor is the growing realisation that
development and progress can be realised only by people
themselves, in an environment where there is respect for
RE
one’s own culture, own language and one’s own lifestyle.
Without respect and trust in one’s own culture and
traditions progress is difficult to achieve.
 Topics and Themes
In evaluating the proposals that the Prince Claus
Fund received as part of the 2012 SECA call certain
topics and themes emerged among the thirty-one
grantees. While this Review does not claim to con-
clusively categorise the many current cultural and
artistic trends of South East and Central Asia, there
is a large degree of topical and thematic overlap
in the initiatives supported by the Prince Claus Fund.
We hope that the following brief summary of these
recurring themes will contribute to a comprehensive
overview of the projects that make up the 2012
SECA call.
PEACE-BUILDING
The Prince Claus Fund works hard to support
culture in communities that experience conflict
and profound social upheaval. Supporting arts and
strengthening communities can encourage the
peaceful development of post-conflict societies.
As of November 2012, 60 countries are involved
in on-going conflict worldwide. In the SECA
region, Tajikistan, Cambodia, Myanmar and the
Philippines have all undergone conflict and serious
social turmoil. In this context art emerges as
a tool in conflict resolution and peace building.
In the Philippines, this call supported CANVAS, a non-
profit organisation that creates, publishes and
distributes children’s stories that tackle issues
of displacement and trauma. In Nepal, the SOUTH
ASIAN POETRY FESTIVAL FOR PEACE offered a platform
for people from nations affected by conflict
to gather and share poetry.
FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
Cartoonists, artists, writers, musicians, journalists,
photographers, even website designers, all express
their views of the political, religious, social, cultural
circumstances in which they live and work. In cases
of restricted freedom of expression due to politi-
cal or religious censorship, artists seek alternative
strategies and platforms. Whilst the right to voice
one’s opinion publicly, in words and other forms
EVIEW
of creative expression, is formally recognised by
34
the laws of most countries, the degree to which
this is upheld in practice varies greatly. Freedom
of expression is considerably restricted in several
of the countries targeted by the 2012 SECA Call,
such as the Philippines or Uzbekistan. The Prince
Claus Fund’s support for projects that tackle the
problem of cultural freedom aims to create open
spaces that encourage dialogue and the exchange
of ideas.
In the Philippines, where political autonomy is
restricted, one Fund-supported project, TUTOK
F.O.E., developed ten online curatorial projects on
a range of social and political concerns that tackle
problems linked to freedom of expression.
Meanwhile in Uzbekistan, a country known for its
high level of cultural censorship, the audio-visual
festival VIDEOART.UZ supports artists and creates
spaces for free expression.
CROSS-CULTURAL COMMUNICATION
Cross-cultural communication occurs when
cultures from the same or different countries
communicate, sharing ideas and cultural practices.
Cross-cultural exchange can be both challenging
and revealing, especially in regions recovering
from conflict.
For example, SONGS UNBOUND, a Fund-supported
project in Bangladesh, focuses on archiving songs
from both the Hindu Bhakti and Muslim Sufi
traditions in a region traditionally divided along
religious lines. The project is unique in highlighting
the common heritage of India and Bangladesh. In
Vietnam, SKYLINES WITH FLYING PEOPLE, a capacity
building project, engages participants in an open
studio exhibition. It provides emerging artists with
an opportunity to present their works in progress
and discuss them with professionals from other
countries.
MARGINALIZED GROUPS
Various communities around the world are
excluded from the societies in which they live.
In such cases of social exclusion individuals and
groups are systematically blocked from rights,
opportunities and resources that are normally
Distribution of themes
available to other members of society. PRESERVATION OF CULTURAL HERITAGE
Marginalization prevents communities from Cultural heritage represents a community’s
participating in social life, affects their living collective identity, be it national, regional or local.
conditions, and limits their access to social Heritage is an intrinsic part of any community’s
opportunities. Issues related to discrimination common history and its preservation is a recogni-
attract the attention of artists, who try to tackle tion and celebration of its past. The Prince Claus
the subject of social injustice through the arts. Fund is dedicated to preserving both tangible and
In the Philippines, Aida Santos-Maranan explored intangible cultural heritage. The Fund’s Cultural
the taboo, stigma, and discrimination faced by Emergency Response programme (CER) provides
Filipino-Amerasians (people of mixed American first aid to cultural heritage damaged or threatened
and Philippine heritage) and developed a project, by conflict or natural disasters. The Grants and
THE FIRST FILIPINO-AMERASIAN FASHION RALLIES, that Collaboration programme meanwhile supports,
raises public awareness through the use of fashion amongst others, projects concerned with cultural
and artistic expression. In Azerbaijan, LIQUID LAND, heritage. For the Prince Claus Fund culture is not
a photo monograph by Rena Effendi, brings atten- static, and its preservation does not aim to preserve
tion to the marginalized communities that are cultures as museum artefacts, instead allowing
living among the dangerous industrial ruins of the them to flourish as dynamic entities.
capital city, Baku. In Bhutan, the Bhutan Indigenous Games and
Sports Association runs a research project on
ENVIRONMENTAL CONSCIOUSNESS which it bases its actions in reviving and promoting
The international community recognizes that the indigenous games and sports. In Uzbekistan, an
consequences of climate change will most affect initiative run by Velvetine Studio revives authentic
the resources, institutions and livelihoods of the Uzbek traditional costumes, presenting them
poorest countries in the world. Artists and activists in contemporary contexts.
are exploring and confronting the social dimen-
sions of climate change. Art projects around the
world address critical environmental issues and
promote awareness, provoke dialogue, and inspire
action through art. Environmental concerns and
artistic activity are often closely tied to local
communities, where art can serve as a vehicle for
communicating knowledge to a wider public.
The second Kathmandu International Art Festival,
‘EARTH|BODY|MIND’, confronts many of the issues
surrounding climate change and highlights the
intricate connections between culture and nature.
In the Philippines, the documentary photographer
Kat Palasi created ten visual stories that illustrate
how various cultures in the Benguet province
have been affected by environmental degradation.
The project, THE LAST PINE TREE, aims to inform the
public about how the many cultures of the
Benguet highlands are being destroyed through
the loss of their natural environment.
Peace-building 1
Freedom of expression 5
Cross-cultural communication 15
Marginalized groups 7
Environmental consciousness 3
Preservation of cultural heritage 5
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Projects by Country
In the 2012 South and Central Asia Call, the Prince
Claus Fund received 146 proposals of which thirty-
one were supported. Due to the scope and extent
of the projects, the Prince Claus Fund felt a need to
develop a comprehensive analysis of each call. Thus,
the goal of this Review is to provide an interesting
overview of contexts, projects and grantees. The
basic idea is not only to show the diversity of the
projects that have been supported but also the people
behind them, the context in which they take place
and a wider reflection of what these projects mean
in the broader context.
NL
The projects supported by the Prince Claus Fund
through the 2012 SECA Call are listed below,
by country. We have used excerpts from the
ArtAsiaPacific Almanac 2012 for our country profiles.
We conducted short question and answer interviews
with all of the projects, edited versions of which
can be found under each project entry. Longer, and
more in depth interviews were conducted with
particular participants – they can be found at the
end of the Review.
AZERBAIJAN
Country profile Following the end of Soviet rule (1920–91),
Azerbaijan is rebuilding once severed international relations,
and with vast revenue from oil and gas, it is redefining
itself as a market economy. Despite economic growth and
improvement on human rights issues since the country
joined the Council of Europe in 2001, Azerbaijan remains
in conflict with Armenia over the Ngorno-Karabakh
territories, inhabiting collaborative regional events.
Azerbaijan’s art community, centered in the capital Baku,
receives support from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism,
supplemented by the regional NGO, the Open Society
Institute. As in neighboring countries, the applied arts
and crafts still dominate the country’s state-run museums
and the country’s main private galleries show primarily
modernist-style painters.
BANGLADESH
Country profile With the secular Awami League party in
power since January 2009, ending a two-year period of
military – backed transitional government, Bangladesh
experienced relative stability and civic peace in 2011.
Overall, political life was calm, the press remained nominally
free, and the government continued to provide modest
support for the visual arts.The arts community is largely
based in Dhaka, and includes artist-run initiatives,
NGOs and a few commercial galleries.
PCF Update, April 2013 Bangladesh’sprime minister has
ruled out a new blasphemy law despite a mass campaign
to introduce the death penalty for bloggers they
accuse of insulting the Prophet Muhammad. Ongoing
political turmoil led to violence and mass strikes
during the first months of 2013.

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KH LIQUID LAND PHOTO MONOGRAPH BRITTO INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP

Description RenaEffendi is a freelance photographer from
Azerbaijan who was a Prince Claus Laureate in 2011.
LIQUID LAND is her second book, a photographic mono-
graph, which focuses on the lives of vulnerable people
in the polluted areas around Baku. In publishing
LIQUID LAND, Effendi has produced an object of art
TL
that focuses on serious issues of oil dependency and
Description The Britto Arts Trust was set up in 2002
as a non-profit artistic foundation. The organization
encourages experimentation and the development
of new ideas in the visual arts through activities that
support emerging artists and bring new contemporary
art to the local community. THE INTERNATIONAL
ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP is the most important project

environmental degradation. The photographs tell the
stories of marginalized individuals and communities
in and around Baku, people trapped in poverty whilst
the lucrative oil industry contaminates their land.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund gave €12,500 to cover
the printing and promotional costs of LIQUID LAND.
An exhibition of Rena Effendi’s work was exhibited
at the Prince Claus Fund in Amsterdam in May 2012.
Interview with Rena Effendi, t page 58
Environmental consciousness
Marginalized groups
organized by Britto. It stimulates the art scene of
Bangladesh and introduces Bangladeshi artists to a
global network. This edition involved ten international
participants from Indonesia, the Philippines, Myanmar,
India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Latin America, Netherlands,
UK, USA, and ten artists from Bangladesh. No such
international exchange programs have taken place in
the past, and therefore this event provides a unique
opportunity for Bangladeshi artists to meet and work
with artists from abroad.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund gave a grant of
€10,000, which covered the costs of all stages of
THE INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP’S development.

