Baia Mare - Capitală Europeană a Culturii 2021

Transcription

BAIA MARE
Candidate CITY
for the
European
Capital of
culture
2021
title
Proposed Application for the Title
of European Capital of Culture
Culture of Hosting
Why does your city
wish to take part in
the competition for
the title of European
Capital of Culture?
We are facing a tipping point, the top of a development cycle. Baia Mare is rediscovering
and affirming, year by year, its potential and its cultural roots, reinventing itself as a userfriendly city, a host to creative industries and an appealing playground for artists and cultural
operators from all over the country. This former industrial center is converting naturally into
a welcoming harbour for national and international tourists, attracting, in the meantime, the
interest and involvement of investors, both local and international.
We have proven ourselves to be adaptable and versatile. The once
heavy-polluted city has become, in the last twenty years, a case study
for sustainable development in terms of traffic, urban open spaces
or natural preservation, a blooming headquarter for high profile
environmental NGOs. The rediscovered sport traditions have projected
us on the charts of European competitions and have dramatically raised
the citizens’ interest for an active and dynamic life. The evolution that
both locals and visitors witness every day is undeniable. Baia Mare can
change and is changing. We believe that culture and education can
accelerate and catalyze this change, can shape the destiny of our city
and the perspectives of our citizens.
The title of European Capital of Culture can provide us with the
power of context, can convert the momentum that we are witnessing
into results with a long-lasting, multipliable impact. Because it is
impact that we are aiming for. The dimensions of the city are our first
credentials. To start with, let’s consider the impact of the incoming
visitor flow of around one million people during the year of the title
on the 135.000 city inhabitants. Let’s take into account the adrenaline
injection of a confirmed title for local entrepreneurs and for the
established creative industries companies, the boost of confidence for
the city’s non-governmental organizations and cultural institutions.
Let’s consider the immediate and long term effects of over 100.000.000
euros of impact investments in infrastructure, organizational capacity,
and continuous education and training. Last but not least, let us
consider the effects of the exposure to the highlights of contemporary
culture, art and cultural management, for the 15.000 youths currently
developing their taste and exploring their options for profiling and
growth.
Introduction
Our geographical position – in the immediate proximity of Hungary
and Ukraine, and also in the close vicinity of Poland, Slovakia and
Moldova – is a clear testimony of our tradition of intercultural
dialogue and intimate understanding of cultural diversity. Baia Mare
and the surrounding region have always provided shelter for a mixture
of ethnical and religious groups. In present days, besides the threequarters of the population represented by Romanian ethnics, Baia Mare
is called home by Hungarians, Germans, Jews, Roma and Rutens. This
constant practice of tolerance, reflected by the fruitful cohabitation of
more than eight confessions, is also confirmed by the presence of one
of the most important center for immigrants in Romania, based in
Șomcuta Mare, in the close vicinity of the city.
We believe that our proven experience as hosts and mediators can be
a valuable asset considering the latest political instability and unrest
in the neighbouring countries: Hungary and Ukraine, as well as
the current wave of refugee and asylum seekers. Please consider our
candidacy as an open platform to research, develop, test and implement
new mediation and communication platforms that use culture as a
medium to address these pressing issues.
Baia Mare 2021 - European Capital of Culture
1
The road to the podium or to the title of European
Capital of Culture is as important as the title
itself. In the short term, the decision to enter this
competition was already a great opportunity for
us:
Another important motivation for our
candidacy is the enthusiastic response
that we received from our citizens. Close
to 70% of the respondents to a relevant
sociological survey were aware of our
project, and 93% of the respondents
expressed their appreciation and their
support for it. This enthusiasm and
availability to mobilization is shared by
the vast majority of the local cultural
institutions, which declared themselves
eager to participate and collaborate.
These facts build and support our
confidence to the significant effects
that our presence on the shortlist and,
eventually, our nomination for the title
have already triggered.
