The cultural ecology of urban events

It was a great pleasure to attend the Citymakers’ Day organised by Breda Marketing recently. This brought together around 140 participants from the public and private sector, from voluntary and cultural organisations and other actors involved in culture, placemaking and events.

My presentation dealt with the contribution of events to the city, and the ways in which the city can support events. All too often events are seen purely as a means of attracting visitors and generating income, but they do so much more. They are also an important means of strengthening the social and cultural fabric of the city, and they provide an important platform for the generation and flow of ideas.

To bring these relationships to life, we presented a model of the cultural ecology of the city, based on extensive research in the neighbouring cities of Den Bosch and Tilburg. These studies show the importance of connecting the Underground of the city, where alternative culture flourishes and new ideas emerge, to the Uppergound where policy is made and culture is given a profile. The Middleground plays an essential role in linking the Underground and the Upperground, and giving diverse cultural forms a platform.

The presentations by the diverse Citymakers in Breda illustrated perfectly how this cultural ecology functions. For example, the organisers of Turf, Pien Steenbeek and Noa Hermans explained how they had developed this festival to combine electronic music, art, culture and technology to attract makers and the general public and animate the city centre. This event has echoes of the Sónar Festival in Barcelona, but it shows that even relatively small cities can make a difference in this field. By providing a platform for the music and cultural scene in Breda they can help bring new ideas to the attention of a wider public, and to the market.

In her presentation, Jenny van der Laar explained how the Rooi Pannen had blown new life in into Kwatta chocolate, a tasty part of the cultural heritage of the city. Using the original chocolate moulds as a basis for new ones, the Rooi Pannen team had recreated this famous product that was once produced in the city. This illustrates how educational institutions like the Rooie Pannen can also play an important role in the Middleground, supporting cultural heritage as well as providing practical knowledge for students.

You can watch the You Tube video of the day (if you can stand the AI American voiceover!) and read more about the presentations on the NRIT website (in Dutch) or read the English version here.