Cross-cultural communication

36 37
Q&A with Tayeba Begum Lipi
Founder- Trustees of Britto Arts Trust
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The international exchanges and discourses
between artists that the workshop fostered.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A It is a great opportunity for local art connoisseurs
who know artists from different parts of the world,
to get to see their artworks in one place, which is
a rare opportunity in Bangladesh. We encourage
artists to work with communities and not stay alien-
ated in a new culture.This way both sides can benefit,
sharing each other’s social and cultural context.
Q What was the most important cultural
event of 2012 in Bangladesh?
A The first ever DHAKA ART SUMMIT organised
by Samdani Art Foundation in April 2012.
CHOBI MELA FESTIVAL VII, ‘FRAGILITY’
Description CHOBI MELA is an international festival of
photography in Dhaka, Bangladesh, that presents the
current state of photography in the region and aims
to put Bangladeshi photographic practice into a broader
international context.The festival presents the creative
work of both established and emerging photographers.
Through exhibitions, discussions and dialogues the festi-
val explores contemporary photographic practice,
encouraging an understanding of the medium within
the industry and amongst the public at large. Bangladeshi
galleries show photography rarely, so the festival chal-
lenges traditional perceptions of art and introduces
the medium to new audiences. In a region where most
people cannot read or write, the festival highlights
important issues through visual culture, thereby
engaging a wide audience with social issues.
Grant €10,205 enabled the festival to bring photo-
graphers from Africa and Latin America to Bangladesh
and funded a mobile exhibition that that brings
photos to remote areas of Bangladesh.
Cross-cultural communication
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Q&A with ASM Rezaur Rahman
General Manager
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The ability to provide a creative platform for
artists from all over the world, while reaching
out to the public in Bangladesh.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A The festival’s outreach program focused on bringing
photography to the attention of a wider public
by exhibiting in non-conventional places, mobile
exhibitions and through the active participation
of the mass media. It has promoted visual literacy
to create platforms for expression for Bangladeshi
people with low levels of textual literacy.
LONGITUDE LATITUDE 5
Description LONGITUDE LATITUDE is a project aimed
at collaboration between different genres of art.
LONGITUDE LATITUDE takes place in five or seven
unconventional public spaces within Dhaka, where
artists stage, perform and showcase their works. In
this, the fifth incarnation of the project, the artworks
question the audience’s construction of self and identity
in relation to the world. The project incorporates
music, performances, street art, installations, poetry,
photography, film, architecture, cartoons and other
media. Artists come together for the project and
improvise further collaborations from their interactions.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s grant of € 3,462
supported the installation of the artworks and
a publication about the project.
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Shehzad Chowdhury
Director Dhaka Art Center
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A It works as a catharsis in the somewhat
conventional/conservative cultural arena in
Dhaka. It helps people feel genuinely passionate
and uninhibited about art and expression. It also
builds new perspectives in the audience’s eyes.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A Since its first show, the reaction from the
community has been overwhelmingly positive.
LONGITUDE LATITUDE has made community
members, artists, professionals and writers take
notice and participate. It has also opened other
doors of cultural expression. The show has been
successful in initiating new ventures: more shows,
performances, street shows, video work and
collaborations have taken place since its inception.
We expect that an investigation of the topics
of ‘Identity & Belonging’ in this show will bring
reflection and insight to communities in
Bangladesh and abroad.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To have a Longitude Latitude event in all the
countries of the world at the same time!
SHAUPNO JATRA (THE JOURNEY OF HOPE)
Description SHAUPNO JATRA (THE JOURNEY OF HOPE) is a
travelling cultural caravan initiative in Bangladesh and
India. The caravan reaches around 15,000 people in
eleven districts of Bangladesh, raising awareness about
safe migration and the exploitation of migrant workers.
The caravan travels to Dhaka, Narayongong, Tangail,
Mymensing, Faridpur, Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Sylhet,
Comilla, Pabna, and Rajshahi and it includes twenty-
four performances delivered over a nine-month
period. SHAUPNO JATRA’S performances include the
documentary film ‘…Ebong Shaupno Jatree’ (The
Dreaming Vendors) and the play ‘Vumoddhyosagor’
(Mediterranean Sea).Volunteers trained in social
media accompany the art project, to educate migrant
workers and their families and bring assistance to
their communities. Although the caravan was launched
with success in November 2012, political instability
since then has put the project on temporary hiatus.
Grant A grant of € 8,100 from the Prince Claus Fund
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was used to cover the costs of performances,
printing scripts and producing DVDs.
Marginalized groups
SONGS UNBOUND
Description The organization The Travelling Archive is
dedicated to documenting the oral and musical
traditions of India and Bangladesh. The organization’s
SONGS UNBOUND initiative aims to record the
marginalized, forgotten and endangered songs and
stories in the Bengal region. Archiving songs that
come from both the Hindu Bhakti and Muslim Sufi
traditions in a region that is sharply divided along
religious lines has exceptional cultural significance.
SONGS UNBOUND also embodies an important example
of the protection of intangible cultural heritage.
Grant A grant of € 6,000 from the Prince Claus Fund
was used for expenses related to the expansion
of the website, www.thetravellingarchive.org, taking
it through a second phase of development.
Marginalized groups
Preservation of cultural heritage
Q&A with Moushumi Bhowmik
singer and songwriter
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A SONGS UNBOUND deals with the unstoppable
flow of culture across (and despite) geopolitical
borders of states and nations in a land once
whole but now broken into many little parts.
What effect has your project had on the
Q
local context?
A SONGS UNBOUND as a specific project has only just
been launched; however, The Travelling Archive,
from which this particular project follows, is almost
a decade old and it has had major impact on folk
music research in the field and archiving in the local
context. The most obvious impact is an increased
interest in local culture in localities, such as in
 Sylhet, on the eastern frontier of Bangladesh.
Local groups such as ‘Sahajiya’ have come up
following our field recording trips to the region,
with a focus on promoting local culture. Artists
from Sylhet have been performing in the Baul
Fakir Utsav folk festival of Kolkata, India since
2010. In Silchar, Assam, India, Studio Udicon, which
Sukanta Majumdar, sound recordist of The Travelling
Archive had helped to set up in 2006, released its
first folk music research CD in 2012, an obvious
result of their interaction with us. In Dhaka, the
Chhayanaut Resource Centre started their
archiving project with a mind to collaborating
with us. There is bound to be more such activity
in the region as a result of our continuing work.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To continue the work on The Travelling Archive
and make it into a strong and viable project
that will eventually last beyond us.
BHUTAN
Country profile The democratic government of the Buddhist
Kingdom of Bhutan measures the success of its activity
in terms of the happiness it produces for its citizens.With
cultural preservation as one of the pillars of Bhutan’s
commitment to ‘Gross National Happiness’, government
funding is focused on three institutions showcasing tradi-
tional Buddhist art: the National Museum of Bhutan, the
National Folk Heritage Museum and the National Textile
Museum.Though the secluded state has increasingly
embraced modern culture in recent years – the royal
wedding of King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck in
October was the nation’s largest media event – the develop-
ment of Bhutan’s small contemporary art scene still relies
heavily on the support of private organizations.
STUDY AND REVIVAL OF INDIGENOUS SPORTS
Description TheBhutan Indigenous Games and Sports
Association (BIGSA) initiated this project to research
and revive the forgotten games and sports of Bhutan.
40
The organization runs a research project, interviewing
elder community members, and compiles, analyses
and synthesizes its findings into a comprehensive
study of forgotten games and sports in Bhutan. Based
on the detailed documentation of indigenous games
and sports, BIGSA then attempts to revive, conserve
and promote these activities. Games and sports have
tremendous cultural importance for Bhutan and the
Bhutanese. There are many important links between
indigenous sports and astrology and traditional
healing in Bhutan – and all are deeply ingrained into
the Bhutanese way of life.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported all stages
of project development with a grant of € 25,000.
Preservation of cultural heritage
Q&A with Lyonpo Kinzang Dorji
President of BIGSA
Q What effect will your project have on the
local context?
A It will help us in our endeavour to strengthen
and facilitate the continued evolution of traditional
values and institutions.
Q What was the most important cultural event
of 2012 in Bhutan?
A The introduction of democracy from the Throne,
and the adoption of the Constitution of Bhutan
which recognizes culture as an evolving dynamic
force and the need to preserve, protect and
promote the cultural heritage of the country.
CAMBODIA
Country profile For the past three decades, Cambodia has
struggled to recover from the genocidal social policies of
the Khmer Rouge regime (1975–79) that devastated the
country.The UN-based Khmer Rouge tribunals continue
in Phnom Penh, following the 2010 conviction of Duch, the
former director of the Tuol Sleng prison where an estimated
16,000 people were detained and tortured.The kingdom
has only recently achieved a moderate level of political
stability and economic growth, accompanied by a subse-
quent influx of foreign investment. In February 2012, a
military conflict erupted between Cambodia and Thailand
following a long-standing territorial dispute over a
4.6-square-kilometer area surrounding the ancient Preah
Vihear temple, a UNESCO World Heritage site that
straddles the border of northern Cambodia. In recent
years, the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, formerly the
‘keeper of Cambodian traditional arts’, has started to
support contemporary art as well.
ASIA TOLD BY ITS PHOTOGRAPHERS
Description Punctum is a photo magazine that acts as a
platform for the promotion and dissemination of the
work of photographers and writers from Asia. This
project is a specific issue of the magazine, which aims
to increase the global visibility and recognition of young
emerging artists from Asia. The participants are
photographers and photo editors from Cambodia,
the Philippines, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Thailand. Their
works were carefully selected and put together and
the resulting publication was distributed worldwide,
thereby ensuring global visibility for Asian photo-
graphers who have otherwise limited exposure. The
project operates on a non-profit basis and has both
a print and online presence.
Grant Prince Claus Fund’s grant of €12,500 covered
costs related to photo editing, the commissioning
of photographs and producing texts.
Cross-cultural communication
TINY TOONES NEXT GENERATION
Description Tiny Toones uses the culture of hip-hop as
a vehicle to reach vulnerable young people in Cambodia.
Hip-hop is very popular among Cambodian youth, which
gives Tiny Toones its unique appeal to some of the most
41
marginalised communities of Phnom Penh. This project
enables at-risk youth to create and use music and
dance as a springboard for education and development.
With the support of the Prince Claus Fund,Tiny Toones
students have created and produced an original music
album, entirely the work of Tiny Toones’ DJs, rappers,
beat-makers and producers and including original Tiny
Toones’ artwork. The lyrics reflect the backgrounds,
experiences and feelings of those involved, while the
music incorporates hip-hop, elements of traditional
Cambodian music, and an array of other influences.
The dances provide a visually exciting counterpoint
for a series of live performances and form the basis
of a music video, filmed in March 2013.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s grant of € 5,376 covers
the cost of the album and accompanying choreo-
graphed dance pieces.
Interview with David Hewitt, t page 55
Marginalized groups
MONGOLIA
Country profile Nestled between the industrial powerhouses
of Russia and China, Mongolia is expected to grow eco-
nomically as it feeds its mineral riches to its two hungry
giant neighbours. However, contemporary Mongolian art
has yet to be considered a natural resource at home.The
small art community receives varying support from govern-
mental, corporate and private sources.The leading NGO, the
ten-year-old Arts Council of Mongolia (ACM), focuses on cul-
tural advocacy, education and heritage conservation programs.
THE IMPORTANCE OF TRADITIONAL
KNOWLEDGE OF MONGOLIA
Description The Fine Arts Zanabazar Museum in
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, displays the work of Mongolian
artists from the eighteenth to twentieth centuries. This
project introduced a multilingual audio guide, making
the museum’s collection more available to visitors
seeking a deeper understanding of Mongolian history,
culture and traditions. Besides purchasing and compiling
an audio guide, the project includes educational work-
shops, and pamphlets directed at diverse audiences.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported all stages
of audio guide’s development and accompanied work-
shops with a grant of € 19,870.
Preservation of cultural heritage
MYANMAR
Country profile After consolidating political power in
November 2010 elections, widely decried as fraudulent,
Myanmar’s autocratic military junta had recently loosened
its hold on the country. Nobel Peace laureate Daw Aung
San Suu Kyi, under house arrest for 15 years, met face-to-
face with president Thein Sein.The head of the national
censorship body publicly conceded that the institution is now
obsolete. In recent years, the junta has assumed a more
amiable stance toward the international community, both
permitting cultural and academic exchange programs
to develop. However, artists and cultural workers are still
heavily monitored and undergo a strict censorship process.
In spite of this, contemporary art activities, particularly
performance art and collaborations between progressive
groups of artists, musicians and poets, continue to flourish
in the former capital of Yangon.
PCF Update, April 2013 On
27 March HE Ambassador
Joan Boer presented the 2012 Prince Claus Award to
Zarganar, performer, comedian and social activist. During
the event Zarganar performed a historic Anyeint per-
formance in the People’s Square in Yangon.This exciting
theatrical performance lasted five and a half hours and
was attended by an estimated 5000 people. It was the
biggest public performance ever to take place in Burma.
BEYOND PRESSURE FESTIVAL
OF CONTEMPORARY ART
Description Beyond Pressure is an independent art
organization initiated and run by artists who work
in their communities to create projects that open
up spaces for self-expression in Myanmar. The festival
42
aims to create forums where people can present
critical alternatives to how Myanmar is perceived
by the outside world. This one-month event includes
public installations, video and sound installation booths,
a graffiti art party, screenings, workshop expos, artist
talks, symposiums, street performances and a perfor-
mance art tour. The variety of art forms and genres
and the wide range of activities are aimed at reaching
diverse audiences and offering a comprehensive over-
view of current developments in Myanmar’s art scene.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund assisted the organization
in covering the costs of travel, artist fees and materials
for artists with a grant of € 9,000.
Freedom of expression
Cross-cultural communication
Blue Wind Multimedia Art Festival
Description BLUE WIND MULTIMEDIA ART FESTIVAL is a six-day
festival located in different venues of Yangon, Myanmar,
and devoted to visual arts, multimedia art, photography
and literature. The festival was founded by local artists,
with the aim of strengthening Myanmar’s visual and
media art scene, and has a particular focus on female
artists and women.The emerging art scene in Myanmar
still remains relatively unknown, and therefore this
festival offers an important opportunity for artists to
network and promote their art.The festival incorporates
symposiums and workshops that encourage dialogue
between artists, the general public and the media.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s grant of € 7,200
covered the festival’s organization and administration
costs, as well as artists’ stipends and materials.
Freedom of expression
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Phyu Mon, Performance artist
and founder of blue wind – Woman Artist Association
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A Censorship and intimidation have led to the
general stagnation of media art and cultural
development in Myanmar. The Blue Wind event
will help to build self-confidence in the Myanmar
art community, specifically in the media art scence.
Dialogue with international artists, curators and
lecturers will stimulate thought on the artist’s
role in different social contexts and provide impetus
for future activities. In the wider community, the
event will propose art as genuine avenue for cul-
tural enterprise, negotiation and engagement.
Blue Wind will function as a true middle ground
for both the authorities and society. Lastly, estab-
lishing this inaugural media art event will lay the
foundation for sustainable cultural activity that will
gather to it more stakeholders and opportunities
for development and change in the years to come.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To develop art knowledge, art education and
society in Myanmar, and to be in good relation-
ships with overseas artists and art society.
MEDIA IN BURMA, CHANGING THE SILENT ZONE
Description The Irrawaddy Publishing Group (IPG)
was founded in 1993 by Burmese citizens living in exile
in Bangkok to report on widespread human rights
abuses in Burma. From its inception IPG has sought
to promote press freedom, independent media and
quality journalism in Burma and South East Asia. The
two main objectives of IPG are the establishment of
an independent media in Burma and the publishing
and promotion of commentaries and public dialogues
from a wide range of groups and individuals who have
previously been marginalized and silenced by the
Burmese military dictatorship. Due to political changes
over the last year, the December issue of the IPG’s
magazine Irrawaddy was the first ever legally distri-
buted in Myanmar itself.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported the Irrawaddy
Publishing Group with a grant of €10,000 and the
development of a permanent bureau in Yangon.
Freedom of expression
43
‘THE RENDEZVOUS’, SECOND SOUTH EAST ASIA
URBAN ART EVENT
Description ‘THE RENDEZVOUS’, SECOND SOUTH EAST ASIA
URBAN ART EVENT aims to introduce and expand the
boundaries of urban art in Myanmar. The event takes
place in Yangon, involves both local and international
artists and includes various artworks: urban painting,
stencils, graffiti, urban toys and murals. The main objec-
tive of the project is to create a platform where artists
can meet, collaborate, learn, create together and pro-
mote the Myanmar urban art scene. The festival, being
publically oriented and advertised, legitimizes and
elevates the role of the urban young artists as significant
actors in the cultural life of Myanmar. The project was
initiated and by local artists who work in urban art
communities.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund was the major supporter
of ‘THE RENDEZVOUS’, with a grant of € 8,500.
Freedom of expression
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Thu Myat (a.k.a) Aung Myat Htay
artist and coordinator of the project
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A Developing and organizing urban art movements
in Myanmar, facilitating the creation of Myanmar’s
own style, and creating a network and resource
base for local and international artists.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A Before ‘THE RENDEZVOUS’ and other urban art
exhibitions, our art was not recognized by people
in Myanmar. After our first events we received
extensive media attention and managed to break
boundaries. The people and other communities
understood what we do and accepted our work.
We improved the community by bringing together
urban and indigenous communities.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To develop the Urban Art community in Myanmar,
 and then the art will be the voice of us and
reaffirm our places in the global art community –
and I want to create ‘Myanmar Style’!
NEPAL
Country profile Political turmoil continues to plague this
small Himalayan nation. In August, Baburam Bhattarai
became Nepal’s fourth prime minister (the position was
only instated in 2008) after his predecessors failed to
facilitate a new constitution.With the government a revolving
door of leaders, the small but growing art scene relies
primarily on private support.The main arts organization,
the Nepal Association of Fine Arts (NAFA), is run by the
Department of Arts and Crafts at the Royal Nepal
Academy in Kathmandu.The NAFA oversees the National
Birendra Art Museum, with a permanent collection, rental
exhibition space, a library and artists studio.
SOUTH ASIAN POETRY FESTIVAL FOR PEACE
Description SOUTH ASIAN POETRY FESTIVAL FOR PEACE
(SAPFP) is a free, public event designed to foster
interaction, cooperation and unity among the people
of the South Asia. SAPFP is a unique festival dedicated
to the message of peace through poetry. International
discord and internal instability have marked South
Asia but the festival promotes free exchange of
thought and poetry by bringing together poets from
Nepal, India, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Pakistan,
Afghanistan and Sri Lanka. At SAPFP celebrated voices
and young talents from South Asia come together
to promote peace and unity.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s contribution of
€12,000 covered travel, venues, translation and
communication costs.
Peace-building
Cross-cultural communication
44
RETELLING HISTORIES
Description RETELLING HISTORIES is a personal history
project, which explores archiving and history through
research, collecting and documenting photographs.
The project runs a mobile archiving facility, which
travels to remote regions of Nepal to reach people
and communities that could not otherwise be docu-
mented by traditional historians. The activities of the
project include archival training, workshops, digital
slideshow presentations, publications, exhibitions and
the creation of a web-based archive. RETELLING HISTORIES
promotes interest in photography as a valuable medium
for addressing and discussing history and identity.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s contribution of
€11,500 supported: the establishment of a mobile
archiving facility, web development, training for
archivists and researchers, workshops and digital
exhibitions.
Marginalized groups
Preservation of cultural heritage
KOLOR KATHMANDU
Description Sattya Media Arts Collective uses murals
and street art to foster collaboration and communi-
cation between artists and the community. In their
project, KOLOR KATHMANDU, the organization selects
a team of fifteen local artists from diverse back-
grounds to work together, mentoring at-risk youths
and involving them in the artistic process. To ensure
high quality, the murals’ designs are reviewed by a
committee including professional artists, journalists
and anthropologists, and then approved by
community members and people who live in the
neighborhood. The murals portray traditional and
modern designs and the sites are selected according
to their historical and contemporary significance.
Established international artists worked on the
project as visiting artists. By transforming the streets
of Kathmandu into an open-air art gallery the project
adds beauty and value to the city, creating a vibrant,
creative atmosphere.
Grant A grant of €17,485 from the Prince Claus
Fund provided the seed money for the hiring of two
coordinators specifically to work on KOLOR
KATHMANDU and a stable stipend for the artists
involved in the project.
Interview with Yuki Poudyal, t page 54
Freedom of expression
Cross-cultural communication
THE KATHMANDU INTERNATIONAL ART
FESTIVAL: EARTH | BODY | MIND
Description The second KATHMANDU INTERNATIONAL ART
FESTIVAL (KIAF), EARTH|BODY|MIND, has put Nepal on the
map as a global venue for the contemporary arts. The
non-profit triennial provides an international platform
for contemporary art in Nepal. 100 artists from thirty-
one countries attended the winter 2012 festival,
which focused on the environment and climate change,
questioning and bringing attention to the human
relationship with nature. KIAF encourages artistic
collaboration and exchange among international
and local artists, creating a space for the arts and
a platform for critical reflection on social and
political issues.
45
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s contribution of
€ 22,000 covered the costs for the hosting of artists
as well as the transportation of their artworks.
Cross-cultural communication
Environmental consciousness
Q&A with Sangeeta Thapa
Director of Siddhartha Art Foundation
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The strongest points of this project have been
the hands-on experience for a team of future arts
managers to work together professionally, pro-
moting the contemporary arts in Nepal, and finding
relevant ways to reach out to a wider community.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A KIAF has allowed for a synergy that links different
arts institutions together to promote the contem-
porary arts in Nepal. We have been able to turn
heads in the environmental activist communities,
handicrafts community, local communities, and
government bodies.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A My dream is to inspire the next generation of artists
and art managers to come forward and take
contemporary Nepali art to an international level.
THE PHILIPPINES
Country profile The 150th anniversary of national hero
Jose Rizal’s birth, 2011 brought celebratory exhibitions
and a major national controversy to the Philippines’
vibrant art scene. Organizers of ‘Kulo’ (‘Boil’ (6/17–8/21),
with 32 artists from the University of Santo Tomas, held
at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP), found
themselves in hot water over Mideo Cruz’s installation,
titled Poleteismo (‘Polytheism’) (2002/11), a wall collage
of religious and pop-cultural media imagery about the
country’s history of idolatry and colonial hegemony. A
television program singled out the piece in its coverage,
leading to its condemnation by Catholic bishops and lay
groups as blasphemous.The threat of a lawsuit, an inci-
dent of vandalism and a Senate investigation prompted
the CCP’s board to prematurely close the show on August 9,
a move criticized as censorship by groups such as the
Concerned Artists of the Philippines.