• To promote and put to work a long term
comprehensive cultural strategy, unifying
multiple development directions
• To build cultural consumption, expand our
cultural offer, and explore new ways of
interaction with our audiences
• To chart cultural and touristic objectives
and unexpected places to be discovered, relived,
conquered, thus upgrading our touristic offer
• To run an extensive audit on all the cultural
fields and build a solid and long-lasting cultural
brand
• To strengthen the capacity of our cultural
operators through consultation, training, and
facilitation of know-how transfer from outside
experts: cultural managers, journalists, artists
• To explore new manners to celebrate our
multifaceted heritage using new technologies and
innovative communication tools
2
By this candidacy, Baia Mare is approaching
an important reconvention opportunity in the
long run. Judged by its magnitude, the chance
to host the title of European Capital of Culture
in 2021 is similar to the industrial reconversion
of the 70s, an impulse needed to recalibrate the
vocation and destination of this city. By entering
this competition, we take into account several
medium-term goals:
• To stabilize the local economy by focusing on
the creative industries and the innovation sector,
thus bringing about a shift that can increase the
local production added value
• To raise the general quality of life for all
citizens
• To decrease social inequity and to eliminate
the wage gap through access to culture and
education
• To reconnect the North of the country to the
national and European economical and cultural
circuit, proposing a functional regional hub for
creative industries
• To upgrade the cultural infrastructure and to
preserve the cultural heritage
• To reclaim, decontaminate and reconvert vast
unused industrial spaces into creative hubs and
public spaces
Introduction
Does your city
plan to involve its
surrounding area?
All the cultural programs subsumed under the Baia Mare candidacy
are hosted, developed, funded and managed within the city, in close
collaboration with the local administration and in mixed partnerships
with the local NGOs, cultural producers or creative industries’
representatives. Our decision to keep our programs contained under
a single urban jurisdiction has multiple reasons, prominently our
commitment to guarantee the political, institutional and public
consensus regarding our assumed strategy, as well as to ensure the
predictability of the financial exercise. We don’t want to risk weakening
the solid network of local stakeholders that we have developed, as we
have invested a great deal of effort in the induction process in order to
implement a coherent communication strategy, as well as to coordinate
the cross-organizational programs.
However, Baia Mare includes a quick developing urban space, and we
are facing an accelerated process of urbanization of the surrounding
area. In a five year timeframe, depending on the economic evolution
of the region and of the country we can expect small, yet significant,
urban border shifts.
Furthermore, NGOs activities based in Baia Mare and local cultural
projects often transcend the geographical city limits, making use
of spaces or referring to cultural objectives found in our close
surroundings. It should also be noted that the city of Baia Sprie is
situated in the immediate proximity of our city, the distance from
city center to city center being of only 10 kilometres, closer than the
farthest neighbourhood of Baia Mare.
Introduction
To summarize we will involve
our surrounding area by:
• using and promoting local traditions and
traditional cultural products of Maramureș:
folklore, crafts, culinary heritage, archaic
seasonal rituals or vernacular architecture;
Baia Mare is the main gateway to Maramureș County, ranked by
National Geographic as one of the 20 must-see places for 2015, and
a constant choice for Romanian and European backpack travellers,
nature and astronomy enthusiasts, as well as adventure seekers from
all over the world. Eight wooden churches listed as UNESCO World
Heritage sites are accessible by car or public transportation in a 30
minute drive radius. Two unique private museums – the contemporary
art Florean Museum and the only private ethnology museum in
Romania – are also accessible inside a 40 minutes drive radius. The
same accessibility criteria apply to at least four tested open-air concert
sites, suitable for festivals or one-time events that can take advantage
of the existing accommodation infrastructure. More than 350
kilometres of marked biking tracks zigzag across the environs, on four
mountain passes, crossing picturesque villages and landscapes favoured
by photography enthusiasts, as well as historical sites or unique
preservation areas already part of eco-tours.
As a touristic destination, Baia Mare is even more appealing because of
the easy-to-reach, lush cultural and leisure offer of its surroundings. In
order to valorize this mobility advantage we designed special programs
that include one-day or half-day tours, photo safaris, or even special
events happening outside the city limits.
There has been a constant historical exchange between the free people
of rural Maramureș and the citizens of Baia Mare, through trade,
workforce movements and by means of cultural vicinity exposure.
