Does the community dance?

A discussion of artistic intervention projects in rural areas

Abstract

This paper will discuss the role of arts education in rural development at a time when rural communities are undergoing profound socio-spatial transformations as a result of contemporary challenges. At the present time, rural areas constitute an exceptionally interesting research setting. First, these areas are experiencing a profound crisis related to demographic, economic and cultural losses. Second, processes of territorial change, namely extensive urbanization and the blurring of the classic urban-rural dichotomy, have been producing «transgenic» territories (Domingues, 2008), that have contributed to an identity crisis of the rural. In response to the above processes, movements attempting to rescue the rural have emerged which recognize new potentialities associated with the processes of reinvention and recreation (Figueiredo, 2011). In the arts and culture fields, this movement of reinvention of the rural seems to be associated with a rather nostalgic and revivalist perspective centered on the appropriation of traditions for tourism-related activities and, therefore, distant from actual existing community life. Thus, it is important to explore the role of community art and art education in rural contexts and to investigate how communities are being engaged in these practices. This paper will identify concrete measures that will sustain community art projects, which are perceived as a vital tool in processes of identity construction.