FIRST FILIPINO-AMERASIAN FASHION RALLIES
Description The FIRST FILIPINO-AMERASIAN FASHION
RALLIES are a series of fashion shows in the streets
of Angeles City showcasing a new clothing-and-
accessories brand created by Filipino-Amerasians.
Filipino-Amerasians are a stigmatised minority in the
Philippines – the children of American GIs,
unrecognised by their fathers, they have suffered
decades of discrimination and exclusion. Prior to the
rallies the participants were involved in healing and
modelling workshops that helped them regain self-
esteem, trust and positive outlooks. After the rallies it
is hoped the clothing-and-accessories brand will
develop into a business that generates income and
helps lift the participants from poverty. Dealing with
difficult topics such as prostitution and racism through
events like fashion rallies creates spaces to address
neglected topics and increase public awareness.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s grant of € 25,000
covered the entire cost of the Rallies.
Marginalized groups
PROMOTING LITERACY THROUGH ART
Description In
this project CANVAS published two
picture books aimed at helping children deal with the
46
trauma of displacement due to war and natural
disasters. The first book, Message in the Sand, is a
story of how even a small child can help the environ-
ment. The second, Blue Stars, is about hope in a time
of war. Both books were distributed to disadvantaged
children in public schools throughout the Philippines.
E-book versions of the stories, artworks and teaching
guides are also available for free download to ensure
accessibility and affordability. The funding from the
Prince Claus Fund made it possible for CANVAS not
only to publish at least 10,000 books (all of which were
distributed to disadvantaged children), but also to
engage professors from the two leading universities
in the Philippines, who prepared teaching guides that
help public school teachers and facilitators to use the
books as tools for teaching and dealing with trauma.
Grant The grant from the Prince Claus Fund, of €14,545,
covered the publication of a larger number of books
and teacher guides.
Peace-building
Marginalized groups
Q&A with Gigo Alampay
Executive Director
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The project provides disadvantaged children with
the opportunity of owning their own high quality,
full colour children’s books written and illustrated
by some of the best young Filipino writers and
artists.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A By giving high quality books to children in dis-
advantaged communities, and featuring original
stories written by Filipino authors the project
hopes to ‘hook’ beginning and young readers into
reading. Moreover, CANVAS engages profes-
sionals who prepare teaching guides that can
help facilitators use the books as tools to alleviate
the trauma suffered by children who are dis-
placed by typhoon, earthquake, war, and other
misfortunes.
Q What was the most important cultural event
of 2012 in the Philippines?
A The Philippines is defined, culturally, I think by
the various fiestas around the country. There is
probably one happening somewhere each day
of the year. Fiestas can symbolize all that is good
with the Philippines – happiness, colour, music,
communities coming together, families reuniting,
religion, etc.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To eventually hand out our millionth children’s
book to a poor child who will then learn to love
books and obtain the lifelong skill of independent
learning through reading.
THE LAST PINE TREE
Description THE LAST PINE TREEis a project by docu-
mentary photographer Kat Palasi. In THE LAST PINE
TREE, Palasi developed ten visual stories that illustrate
how people in the Benguet province of the Philippines
have been affected by environmental degradation,
and how the Benguet highlands and its many cultures
are losing their natural environment to destructive
development practices. Through the medium of
photography Kat Palasi aims to encourage people to
preserve their cultural and environmental heritage
for future generations. Palasi’s visual stories of
Benguet were first shared on an online platform and
then exhibited in the UP Vargas Museum in Diliman,
Quezon City.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund’s grant of € 2,640 covered
travel, the creation of a website, the Duratrans
Lightbox Photo Exhibit and research costs.
Environmental consciousness
Q&A with Kat Palasi
photographer
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The first person point of view will be pretty
strong as it gathers and uses the voice of the
people that have been most affected by changes
where they live.
Q What effect has your project had on the
Q local context?
A I think it’s important to tell these stories so that
the local population is reminded of what has been
happening to their surroundings, their communities
as the changes came and went. I expect the local
population to see the situation of their commu-
nities in a new light – that ‘development’ can
mean a ravaging of the natural beauty of the land,
the loss of lives, the degradation of the quality
of life, and that culture can be disrespected.
Q What was the most important cultural event
of 2012 in the Philippines?
A An exhibition that I saw at the Ayala Museum on
47
Philippine Gold. It was Philippine history made
richer by the tracing of the presence of gold
in the country and how it has always been part
of the island way of life even before the Spanish
arrival in the Philippines. It was an eye-opener.
HYPERCORPOREALITY DANCE COLAB
Description ‘What function does contemporary dance
fulfil in a country of poverty and corruption like the
Philippines?’ is the question that lies at the core of
the projects and activities run by the Transitopia
Contemporary Dance Commune (TCDC). During
the Commune’s six-month long residency, guided by
values of development through the arts, TCDC
attempts to radically reconfigure the ‘dancing body’.
Through music and sound explorations they visualize
and capture the essence of ‘shifts in reality’.
HYPERCORPOREALITY DANCE COLAB in particular pushes
contemporary dance towards new frontiers by
mapping, linking and appropriating new perspectives
and philosophy in social technology and social
innovation.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported the project
with a grant of €12,000, which covered the movement/
dance investigation, open public lectures, dance
composition and choreographic collaborations.
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with (Jose) Jay B. Cruz
Artistic Director of Transitopia
Contemporary Dance Commune
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A We are hoping that this project will encourage
more independent contemporary dance artists
to address challenging questions through their
interaction with us in this specific project and
eventually in their own pursuits.
Q Who is your favourite artist?
A Rolando Chabet, a Filipino artist who led the
 1970s conceptual art group called Shop 6 and
taught for over 30 years at the UP College of
Fine Arts in Diliman, Quezon City.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To be able to create an institution or find
partner institutions who could establish a theatre
venue for contemporary dance that creates a
platform for heightened interface, interaction,
collaboration and co-creation between a diverse
audience, multi-disciplinary artists and specialists
from different fields like Psychology, Philosophy
and Cultural Anthropology.
TUTOK F.O.E.
Description TutoK is an art organisation that invites
selected artist and curators to propose projects to
be articulated through its TutoK F.O.E. (freedom of
expression) website.Various artists develop text,
photos, graphics, animations, videos, and other forms
of new media within specific curatorial schemes. Ten
projects are chosen, each of which has an artist or
curator at its helm that collaborates and coordinates
with TutoK in achieving the online expression of the
project. The ten curatorial projects engage with
current art practices and social issues, and are
designed to prompt artists and communities towards
reflexive discussion and action. TutoK aims to share
emerging art productions with the public and with
networks that can provide feedback, discussion and
possibilities for further collaboration. The
continuation of curatorial projects in virtual space
extends the outreach and contributes to greater
accessibility.
Grant The seed money from the Prince Claus Fund –
€19,000 – covered the costs of web development
and maintenance, as well as grants for each of the ten
curatorial projects.
Freedom of expression
48
Q&A with Karen Ocampo Flores
Project Director
Q What effect has your project had on the local
context?
A The project will invite rethinking and exchange
that will be both critical and creative. It will start
the process of determining answerability and
accountability in art practice. Then we will see
where trajectories towards change may develop.
Q What one word defines the Philippines?
A ELSEWHERE. Philippine culture is obsessed with
the other side of the fence. Its myopia is intrinsic
in its view and standards of art education and art
production. There remains a post-colonial mind-
set that we continue to grapple with. Here is
never good, it is utterly unsatisfactory.
‘Elsewheres’ are always best.Yet we end up
grounded in a here that is framed as an
elsewhere.
Q What was the most important cultural event
of 2012 in the Philippines?
A The sudden emergence of the so-called ‘anti-
cybercrime law’ (RA10175) and how artists and
cyber-communities united with civic groups to
cause a temporary restraining order on its
implementation.
WHAT’S COOKING IN THE PHILIPPINES?
Description WHAT’S COOKING IN THE PHILIPPINES? aims
to popularize timely and relevant social issues and
events that are happening or ‘cooking’ in the
Philippines and that deeply affect the lives of the
Filipino people. The project also aims to mobilize the
poor and marginalized sectors of society to push for
social change and justice through good governance,
with the help of popular art forms. The ‘cookbook’
is a collection of published column articles and pieces
written by Liza Maza, a well-known Filipino advocate
for Women’s Rights. The WeGovern Institute collabo-
rates with young women artists to translate the
articles into popular art forms, including comic strips,
caricatures, cartoons and photographs. The format of
the book resembles a ‘cookbook’, with the articles in
the form of ‘recipes’ on how issues are ‘cooked’.
The publication of the book was followed by book
launch and art exhibition.
Grant With the Prince Claus Fund’s grant of €10,728
the WeGovern Institute coverd the stipends of artists,
communication and publication expenses, as well
as the costs of the book launch and exhibition.
Freedom of expression
Q&A with Liza Maza
Activist, President of the board WeGovern institute
Q What is the strongest point of your project? INTERNATIONAL CHILD FESTIVAL: SMILE 2012
A WHAT’S COOKING IN THE PHILIPPINES? was able to
engage young and progressive women artists Description De Pamiri is an NGO in Tajikistan. Its festival
who, like the WeGovern Institute, believe in the of young talents, SMILE 2012 was held in cooperation
power of art in inspiring social change. with the Regional Education Department, Regional
Q What effect has your project had on the local Cultural Department and the Badakhshan branch of
context? Poets Union of Tajikistan to honour talented Tajik
A The project aims to help propagate art as a tool schoolchildren. Following a competition to select the
for social change and to inspire and mobilize best poets, musicians, and artisans among school-
artists to promote good governance through children between the fourth and ninth forms, the
popular art. Festival itself took place on 10 November 2012 in
Q Who is your favourite artist? the regional theatre in Khorog. The aim of the festival
A The Mexican painter Frida Kahlo, who voices is encourage young people to embrace creativity,
down her personal pains through her art, which literature, knowledge and culture.
in turn depicts social reality – the struggles of Grant With the Prince Claus Fund’s grant of €15,000
women and indigenous people. Her art redefined the organizers of SMILE 2012 were able to increase the
the relationship between ‘the personal’ and ‘the number of participants they were able to include.
political’ and popularized the feminist concept in
art. Frida Kahlo was also a committed activist all Cross-cultural communication
through her life.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects? UZBEKISTAN
A To move the struggle for social change forward Country profileDespite a rich Islamic cultural heritage and
through engaging and engaged activist art. historical connections to the Russian avant-garde,
Uzbekistan still struggles to distance itself from its Soviet
past.The government enforces strict censorship over the
TAJIKISTAN media and controls the country’s arts organizations,
Country profile With a small economy based primarily concentrated in the capital Tashkent. In December 2009,
on agriculture,Tajikistan is still recovering from a civil war photographer Umida Akhmedova was convicted of
(1992–97) following the collapse of the Soviet Union. ‘cultural slander’ for her documentary photographs, but
There is little funding for the arts and a negligible art was subsequently granted amnesty. State institutions
market.Traditional Tajik culture, with its Persian roots, was remain Soviet in their form and content.
overlooked during Soviet times, and remains under-
researched by scholars and historians. Local contemporary
art infrastructure is limited to a few independent
institutions supported by international NGOs in the
capital Dushanbe.
49