Thus, the folkloric influences of the area cannot be denied by any
cultural development, not only because of the singularity of the
traditional Maramureș culture, but also because of its strong presence
and influence felt within the city.
• increasing the collaboration between
urban and rural communities, in sustainable
projects that value preservation and
conservation;
• linking the urban and the rural area – Țara
Lăpușului, Valea Izei, Sighet, Baia Sprie –
through cultural and touristic programs, in
order to promote alternative event spaces,
empower the local infrastructure and
encourage local and touristic mobility;
• putting the love brands of the region into
new light through technology and innovative
touristic approaches: namely the eight
churches listed as UNESCO World Heritage
sites events and the Merry Cemetery of
Săpânța;
• celebrating, trough our programs, the
cultural diversity of Maramureș – the so
called ”countries” of Maramureș: Chioarului,
Lăpușului, Codrului and the medieval
Maramureș – and prototyping new ways of
salvaging ancient traditions.
3
The history of the city is anything but brief, counting close to 700
hundred years from its first documentary mention and more than 450
years from the inauguration of the first educational establishment.
The stories and legends the locals are keen to share with you are, as
well, anything but brief, linking the Bronze Age artefacts with archaic
symbols and signs still inlaid on the local festive outfits.
The top of mind cultural references, when it comes to Baia Mare and
the region of Maramureș, are the rich local folklore and traditional
arts and crafts, thoroughly explored by two important museums and
numerous research center and associations. The diligence to safeguard
and explore this unique ancient heritage is an important common value
that brings together scholars and enthusiasts form all over the world,
as well as environmental NGOs and international institutions. The
ethnographic and historical approach to these subjects is supported
by significant studies in semiotics, linguistics or music, constantly
generating new publics and specialized events.
Being geographically close to a possible center of Europe, but also at a
safe distance from the traditional centers of power, Baia Mare became a
place of choice for artistic experiments, starting with the international
Colony of Painters founded in 1896 by Simon Hollósy and active for
over 70 years. Starting with the 60s, the city hosted famous actors or
filmmakers such as the appraised Liviu Ciulei, as well as experimental
performers and visual artists. This openness to new artistic forms
of expression has a confirmed legacy, as the alumni of the local Art
School keep on receiving national and international recognition, in
various fields of activity, ranging from classical music to painting, from
industrial design to advertising.
Explain briefly the
overall cultural
profile of your city
4
Baia Mare had reached its first development peak as a mining center,
a destiny that shaped the character of its inhabitants – autonomous,
proud and resourceful – but also the cultural consumption habits. The
prosperity of the upper and middle class in the early 1900s started to
translate into personal collections of paintings and sculptures; theaters
and cafes were hosting a bohemian crowd and musical education
became a must. The 50 years of communism to follow democratized
the access to culture and education, large multipurpose cultural
establishments such as the Union House or the Youth House used
to accommodate thousands of people, sculptors and architects were
crafting their modernist visions for the generous public places, cinemas
and theaters amassed constant audiences.
Introduction
There is more than meets the eye in Baia Mare, there are facts and
figures that elude a cultural simple audit – over twenty active cultural
operators, a cultural agenda including over five hundred cultural
events per year, fifteen exhibition spaces, relative low rates of cultural
consumption outside free access public events. Baia Mare hosts a
vibrant photography community, and a surprising private collection
of experimental movies. Painting is the most preeminent form of art,
strongly still represented today by a community of more than one
hundred professional visual artists within the Union of Artists of Baia
Mare. The City Library has the highest readership rate in the whole
North-Western region and one of the richest collections in the country.
The local churches and cathedrals have proven an unexpected aperture
toward large scale events such as concert and artistic projects. The local
theater is hosting again the most longeval Romanian theater festival:
Atelier. In private museums and collections there are still thousands
of traditional, modern or contemporary art pieces waiting to be
discovered.