CROSSROADS: ETHNO PHOTO
AND STREET DANCE
Description The CROSSROADS project is a platform for
the educational and artistic development of young
artists in Uzbekistan. CROSSROADS is comprised of
two sessions, each of which engages ten young visual
artists and musicians who participate in an intensive
course of lectures given by established local and
international professionals. The themes cover specific
concepts and practical questions in the fields of
photography, visual-arts, public-arts and music. The
lectures are followed by evening workshops where
visual artists and musicians elaborate on the form of
their art and transform artistic ideas into concrete
artworks and performances. Eventually the results of
the sessions are presented to general public at a
combined exhibition and performance event.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported CROSSROADS
with a grant of €12,500 for two multimedia initiatives:
BANGLADESH ETHNO PHOTO and STREE DANCE.
Freedom of expression
Q&A with Shahnoza Karimbabaeva
artist and Project Coordinator
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A The creation and improvement of an atmosphere
of artistic independence in present-day
Uzbekistan, and the establishment of proper
conditions for young artists’ development.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To create a structure that could give all starting
artists access to a wide public and to provide
them with the best material support.
50
VIDEOART.UZ FESTIVAL
Description The VIDEOART.UZ FESTIVAL is an event that
happens once every three months in Tashkent,
Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan is known for its high level of
cultural censorship, and most cultural organizations
self-censor themselves because their funding comes
from the government. VIDEOART.UZ offers an alternative
to the mainstream official and commercial film industry
by presenting the work of emerging and established
Uzbek video-artists and filmmakers. The festival initi-
ates discussions, cultural exchange, supports young
filmmakers in all stages of the film production, initiates
collaborations between the authors, publishes cata-
logues, and issues special awards. The project’s main
objective, however, is to create a space for freedom
of speech and to help connect local creative forces
with an international context.
Grant The grant of €20,000 covered the overall
expenses of the festival.
Interview with Irina Popova, t page 57
Freedom of expression
THE MOVEMENT OF REVIVING THE TRADITIONAL
Description This
project, an initiative of Bibi Hanum/
Vevletine Studio, revives authentic Uzbek traditional
costumes to bring them into contemporary contexts.
The project gathers traditional patterns and weaving
methods from older generations of people in the
Fergana Valley, Andijan and Bukhara. Textile artisans,
together with Russian and Uzbek ethnographers of
costume, create exact copies of these traditional
patterns. The newly made traditional garments are
then photographed and published. Photographs of fifty
of the most unique robes and kaftans were assembled
in a catalogue and distributed to museums, art galleries
and design schools. The project ended with a master
class for designers and artists on the production of
traditional clothing. According to Muhayo Aliyeva,
Project Director, the project aimed to ‘preserve our
cultural heritage and create a fantastic line of tradi-
tional clothes that could be demonstrated worldwide.’
Grant A grant of €15,150 from the Prince Claus Fund
covered the research, tailoring and promotion of
the garments.
Preservation of cultural heritage
LABORATORY FOR YOUNG DIRECTORS
OF CENTRAL ASIA
Description The Ilkhom Theatre, founded by the late
Mark Weil, is a professional and multi-disciplinary
platform for the contemporary and performing arts
in Uzbekistan. The Theatre’s project, LABORATORY FOR
YOUNG DIRECTORS OF CENTRAL ASIA, is a forum that
involves professionals in the performing arts from
USA, Europe, Russia and Central Asia. This forum
creates a productive artistic environment for profes-
sional development not only for directors, but also
for set and costume designers, choreographers, and
musicians. The LABORATORY’S multi-disciplinary program
includes every element of staging a performance –
from the casting and reading of a play, through to
creative rehearsing and technical production, and its
presentation on a professional stage. The project
gives emerging directors from Central Asia a unique
opportunity to learn from international professionals
and develop their potential.
51
Grant The Prince Claus Fund supported the ICCA with
a grant of €10,889, which covered the expenses for
the young theatre directors’ participation and the resi-
dency costs for the invited international professionals.
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Irina Bharat
Assistant General Manager, IIkhom Theatre
Q What effect has your project had on the local
context?
A The project has had a series of key features,
namely: maintaining a unique collection of theatre
pieces in the format of a real repertoire company;
producing new productions and projects of high
artistic quality; educating audiences and performers
in the performing arts; developing an international
network; engaging new audiences; and providing
assistance to emerging artists in different genres.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A My dream is to give a birth to new generation
of young directors.
VIETNAM
Country profile Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party intro-
duced market-led reforms in the late 1980’s, and now
presides over a rapidly growing economy. State censorship
of culture, media and political dissent remains stringent,
particularly this year following the Middle East uprisings.
The artistic community contends with government restric-
tions and limited funding, as do state-owned museums,
which suffer from disrepair. In a sign of progress this year,
the Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts Museum opened newly
refurbished premises adjacent to their current home.
MY VOICE BIENNALE
Description Hanoi Grapevine is a web-based project
offering support to the arts scene throughout Vietnam.
Following the success of its website, Hanoi Grapevine
is now developing into a well-known cultural and arts
organization, involved in promoting and organizing
art events. MY VOICE BIENNALE consists of a series of
events engaging with multiple disciplines including
performances, visual art exhibitions, literature events
and film screenings. MY VOICE also offers a series of
interactive workshops, public debates, and talks on
various art-related topics. With MY VOICE BIENNALE,
Hanoi Grapevine hopes to build awareness and
develop dialogue between artists, audiences and local
authorities.
Grant The Prince Claus Fund grant of €12,000 was
crucial in covering the salaries of local curators, fees
and materials costs for local artists, as well as expenses
linked to the production of the exhibitions.
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Vu Ngoc Tram
project Manager, Hanoi Grapevine
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A MY VOICE focuses on promoting young and
upcoming Vietnamese artists. The project
encourages collaboration between young and
established Vietnamese artists including Vietkieu
(overseas Vietnamese) artists. Also, the project
has a strong focus on audience development for
contemporary art by creating dialogues between
the artists and audiences and the local authorities.
Q What is your dream, with regard to your
projects?
A To create a platform for young Vietnamese
artists, and to contribute to the development
of the arts scene in Vietnam.
SKYLINES WITH FLYING PEOPLE
Description SKYLINES WITH FLYING PEOPLE consists of a
series of public events that last for three weeks and
engage with audiences and participants from Vietnam,
Japan, America, Korea and Germany. Although widely
known around the world, showing art in open studios
52
has never taken place in Hanoi. Through this project
Nepal Retelling Histories / Photo contributed by Sanjay Sthapit to Photo Circle Nepal, unknown photographer
Vietnamese artists have an opportunity to connect
with local communities by presenting their works-in-
progress in multi-functional public spaces rather than
art galleries and museums. The project stimulates
alternative methods of art production and teamwork
and gives artists opportunities to communicate,
share, learn and discuss each other’s practices.
Grant With funding of €10,000 from the Prince Claus
Fund, Nhasan Studio was able to support the
residency of twelve Vietnamese artists, and cover
supporting fees and promotion costs.
Cross-cultural communication
Q&A with Nguyen Phuong Linh
Art organizer/curator
Q What is the strongest point of your project?
A Exploring new possibilities to create and
alternative methods of art-making and team-
working in the local scene.
Q What effect has your project had on the
local context?
A Open Studio, unlike an exhibition where artists
present their finished and polished works, is a
space where the audience gets to see what goes
on behind-the-scenes. The artists will stay in their
studios, showing old works, explaining future
plans, and answering whatever questions come
their way. It is precisely the kind of exposure
artists need in order to build up their
confidence, awareness and capacity.
53
InFocus Skype Case Studies
NEPAL KOLOR KATHMANDU
Yuki Poudyal is a social activist, an entrepreneur, a development worker,
and most of all a believer in the good of the human spirit. After studying
in the United States, shes moved back to Kathmandu – her hometown
– to be a part of the buzzing vibrant culture that she left behind. In
that course, she started Cuppas – a coffee shop that promotes locally
brewed coffee, and provides youth a space to explore their talents.
She now works on Kolor Kathmandu.
Q How did the Prince Claus Fund’s support
make a difference to your project?
The Prince Claus Fund saw us and believed in our
potential, and that was a huge boost for us. This seed
money allowed us to hire two coordinators who will
be specifically working for this project. Additionally,
the money provided us with a stable stipend for artists
involved in the project. When I applied I felt a bit
overambitious and it was such a beautiful, amazing
surprise when we found out we got the grant.
The Prince Claus Fund helped us a lot.
Q How is your project perceived by people
in Kathmandu?
At the moment we are in the process of calling for
artists and this has definitely created a stir in the artistic
community. This type of project is unheard of; it is
one of the pioneering initiatives.
Q The murals are going to be in public spaces.
Are people on the streets excited about it,
happy or worried?
We want to make KOLOR KATHMANDU a positive, happy
thing for the public and at the same time give them
a reason to critically think about certain issues. We are
going to be very selective of the designs that we will
be putting up and make sure that they do not totally
contradict or upset any group of any kind.
Let me tell you something – we had been working
with a couple of murals already before we started
KOLOR KATHMANDU, that’s how we experimented. We
had had really amazing reactions, people loved it, they
54
would sit there, take pictures, and while we were
making the murals people would come and ask if they
could paint with us. It is this very amazing, feel-good
kind of process, and at the same time the product
comes out well and you can see people are responding
to it fantastically.
Q I can imagine if someone went onto the
streets here and started painting on buildings
people would be surprised at best, probably
rather confused and maybe annoyed. How is
it in Nepal?
It’s very different in Nepal because people are really
used to seeing people paint – more political jargon
and commercial ads than really amazing paintings.
That kind of tolerance is here, but I really understand
that this is different in other parts of the world
where painting on the streets is often considered
illegal. We work with permission from both the
municipality and the homeowners, which definitely
gives us tremendous support later on.
Q What is the expected impact of the project?
What do you think you will achieve with
this project?
It’s something we have been internalizing for a while.
Towards the end of the project, we want to create
a really strong network within the artist community,
make them feel that they were part of this really
amazing project, beautifying the city and making people
think about art and culture of our nation.
Here art is sort of side-lined in terms of being taken
seriously, art is considered something that people do
as a hobby, but as a profession it is really marginalized.
With this project we want to make people think and
to reclaim space back from commercial jargon and
political ads.
Also, we want to create a sort of ownership of the
streets and make people aware of how things are in
different parts of the country. Especially in urban areas
we are becoming more and more ignorant of our rich
cultural heritage. With KOLOR KATHMANDU we want
to splash topics of national heritage in a very cool
and trendy way so it’s not a cliché but a hip identity
people can relate to. Mixing the traditional and
the modern can give identity a broader context.
Q Could you tell me more about Nepal? What
are the biggest challenges and advantages
about working there?
Let me give you a little bit of my background and
personal perspective. I was raised in Nepal and finished
my undergraduate degree in the USA. I wanted to
come back and work in Nepal, but that experience
gave me an idea of what other nations are like.
In Nepal we don’t have electricity sometimes for
20 hours a day. There is also a lot of political instability,
which causes trouble for office work, business and
transportation. Because of the civil war many people
have moved to Kathmandu searching for opportunity.
This has caused an uncontrolled process of urbani-
zation with an immense population increase in the past
five or six years. There are a lot of negative factors
that govern the country. All the negative factors have
made people more apathetic and self-centred. When
I grew up there was more of a community, people
knew about each other, and now that’s slowly changing.
Culture and a sense of community do not happen
overnight, but we want to give a reason to revive that,
we want to be a means to get that positiveness out.
The positive aspect of doing this project in Nepal
is that we are not considered illegal because we are
working in the streets, people are very open towards
that idea and they haven’t vandalized the walls. People
have shown a strong interest and many look at murals
with amusement.
I am super-happy about this project because it’s like
a dream come true for me. I lived in Philadelphia for
a while and Philadelphia has amazing murals – it’s a
city of murals in itself – and now Kathmandu is too!
I am more than happy with the project in that sense.
Q What are your future plans and ideas
regarding your organization or other
projects?
During the time I have been here I have seen my
organization grow. Right now we are simultaneously
working on different projects. One of them is a city
garden space, called HARIYO CHOWK, which brings
up a lot of interesting urban living and environmental
sustainability topics. Also, we just recently got some
crowd-funding from people in the States for a project
where we are going to screen documentaries in the
streets and venues of Nepal. We are really excited
about that.
I am sure we will have more inspirations – as we
interact with more people new ideas come up,
we take up the new ideas and make them grow.
After KOLOR KATHMANDU I would like to see more
street art improving. I hope artists will become more
experienced in terms of working in the streets.
At the same time I want to see an expansi on of that
department, that sector of street art. I am sure we
will come up with more projects but as for now
our sole focus is on KOLOR KATHMANDU!
55
CAMBODIA TINY TOONES
NEXT GENERATION
David Hewitt has over ten years’ experience working to improve the
circumstances and life opportunities of vulnerable and disadvantaged
people. At the UK homelessness charity, Crisis, he designed and managed
national education, volunteering and housing programmes that enabled
thousands of people to take greater and more positive control of their
lives. He has worked for Tiny Toones in Cambodia since January 2012
where he is developing and implementing organisational strategy along-
side all fundraising and communications responsibilities.
Q What makes the Tiny Toones project unique?
I think the strongest point about Tiny Toones is where
it evolved from, how it came about it. The founder,
KK [Tuy Sobil], was volunteering for an organization
in Cambodia. He was new to the contract, and he was
doing street outreach work with at-risk kids that
were getting into gangs and drugs.
Some of those kids found out that he is a break-dancer
and they started pestering him to teach them how
to dance. So these kids that he was trying to reach
out to started turning up at his door, knocking on the
door of his flat and asking him to teach them to dance.
He saw an opportunity to do something to potentially
help these kids to avoid some of the mistakes that
he himself has made. And so he opened up his front
room and started teaching.They would watch cartoons
in between dance sessions, which is where the name
Tiny Toones came from.
In terms of what’s unique in the Tiny Toones, the
thing I got really excited about when I saw the project,
is that it wasn’t someone like me from an NGO
background turning up and saying ‘here is this really
good model you should try’ – it actually came from
the very kids that you want to reach, it came from
their demands, their interest, it came about as a
response to what they wanted to do. I think that
explains its success and its unique outreach.
Q What was the Prince Claus Fund’s
contribution to your project?
The Prince Claus Fund opportunity was brought to
our attention by Arts Network Asia. We started
discussing what would be an exciting project and
how we could make the most of this opportunity.
The Tiny Toones founder, the executive director, had
this concept for a project knocking around in his
head for a while to bring the dance and music sides
of TINY TOONES together. He had this dream of doing
that project for a very long time and so this was
an opportunity to bring in some funding and make
it a reality – which is what we are doing now!
Q What are the major challenges you are
experiencing in trying to reach your
objectives? Are there problems related to
the context and country you are working in?
There are a number of things that make our work hard.
The aspiration for everyone at Tiny Toones is not
only that they learn to dance but also that they get
an education. It’s extremely difficult in Cambodia with
the kind of fees involved in going to school – both
the kind of official costs and unofficial costs, the
informal fee structure that Cambodia is infamous for.
It’s extremely difficult having to find money to pay
for things, to pay for exam papers if you want to sit
an exam, having to find a daily bit of money for the
teacher if you want him to pay any attention to you.
The quality of education is not good and the level of
sustainment is low, so many children drop out of school.
We provide our own education, which is great, a
quarter of the kids that come to us have never been
to a public school, which is astounding. We are their
primary source of education but we are not geared
up to it, we don’t have the expertise and the funding
to deliver the education they really deserve. So a big
challenge for us is to work with public schools to make
them accessible for kids, to make it a realistic, feasible
option for them.
At the moment we are paying for some of the kids
ourselves, helping them to cover some of the costs.
We are also working with the families to ensure that
they understand the importance of education and that
they are supporting them as well. But it’s really difficult
to get a kid to get a good education within the system.
Q What effects does the project have
on the community?
We run both creative as well as education classes.
Particularly as far as dance is concerned, we have a
high profile within Cambodia, we are very well
regarded within the arts community, and we are very
cool amongst young people. It’s quite easy for us to
engage the kind of kids that we feel we need to reach
because they come to us themselves.
This project specifically is an opportunity to create
something that’s new, something that’s Cambodian,
that draws on some Cambodian influences, brings
hip-hop into the mix and brings the music side of
56
Tiny Toones more to the front. We are best known
for dance, music is less developed, so it’s an oppor-
tunity to put them on an equal footing. It will hope-
fully result in more kids coming to us even if they are
not interested in dancing.We expect to see an increased
participation from the kids that are interested in
music and, after all, it is all about getting at-risk young
people into Tiny Toones, getting them to engage within
our community, and using that opportunity to plug
them into education and peer-mentoring. We see this
project as a new tool for engagement and reaching out
to kids that are potentially not reached at the moment.
That’s part of the effect in the community that we
foresee. We also observe effects within the
community that is already at Tiny Toones. We recently
had a couple of performances where the younger
kids in particular could see the achievements and the
respect that the older kids that have been around for
a while get. It feels to me like it raises aspirations
across the board as to what is possible. A lot of the
kids come from extremely poor backgrounds, they
are working from a really young age, they don’t have
access to education, they are not seeing a lot of the
world but then they are seeing the older kids that
have been at Tiny Toones that have learned to create
music, to create dance, that are performing at
theatres and travelling. It raises the level of relation
to what is possible and what you can do.
Q What are your future projects and plans?
We are currently putting together a new strategy.
Most of the focus so far has been on the teaching
side. We want to strengthen our peer-mentoring
program. We want the older kids that are now
recognized performers and teachers to fulfil a
mentor role with more vulnerable children that are
coming to us. Building up the peer-mentoring side so
that it’s more of a consistent approach, with more
one-to-one interaction, especially for those who are
at most at risk, is a big part of our strategy.
Also, we just recently joined the National Education
Partnership and we are hoping to develop that and
strengthen our education program to address the
issues I mentioned before.
So that’s some of the plans for the education side. As
far as the creative goes – we really want to strengthen
the music side, take that to another level and really
get that up to a level comparable with dance. This
project supported by the Prince Claus Fund is a big
part of that.
We have some more ideas bashing around, one of the
things we are talking about is taking part in a break-
dancing battle. The event takes place in South East
Asia, normally in Thailand or Vietnam. We are excited
about that, it obviously depends on funding, but we want
to look up whether we can take that step, get a team
to that battle and raise our profile within the region.
UZBEKISTAN VIDEOART.UZ
Irina Popova, is a photographer, film-maker and curator from Tver,
Russia. Irina studied at the Tver Journalism faculty, then in Moscow
at the Rodchenko Photography and Multimedia School, and was
a resident artist at the Rijksakademie, Amsterdam. Irina has worked
on several documentary multimedia films and photo-projects
in Uzbekistan. In 2011–12 Irina was the co-organizer and manager
of Videoart.Uz festival of film, video art and multimedia.
Q What impact you expect the project
to have on the community?
In Uzbekistan there is a lot of suppression of culture
and it is very difficult to talk about culture. There is
so much poverty and human rights oppression that
conversations about the existence of real culture are
almost impossible. What is understood by most
people as culture is some official, very pompous, very
glamorous culture style that is interested mainly in
hiding problems and not revealing them. Moreover,
culture is very much separated from the local people,
if it has national character it is the pretentious, official
and pompous side of Uzbek culture.
The festival VIDEOART.UZ is unique because it promotes
local art and tries to integrate it into international
discourse by encouraging everyone to make their
own films. One of the statements of this festival is:
‘if you watch the films why don’t you go out and
make some yourself’. This festival reaches out to
people and connects them with culture instead of
disconnecting them.
Q Is the festival an opposition to the
mainstream culture in Uzbekistan?
From its inception the festival has been an opposition
to mainstream culture. Independent existence of video
art has already a political meaning of opposition. In
Uzbekistan being in opposition to official culture has
political consequences. It has always been like this, so
the date and place of the festival is a secret – people
don’t share it openly. Participants invite each other
57
and other people they know. We know already from
our past experience how easy it is for the authorities
to stop everything and to close down the festival.
Q How do you advertise your festival?
How do people know about it?
The community of people who think, create and are
interested in art is not very big – its quite small
compared to countries like the Netherlands. There is
a community of people who know each other and
they advertise the festival through informal channels.
The festival is in danger of being cancelled or closed
down by authorities, literally with one call. We already
had such an experience when someone wrote a
complaint to the authorities that something
‘improper’ was going on and the authorities
immediately closed down the event.
Q Does the festival change the situation
in Uzbekistan in any way?
The festival is mainly about the freedom of speech
and freedom of showing your own world – it doesn’t
have to be directly political or directly oppositional.
In the festival we declare that views on the world can
be very different; we have so many films about love,
emotions that have nothing to do with politics.
Already showing your own world is important, it’s
something new, people are not only viewers, but also
participants in the creative process of viewing the
world differently. Through this festival we show that
there are multiple views on the world. We are not
saying that all the films are perfect from technical or
skills point of view – it’s about giving a chance to
local video artists to exercise freedom of speech and
develop.
Q How do you receive funding for your festival?
Before the Prince Claus Fund we did not have any
real funding and we sponsored the festival ourselves
with the help of the participants. With Prince Claus
Fund funding we managed to publish a special edition
DVD with all the films and a good quality catalogue
with high-resolution photos. It’s the first time we’ve
done this and we are very happy about that. The
DVD is an opportunity to spread the news about the
festival because not everyone can attend the events.
This is a way for us to get more public acquainted
with our work. The catalogue with pictures, descrip-
tions and biographies allows us to promote our
festival further. Mainly, with the Prince Claus Fund’s
help, we were able to put much more time and
energy into preparing materials. We also had more
time to help some less experienced filmmakers with
the production process.

AZERBAIJAN LIQUID LAND PROJECT
Rena Effendi is a photographer who creates work that is an eloquent
testimony to human dignity and resilience. In 2011 Rena Effendi was
honoured with a Prince Claus Award ‘for her remarkable portraits of
individual lived experiences in zones of silence, for documenting the
social impact of rampant, profit-driven ‘development’ and for raising
awareness of social realities in contexts that require developmental
support.’
Q You are in Romania at the moment, right?
Yes, I am here on an assignment from National
Geographic Magazine. I have been here 4 for four
weeks photographing the last European peasants and
the dying-out traditions and culture of this region. It’s
in Transylvania, rural Transylvania, Maramursh region,
which is very traditional, very austere, where the farmers
still use medieval ways of farming. I have been doing
this for four weeks and soon I am leaving for Cairo.
Q I have some questions for you about your
project LIQUID LAND. What was the effect of
you project on the community you
photographed?
To be honest with you, one of the things that I was
able to do while I was photographing them and
making contact was to include the community in any
kind of secondary coverage of the work. For example
the ARTE TV station came to do a reportage piece
about me and my work for LIQUID LAND. I took them
to the community so they had a chance to film the
community, how they live, and they interviewed me
right there. So the project was seen not just in the
book but also on major European TV networks. It
also transmitted at the time when they had the
Eurovision Song Contest in Azerbaijan and there was
a lot of press coverage of the country worldwide,
especially in Europe. It was a good moment to show
that the government PR machine was presenting
Azerbaijan as a very progressive European country
but there are still deeply ingrained social problems
that haven’t been addressed, like these refugee
58
communities that have been living in those oil fields
areas for over 20 years.
I was able to draw attention to the community.
Whether or not this physically affected their life
I cannot tell you. But at least my job was done as
someone who informs the public about the situation.
I was able to draw attention to this community
through a cultural medium by publishing a book.
There were two programs that covered the story.
One was a Swiss public TV channel; they did a
documentary about travelling along the Silk Road.
Azerbaijan was on their way and they decided to
portray me as one of the cultural representatives of
the country. I took them to that community when
I talked about my book and I was able to get
coverage of the place.
Q How did you come across and become
interested in that community in the first
place?
They are in Baku, the city where I grew up and lived
all my life. Pretty much at the very beginning of my
photographic career I was photographing such
communities. I can say I am a very socially engaged
photographer, it’s very important for me to have that
social context. I go out and seek stories like that.
One story that I did in Baku was all about urban
change, it was an area in my city that was undergoing
a lot of changes with the new constructions taking
over the neighbourhood. That’s how it started and
then I went on and I looked for other places like that
and I found people living in the oil fields from the
Soviet era. Some of these oil fields date back to the
‘noble investment era’ at the turn of the century. And
people still live there – they are impoverished and
most of them are refugees who found shelter in the
area, where housing is very cheap because they could
not afford another place, and nobody else wants to
live there. It’s a sprawling disaster and people live
among these industrial ruins. The book shows, in a
very artistic way, life in Baku, a city booming with oil
money. The point is to show the flip side, to work
against the PR machine. For me that is the important
point of the project: to show that kind of contrast.
Q What were the biggest challenges of
the project?
Well, the immediate challenge is something that I
always feel as a photographer, ‘photographer’s guilt’.
When you arrive in a community people have an
expectation that their life might change but you do
not know how to control that and you feel a sense
of responsibility – and that’s why I always try to tell
myself that my work is to inform the public, and that
I am successful at, that I can achieve. What happens
next is beyond my control.
There was one particular place I kept photographing
where I think I brought three European TV crews to.
In this abandoned factory, where people live in
cardboard homes, there was this one boy who was a
three times boxing champion of Azerbaijan. He is 12
years old and he lives in a cardboard home! I brought
TV crews there to film his story. I don’t know how
this will change his life immediately but at least his
story was told and that’s very important.
Publishing a book is a big challenge in itself. Now, in
today’s market, it is very difficult to publish a photo
book – they are expensive and there is a very limited
market of buyers. To be able to do a very good
quality publication you basically need to subsidize it.
Very often publishers ask photographers to find their
own funding – through crowd funding or other
channels. I was very delighted to get an opportunity
to work with the Prince Claus Fund. The grant
allowed me to cover the printing costs and
promotional costs as well.
Q What do you think is the strongest aspect
of your project? What makes it unique?
The way the story is told is very personal. I focus
more on my personal history and I became per-
sonally engaged with the work. I decided to combine
the story of these communities in Baku with that of
my father, an obsessive butterfly scientist, who
collected 30,000 butterflies all around the Soviet
Union. I use butterflies as metaphor of fragility. I think
that the fact that I use a more artistic approach
makes the social message a bit more subtle and at
the same time more memorable. I feel like it’s a more
sophisticated way to address social subjects. Often
you see a lot of work from more classical reportage,
which is more direct – I like the fact that this book is
more an art object, because it can reach other
audiences. Also, by painting a collective portrait of
this community living dangerously in the industrial
ruins of Baku I want to present a dignified portrait.
I try to be respectful towards the people I photograph.
59
 The Thirty-one Projects
of the 2012 South East and Central Asia
Call for Proposals
By Kanak Mani Dixit