In the last ten years, the creative industries have changed the city’s
dynamics. Flourishing business and start-ups in media, IT &C,
printing, advertising, interior design, wood processing, furniture
production or architecture created new job markets and a new
generation of cultural audiences: early adopters, cosmopolitans and
frequent flyers, environmental aware and cycling enthusiasts. The
cultural offer followed the trend – live music and show keep the
Historical Center alive at night, jazz and electronic beats can be heard
on stage during summer nights, fashion or gastronomy festivals are
celebrating the fusion between the old and the new. This year, the
traditional Chestnut Feast became a legitimate one-week long festival,
mixing for an audience of over 150.000 people: DJing and wood
crafting, local painters and international bands, arts exhibitions and
movie premieres.
Introduction
Once we started working on this project we have witnessed a
remarkable amount of prejudice. Prejudice toward the generous sense
of the word culture, toward its power to include. Prejudice towards
the faith of any town with less than a quarter million inhabitants.
Prejudice towards the apparently wild and unexplored Northern part
of Romania.
Prejudice is motivating. Prejudice is a great starting point in a long
term endeavour. Prejudice determines answers and actions. Progress is
impossible in the absence of prejudice, of biases, of pessimism.
And progress is what we are aiming for.
It takes us usually around 15 minutes to convince somebody that Baia
Mare is a place worth visiting. In 30 minutes we can see the first signs
of enthusiasm. After one week-end spent exploring the city people have
the tendency to delay their departure. One week in, creative of all sorts
starts exchanging business cards and asking question about the rent
costs. We hope you’ll feel the same. You know where to find us.
And, never forget, you are welcome!
5
Explain the
concept of the
programme which
would be launched
if the city is
designated as
European Capital
of Culture.
6
Our concept can be summed up in three words: Culture of Hosting. This assumed statement
will be translated in several strategic objectives: opening the city to all forms of culture and
performance in the creative industries, reconnecting the city to the international and national
cultural, economical and touristic circuit as a top-of-mind regional center, prototyping and
implementing self-sustainable form of cultural management. Our approach is combining the
director based curative process and the open-call based process, offering multiple
“reasons-to-come” for broad and specialized audiences.
We believe that the culture of hosting should is, above all, a two-sided process, based
on a genuine curiosity toward other cultures that creates a fertile vv for networking and
collaboration. Hosting is not about giving and receiving, is about sharing – a shelter, a road,
a destination – and, most importantly, is about learning.
Introduction
If the city is designated as European Capital of culture we aim to
implement an open-doors policy, offering to local and incoming
artists and performers a broad variety of spaces to explore and to use
as a canvas. The current urban planning defines the city as a stage for
public events of all sorts, from concerts to interactive installations; the
local architecture rich in generous courtyards and sumptuous halls is
suitable for exhibitions and performances; the museums and historical
landmarks can be easily integrated or converted into thematic cultural
projects or for theme tours; private collections and workshops are
waiting to be discovered. The open-door policy is also translated in to
residency programs, fellowships and scholarships, competitions and
awards, international calls for projects for public interventions and
calls for applications for dedicated workshops. Opening the city means
creating unique shared moments, memorable events that can appeal
to broad national and international audiences – big scale festivals,
concerts, art biennales, international fairs and shows – but also
opening culture for insufficiently explored publics, including social
groups at risk, seniors or minorities.
Introduction
Our endeavour is to shape and to promote Baia Mare as a junction
point, a new hub for creative industries and innovation. The setup is
favourable to this objective: high life quality standards are accessible
and affordable; the rent costs are attractive and qualified workforce is
available; furthermore, some business sectors such as IT&C, design,
advertising or printing, are already blooming. We have all the reasons
and prerequisite to become a plug-and-play knowledge-based city that
can attract talents and investors, perfect for relocation and start-ups.
We have dedicated strategic lines of our program to this objective, in
a sustained effort to bring together professional communities – such
as the film industry, graphic design or photography – and support
their activities and development. Taking things further we started to
prototype and test infrastructure solutions – dedicated portals, internet
of things applications, excellence and micro-financing center – that can
provide an appealing workframe for the aimed audiences.