Only a few people who create art or nurture artistic The PCF also looks at areas that are often neglected
endeavours – painters, actors, filmmakers, musicians, by the ‘mainstream donors’, and of course culture
singers, curators, archivists, critics – tend to be as a whole suffers from general neglect in this respect.
financially well-off, or have family support that allows Take for example, the PCF’s focus on archiving, as a
creative, imaginative output. This is why art requires means of preserving the past and the present for the
patronage, particularly in the countries of the South, sake of the future. This feel for the importance of
where there is little of the kind of support required preserving memory throughout Asia is evident in the
for creativity. In its work the Prince Claus Fund (PCF) projects supported by this call, from fashion in
has helped keep a small but significant window open, Uzbekistan, to indigenous sports in Bhutan, photo-
providing support for a wide range of artistic efforts graphy in Nepal, and art in Mongolia.
and allowing the fresh breeze of creativity to stimulate The PCF is able to do a great deal with relatively
young and curious minds around the world. little funding. The amounts disbursed across the
MN This is evident in the thirty-one projects chosen 31 projects are not substantial, relative to the kind
by the PCF for support in the 2012 South East and of money spent by development agencies in the
Central Asia Call. The call is regional – it refuses to developing world. For me, the PCF’s grant-making
AZ
UZ KG submit to any attempt to define trends and themes. is an example of how a little money can go a long
TJ And this is as it should be, because Asia, as the largest way –perhaps cultural output can be compromised
and most populous continent, is itself impossible by too much liquidity! Nevertheless, one would hope
to categorise and pigeonhole. The cultural needs and that the development agencies understood better
wants of more than four billion people with such the importance of supporting cultural creativity,
NP
indescribable demographic diversity obviously cannot challenging cultural censorship by protecting open
BT be tackled by any set formula. Besides, the societies society against marauders, and understanding that
BD
are evolving at different speeds, some are open, some people do not live by bread alone – they need cinema,
MM VN are opening, others are closed and stifling. Cultural fine arts, documentaries, theatre and poetry!
freedom needs to be protected from demagogues
TH
in some places, creativity nurtured in others, while
PH elsewhere imaginative artists must be supported
KH
to proceed with abandon.
This is what the PCF has done in approving this
batch of projects in the SECA region, sticking to its
trusted formula of giving catalytic support where
required, sparking creativity where possible, giving
shelter where necessary. The dirty urbanization
of Kathmandu has been relieved somewhat by the
TL support for murals on public spaces. The poets
of Asia are brought together in one city, while dance
is used to challenge the corruption-mongers in
another. In Uzbekistan, traditional weaves are saved,
in Bangladesh photographic exhibitions are taken
traveling to isolated villages. Everywhere, there is an
effort to give global visibility to the artists and
activists of developing societies, in a world where
the industry tends to privilege artists of the West.
This is a particular strength of the Fund.

Budget € 390,150
Maximum Grant Amount € 25,000
Applicants 146
Proposals that reached research stage 40
Grantees 31
New Contacts 90%

60 61
Evaluation Process Distribution of allocated grants
The Prince Claus Fund issued the South East and Central Asia Of the 40 projects that reached the research phase, thirty-one were
(SECA) Regional Call for proposals in February 2012 for six weeks. approved. Each grantee is at this point notified about the amount GRANT IN € TOTAL IN €
The Prince Claus Fund issues a call for Projects twice a year – one of financial support they will receive. After each project ends, its
regional call and one thematic. For each call, a project committee objectives and success are evaluated and documented – exemplary 2 3,462–5.000 6,102
screens the proposals to make sure they fall within the Fund’s criteria projects are shared on the website and through the Prince Claus 6 5.000–10.000 44,176
for consideration, evaluating them according to six criteria: quality, Fund’s network. 14 10.000–15.000 161,367
innovation, engagement and development relevance, cost, freedom
of expression, and culture and conflict. This Review forms a catalogue of all thirty-one proposals that were
approved as part of the 2012 SECA call, giving insight into the nature
Of the 146 proposals received during the SECA Call, 40 reached the of the proposals and the themes that tie them together. 5 15.000–20.000 86,505
research phase. At this stage, the selected proposals are researched
in detail, and second opinions are gathered from independent experts. 2 20.000–25.000 42,000
Although applicants provide references, independent and objective 2 25.000+ 50,000
opinions are always sought for every project. Based on the results
of the research, the programme committee approves or rejects
each project. 61% new contacts 58% young organisations total number of projects 31 390,150
(founded after 2005)