We are focused to create a growing context for the cultural institutions,
operators and initiators that can insure long-term development and
sustainability. Our program has a strong educational component and
aims to maximize the know-how transfer, to build incrementally the
capacity to deliver, to communicate to scale, to attract funds and
partners. We have dedicated major lines of our program to public and
events such as seminars, conferences, master classes, summer academies
and arts camps, the type of seminal events with long-lasting effects. We
encourage local initiative and aims to create long-term partnerships
with programs and organizations that proved to be success stories. We
are confident in the local entrepreneurship and we want to catalyze
organizational intrapreneruship in the cultural field. Our program is
agile and responsive to trends, market feedback and audiences real-time
reactions, as being a host means paying attention to the dialogue and to
create a consistent dialogue.
7
Contribution to the long-term strategy
What are the plans for
sustaining the cultural
activities beyond the year
of the title?
How is the European
Capital of Culture action
included in this strategy?
If your city is awarded the title of European
Capital of Culture, what do you think would be
the long-term cultural, social and economic impact
on the city (including in terms of urban development)?
We believe that it is impossible for a city, a community, a society to
stand still. Evolution is part of its nature. As time passes by, sceneries
change, new generations light up and old ones fade away, the context
shapes and reshapes who we are and what we do. It’s like pouring water
into different vessels: it will always take the shape of its containers. In
the same way, cities are irreversibly shaped by the realities they inhabit.
Baia Mare was once a small mining town. Its first name, Rivulus Dominarum, was inspired by the legend
of the ladies who had mourned the loss of their husbands to the mines, turning their tears into a river.
Over time, the city was ruled and inhabited by Hungarians, Germans, Austrians, Jews, Ruthenians,
Roma and Romanians. Thus, it absorbed and mirrored the polychromy of such diverse cultures, growing
into a cosmopolitan city of the arts. Baia Mare was home to a European cultural manifesto avant-lalettre – the famous Colony of Painters founded 125 years ago, which melted down borders in a preview
of what Europe became more than half a century later. After World War II, the Communist era heavily
industrialized the city, fading its cultural vibrancy. Once the Iron Curtain fell, Baia Mare was left in a state
of confusion. Slowly, it gathered its strength and used whatever resources were left available. We started
reconnecting with our very roots and values, mining the gold within. Dignity, endurance, and hard work
define us. The symbol of Baia Mare, an industrial tower so tall it outshines the Eiffel Tower, stands proof to
our resilience and determination. We call it the Phoenix Tower. Our Phoenix.
Our rebirth.
For the last five years, Baia Mare has raised an up and coming profile and has known constant growth in
almost all areas concerning the life of the city. It currently boasts an emergent economy based on wood
processing and commerce, making it the 3rd most important urban center of the region.
9
Mission and values
In 2015, we have adopted our long-term cultural strategy to be implemented for a time span
of fifteen years, up to 2030. In order to come up with a solid and sustainable strategy, we have
linked it to all strategic documents concerning different sectors of city life. We believe that
only by a conjugated effort can we build our future coherently and make each step count. Our
objective is to plan in a smart and integrated manner in order to achieve our vision of setting up
an improved Baia Mare that has surpassed its challenges in a proactive and ingenious manner.
This is why, the cultural strategy is in sync with the Integrated Urban Development Strategy,
Social Development Strategy, the Sustainable Development Strategy and last but not least, the
Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan, focusing on transforming the city into a creative regional
center, characterized by an intelligent, sustainable and socially inclusive economy.
We built the strategy in a solid, creative and consistent manner. We started by analyzing all
aspects of city life, looking into what the status quo was. We diagnosed the cultural profile
of the city, auditing each and every component including all types of cultural operators,
audiences, creative industries and economies, social participation and infrastructure,
while trying to find both strengths and weakness, in order to be able to build on a healthy
foundation and address issues truthfully and properly.
Baia Mare has a strong cultural legacy, as for example the one built
by the renowned Colony of Painters, translated today into the largest
organization of professional painters in Romania. We boast one of the
most active public libraries in Romania, with the highest readership
rate in the North-West and 12 subsidiaries open around the world.
There is no other area in the country to have such a powerful folkloric
and archaic music sector, nor host a dense traditional craftsmanship
hub. The specific wooden architecture practices of Maramureș are
unique and have been valued by the UNESCO organization as world
heritage values. Moreover, the local creative industries are solid and a
peer in terms of furniture manufacturing. Business initiatives, especially
in young entrepreneurship, are growing in size and number, some of
which are top performers in their chosen fields.