WHO WHAT WHERE WHEN GRANT IN €

1 Rena Effendi LIQUID LAND AZERBAIJIAN May 2012 – April 2013 12,500
2 Britto Arts Trust BRITTO INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP BANGLADESH February 2013 10,000
3 Drik Picture Library CHOBI MELA FESTIVAL VII, ‘FRAGILITY’ BANGLADESH June 2012 – March 2013 10,205
4 Longitude Latitude LONGITUDE LATITUDE 5 BANGLADESH February 2013 3,462
5 Move Media Communications SHAUPNO JATRA (THE JOURNEY OF HOPE) BANGLADESH September 2012 – September 2013 8,100
6 The Travelling Archive SONGS UNBOUND BANGLADESH September 2012 – September 2013 6,000
7 The Bhutan Indigenous Games and Sports Association STUDY AND REVIVAL OF INDIGENOUS SPORTS BHUTAN September 2012 – August 2013 25,000
8 Punctum Magazine ASIA TOLD BY ITS PHOTOGRAPHERS CAMBODIA July 2012 12,500
9 Tiny Toones TINY TOONES NEXT GENERATION CAMBODIA July 2012 – June 2013 5,376
10 The Fine Arts Zanabazar Museum THE IMPORTANCE OF TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE OF MONGOLIA MONGOLIA July 2012 – July 2013 19,870
11 Beyond Pressure BEYOND PRESSURE FESTIVAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART MYANMAR December 2012 9,000
12 Blue Wind Art BLUE WIND MULTIMEDIA ART FESTIVAL MYANMAR November 2012 7,200
13 Irrawaddy Publishing Group MEDIA IN BURMA – CHANGING THE SILENT ZONE MYANMAR August 2012 – December 2013 10,000
14 ‘The Rendezvous’ Second South East Asia Urban Art Event THE RENDEZVOUS SECOND SOUTH EAST ASIA URBAN ART EVENT MYANMAR February 2013 8,500
15 Chirag Bangdel SOUTH ASIAN POETRY FESTIVAL FOR PEACE NEPAL September – October 2012 12,000
16 Photo.Circle RETELLING HISTORIES NEPAL August 2012 11,500
17 Sattya Media Arts Collective KOLOR KATHMANDU NEPAL July 2012 – July 2013 17,485
18 The Siddhartha Arts Foundation 2ND KATHMANDU INTERNATIONAL ART FESTIVAL NEPAL August 2012 – January 2013 22,000
19 Aida Santos-Maranan FIRST FILIPINO-AMERASIAN FASHION RALLIES PHILIPPINES May – July 2012 25,000
20 CANVAS PROMOTING LITERACY THROUGH ART PHILIPPINES August 2012 – February 2013 14,545
21 Kat Palasi THE LAST PINE TREE PHILIPPINES October 2012 – April 2013 2,640
22 Transitopia Contemporary Dance Commune HYPERCORPOREALITY DANCE COLAB PHILIPPINES September 2012 – March 2013 12,000
23 TutoK Art Core, Inc. TUTOK F.O.E. (FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION) PHILIPPINES September 2012 – May 2013 19,000
24 Working for Empowerment and Good Governance WHAT’S COOKING IN THE PHILIPPINES? PHILIPPINES August – December 2012 10,728
25 De Pamiri INTERNATIONAL CHILD FESTIVAL: SMILE 2012 TAJIKISTAN August – October 2012 15,000
26 Art and Fact Gallery CROSSROADS: BANGALDESH ETHNO PHOTO AND STREET DANCE UZBEKISTAN January – February 2013 12,500
27 Videoart.uz VIDEOART.UZ FESTIVAL UZBEKISTAN 2012 – 2013 20,000
28 Bibi Hanum (Vevletine Studio) THE MOVEMENT OF REVIVING THE TRADITIONAL UZBEKISTAN March – December 2012 15,150
29 ICCA – The Ilkhom Center for Contemporary Arts LABORATORY FOR YOUNG DIRECTORS OF CENTRAL ASIA UZBEKISTAN May – June 2013 10,889
30 Hanoi Grapevine MY VOICE BIENNALE VIETNAM October 2012 – December 2013 12,000
31 Nhasan Studio NHASAN ARTISTS CAPACITY BUILDING PROJECT: VIETNAM December 2012 – February 2013 10,000
SKYLINES WITH FLYING PEOPLE

62 63
 COLOPHON
Forthcoming Review Editor Thomas Roueché & Joumana el Zein Khoury

Digital
Assistant editors Amelia Kuch, Nerea Lopez de Vicuna
Design Irma Boom and Julia Neller

© 2013, Prince Claus Fund

Culture & Prince Claus Fund

Herengracht 603
1017 CE Amsterdam

New Media
The Netherlands
princeclausfund.nl

First published 2013 by Prince Claus Fund

2012 Call
Printed in the Netherlands

All rights reserved. No part of this publication

may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system
or transmitted in any forms or by any means
electronic, mechanical or otherwise without prior
written consent of the copyright owners.
For information, address Prince Claus Fund

As the May 2012 thematic call for project proposals, the The photos on pages 33 through 53
were provided courtesy of the project partners.
Prince Claus Fund focussed on cultural initiatives in the fields
of digital culture and new media. Every effort has been made to trace all copyright holders
Digital forms of expression, both social and artistic, have but if any have inadvertently been overlooked, the publisher
the power of connecting diverse cultural interests, engaging will be pleased to make the necessary arrangements
communities, and giving rise to a wide-range of group inter- at the first opportunity.
actions. Through this call, the Prince Claus Fund supported
innovative creative initiatives that link digital techniques and/
or new media with culture and development.
The Prince Claus Fund was particularly interested in projects
in the field of digital culture and new media that facilitates
freedom of expression, stimulates dialogue and encourages
cultural exchange. The next Review will detail the projects
supported by the Fund in this call.
RE
 RE
The challenge of the modern era is to maintain
the vibrancy of individual communities as well as
of the multiculturalism.The spread of the economic
globalization, of world media, and the invading
global market, are introducing changes to the culture
as well as ‘multiculture of Southasia in such a way
that the drift is towards monoculture… Just as
the movement towards cultural monochrome was
the result of technology and market, same forces
must be used to protect and win back the vibrant
plurality of the humankind. Kanak Mani Dixit

EVIEW
 CULTURE IS A BASIC NEED

PHILIPPINES

Culture shapes individuals’ and societies’ identities. It is a reflection of people, place and
a documentation of their evolution. Practicing rituals and culture make people who they are,
and unique from one another. It opens avenues for people to explore and connect
to each other. No society can function without culture. Hence, culture is a basic need,
and practicing it should be a basic right.
YUKI POUDYAL, KOLOR KATHMANDU

Art is the expression of the ideas and aspirations of people, and they form the foundation
of culture. Art and culture give people hope, and real reasons for living and ambition.
GIGO ALAMPAY, PROMOTING LITERACY THROUGH ART

Culture is a basic need because as a shared experience a group of people, nation or civilization,
it mirrors the memory, spirit, struggles and the aspirations of humanity.
LIZA MAZA, WHAT’S COOKING IN THE PHILIPPINES?

BANGLADESH

To me it’s what keeps us humane. Culture is the only factor that is universal to all societies and
it connects us as a universal language. It’s the secret element that connects us to great collective
unconscious. I also believe that it is as essential to us as the other well-established basic physical
needs.
SHEHZAD CHOWDHURY, LONGITUDE LATITUDE

Culture is the vital part of the basic needs such as food, cloth and home in our life.
Culture and civilisation walk together.
TAYEBA BEGUM LIPI, BRITTO INTERNATIONAL ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP

We should recognize the importance of culture, add it to our political practice and
promote it’s development.
ASM REZAUR RAHMAN, CHOBI MELA

BANGLADESH AND INDIA

Culture is intricately linked to social and political questions; like food, shelter, health and education,
we have an absolutely essential need to make our individual cultural expressions seen and heard;
culture thus is a question of our survival. Hence, it is our right to be able to make our own cultural
expressions, without having to succumb to the powers of cultural hegemonies.
BHOWMIK, SONGS UNBOUND

MYANMAR

I also believe that culture is a Basic need. Countries all over the world base on their own culture
what type of country they are. If there is no culture, we can’t distinguish countries.
THU MYAT (A.K.A) THU MYAT AUNG, ‘THE RENDEZVOUS’ SECOND SOUTH EAST ASIA
URBAN ART EVENT

I love our culture and I would also love to know other countries’ culture. Culture is the basic
foundation of the country.
REVIEW

PHYU MON, BLUE WIND MULTIMEDIA ART PROJECT

VIETNAM

It means culture is everything and so is the art. Beauty saves the world, humans are civilised
thanks to art.
VU NGOC TRAM, MY VOICE BIENNALE

To me, culture is human. A strong, free, real human will create a strong, free, real culture.
NGUYEN PHUONG LINH, SKYLINES WITH FLYING PEOPLE

NEPAL

Culture is the pulse of a society – it defines who we are…

SANGEETA THAPA,THE KATHMANDU INTERNATIONAL ART FESTIVAL

UZBEKISTAN

Our nation is identified by our culture. Culture combines material, spiritual and emotional aspects
of people. We express ourselves through our culture. There are many different cultures that live
side by side in the world respecting and tolerating each other. I believe that culture can unite people
without politics.
MUHAYO ALIYEVA, BIBI HANUM,THE MOVEMENT OF REVIVING THE TRADITIONAL

It means that culture makes people look at each other like humans and not like numbers,
not like consumers, not like machine components.
SHAHNOZA KARIMBABAEVA, CROSSROADS

MONGOLIA

Culture is quality.
U. SARANTUYA,THE FINE ARTS ZANABAZAR MUSEUM

BHUTAN

Culture has both intrinsic and extrinsic value. For a small country like Bhutan, it means our identity,
it means our sovereignty and security, it means our values and many more.
LYONPO KINZANG DORJI,THE BHUTAN INDIGENOUS GAMES AND SPORTS ASSOCIATION

AZERBAIJAN

I was in Zambia on assignment for Marie Claire magazine. We were in a remote Zambian village
and there was a congregation of women; they were sitting on the ground, talking. There were a few
other women from Europe and they were asking them questions: what are the things that you
need for this village to work better, to improve, including infrastructure, public health. And then one
woman said – “you know, one thing that we really need, I tell you what, we are really bored here,
life is really boring for us, the one thing that we need is something that we can have fun with”.
I think what she meant to say was basically that they need more culture – and by culture I mean
an exposure to something else. Within 10 minutes some musicians came in, played drums, and the
whole village stood up and started dancing. And immediately there was this electric atmosphere.
And I felt like – ok, this village probably does not have very good electricity and water supply, it has
terrible sanitation, but the spirit prevails. These women got up and danced and we danced with
them and the whole thing was on fire and everybody felt that energy and happiness in the air.
That’s exactly it – culture is a basic need, just like water. Essentially it feeds the soul and I think it
is something that people really respond to. It’s a direct fuel for the soul, that’s all I can say.
RENA EFFENDI, LIQUID LAND
REVIEW
 MN

UZ KG
AZ
TJ

NP
BT

BD
MM VN

PH
TH
KH

TL

PROJECTORGANIZERS
REV
BT STUDY AND REVIVAL PH THE LAST PINE TREE AZ LIQUID LAND PHOTO
OF INDIGENOUS SPORTS MONOGRAPH

KH TINY TOONES NEXT MM BLUE WIND MULTIMEDIA NP SOUTH ASIAN POETRY

GENERATION ART FESTIVAL FESTIVAL FOR PEACE

BD CHOBI MELA FESTIVAL VII, VN MY VOICE BIENNALE PH HYPERCORPOREALITY

‘FRAGILITY’ DANCE COLAB

BD BRITTO INTERNATIONAL VN SKYLINES WITH FLYING UZ CROSSROADS: ETHNO

ARTISTS’ WORKSHOP PEOPLE PHOTO AND STREET DANCE

MM BEYOND PRESSURE FESTIVAL UZ VIDEOART.UZ BD SHAUPNO JATRA

OF CONTEMPORARY ART (THE JOURNEY OF HOPE)

NP THE KATHMANDU INTER- MM MEDIA IN BURMA, UZ THE MOVEMENT OF

NATIONAL ART FESTIVAL: CHANGING THE SILENT ZONE REVIVING THE TRADITIONAL
EARTH | BODY | MIND

TJ INTERNATIONAL CHILD NP KOLOR KATHMANDU NP RETELLING HISTORIES

FESTIVAL: SMILE 2012

PH WHAT’S COOKING IN THE KH ASIA TOLD BY ITS UZ LABORATORY FOR YOUNG

PHILIPPINES? PHOTOGRAPHERS DIRECTORS OF CENTRAL ASIA

BD SONGS UNBOUND PH FIRST FILIPINO-AMERASIAN PH PROMOTING LITERACY

FASHION RALLIES THROUGH ART

MN THE IMPORTANCE OF PH TUTOK F.O.E. MM ‘THE RENDEZVOUS’,

TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE SECOND SOUTH EAST ASIA
OF MONGOLIA URBAN ART EVENT

BD LONGITUDE LATITUDE 5
REVIEW