Limitations are those who favor the development of an ingenious project. Think about trying to
build a house on a rough terrain. Its shape will inherently remind of the declivities it rises upon.
Yet, that wouldn’t downgrade its value, function or originality, were it to be built coherently.
This is why we began by looking at factors that either inhibit or threat our growth and tried to
think of alternative ways to build around them in order to succeed in achieving our goals. And
so we did with each of our strategic plans.
Baia Mare holds today a heterogeneous legacy, with both high and low points, in terms of
economy, society and culture. Its rather isolated position, both geographical and historical,
has placed it on the border of the main cultural and urban system in Romania. Yet, this
provided with an excellent opportunity of preservation of archaic and folklore heritage
and the development of a survival mentality. Even though Baia Mare has succeeded in
organically surviving the downfall of the industrial mining era, part of the city’s physical,
social and economic fabric still brings about related limitations: some of our urban spaces are
contaminated, some of our people face poverty and social exclusion and others choose to work
abroad, our education system is not yet up to speed and innovative, while our capacity to build
high added value and face true European competition is still limited.
10
Nonetheless, one can observe the lack of coverage or performance
into different areas of culture, creativity and art. Local public cultural
operators face challenges in providing high quality, up-to-date expertise
in terms of content, communication and marketing skills. Even though
they have built partnerships with European operators over time,
they infrequently cooperate with each other and their openness to
develop new challenging and fruitful collaborations is limited, as their
operational capacity is, due to insufficient funding or staff. Fewer and
fewer young people choose to follow a cultural profession and reside
in Baia Mare, mainly because there is no high education institution or
other alternative education facilities to add value to local graduates and
partly because opportunities are more abundant in larger cities.
The local cultural ecosystem is self-sufficient and complies with the
needs of the usual audiences. The city cultural operators produce a fair
amount of events considering the public’s dimensions. Lacking real
competition and outside feedback local events are poorly marketed
and rarely innovative, while the adhesion to technology in culture is
arbitrary. Though rich and strong, the cultural heritage is insufficiently
integrated into the present context; also traditions are casually and
inconsistently safeguarded.
Local audiences show a neophyte profile, attending free events in high
numbers. For example, the Chestnut Festival of 2015 brought together
about 150000 people, participating in arena concerts, opera concerts,
plays, exhibitions, film showings, book launches and others. Yet, the
disposition to pay for cultural events is underdeveloped, partly because
of the way the community is structured, with a large part of the people
concerned in caring for their basic needs, were we to refer to Maslow’s
Pyramid. With the exception of key niche audiences, the public shows
a lack of ability in decoding cultural capital, consuming entertainment,
rather than culture. Young groups are either dormant or in search of
guidance and leadership.
10000 people work in the creative economy, out of a total of 58000
active employees in Baia Mare. The creative industries make up
17.5% of the local gross product, that is about 265 million Euros each
year, out of which 80% are made in wood processing and furniture
manufacturing. Even so, the economic activities mentioned currently
employ too little creativity in the production process.
11
Our analysis tried to grasp the existing status as coherently as possible,
as we took a critical first look at the major context, then at specific
domains and after that, we further searched into key and details. Our
conclusion showed that Baia Mare has a multitude of valuable cultural
resources that need to be empowered and better operated. This is why
our approach is both top down and bottom up, on different key aspects
of culture within the city. We target all issues using a resource-efficient
and most importantly, a long-term sustainable approach, focusing
major investments in human resources and promoting education and
culture as key pillars in the regeneration of the city, also in social action
for the common wealth of citizens.
Addressing the
status-quo.
Addressing the
public.
12
In terms of infrastructure development, efficiency is the key principle
that guided our approach. We believe it is far-fetched to suggest
heavy investments into new infrastructures in a city that is currently
transitioning. So, we decided to turn to reinventing the usage of
different and alternative spaces, opening them to culture, but also
making the city a stage in itself. Public exposure to culture is essential
in all our efforts, hence the usage and remodeling of public spaces
to harbor cultural activities proves that our overview is not only
integrative and efficient, but also sustainable.
In particular, we take to audience building and development by
means of cultural exposure throughout the city, raising curiosity, while
code-building using both formal, informal and non-formal education
and developing cultural practices within the family. Diversifying
the cultural offer and generating dedicated products and events is
mandatory in our process, with a stronger outreach due to plans of
calibrating communication and marketing of cultural goods.
Our strategy, as it focuses on process and system effects, rather than
components, is in itself a demonstration that our plans will enhance
the economic and social sectors, creating strong links and crossovers.
Consolidating entrepreneurship, increasing productivity, as well as
employment and promoting high added value creativity constitute
the main objectives set out by the strategy. We undertake Baia Mare’s
metamorphosis into a specialized design hub, based on the translation
of the rich local heritage in terms of architecture and wood, but also
metal processing.
Raising the quality of the cultural scene is strongly related to the
capacity of local operators. Our endeavor focuses on consolidating the
expertise of both cultural and technical staff. Alternative professional
education and long-life learning will fill the gap by means of training
in all areas needed, from cultural management to financing. Crossfertilization as a result of international cooperation is one of the tools to
be used for the increase of expertise and dynamism of people working
in cultural and creative industries. To this extent, raising the public
budget for culture is insufficient, if the city’s cultural agenda does not
attract quality operators. Hence, our plan is to encourage a competition
that sets international-local collaboration as mandatory in applications.
As for social change and cohesion, the strategy looks to mixing
culture and education as complementary instruments to better life
quality for deprived or specific groups. Targeted or educational events,
conjugated with social benefits for participation in culture are to favor
the creation of a thriving community. Also, multicultural dialogue,
as well as volunteering are shaped as social practices in our cultural
strategy and represent pillars in all our steps. Whether we look into
active aging, healthy parenting or social integration of the deprived,
our final purpose is to make the Baia Mare cultural and city experience
as rewarding as possible for all of its citizens, no matter the group they
represent.
In 2030, we envision Baia Mare to be the most dynamic creative
industry harbor in Romania, generating expertise and know-how and
relying on a growing network of experts, in a polychromatic culture of
mobility. The city bases a large part of its economy on high added value
creative entrepreneurship that engages young professionals, as well as
seniors, balancing both fresh and experimental approaches, but also
expertise and tradition.
Our goal is to be a plug and play cultural motherboard, using
technology and our smart city infrastructure to allow instant remote
connection and implementation of all initiatives, products and services.
In other words, Baia Mare set outs to become the top of mind when it
comes to dynamic and user-friendly cultural cities in Mitteleuropa.
Projecting the vision.
Defining the mission.
Moreover, our vision of Baia Mare portrays it as the most relevant
cultural center of Northern Romania, with a functional cross-border
and international dimension, polarizing a multitude of European
operators and different nearby nationalities and ethnicities. One of
our endeavors is to offer and host a wide range of cultural goods and
services, promoting dialogue, partnerships and cross-fertilization as a
recommended practice for growth. To this extent, we plan on using our
traditional heritage as a source of inspiration for generating new forms
of art and creativity.
Our process enhances audiences, building lifestyles and climates guided
by a strong demand and habit of consuming cultural goods, offering
access to any and all social groups. Based on our existing strong values,
we set out to represent an evolved and involved community guided by
tolerance, hospitality, will for prosperity and flexibility.
Education is a vital part of our plan. We believe that it is the single
most important tool for generating growth, as talent needs to be
shaped, nurtured and harvested. A flourishing educational center,
Baia Mare will be the place of choice for international conventions,
workshops and networking events.
As a touristic city break destination, we wish to become a democratic
host for culture, efficiently and ingeniously using our city
infrastructure. Not only will we turn to empowering local heritage
buildings, utilizing them in new and original contexts, but we will also
open up our alternative public and private spaces to culture. Churches,
former factories, abandoned or forgotten places, markets, living-rooms
and backyards, forests and hills, each part of the city will be redeemed
by the community.
In 2030, Baia Mare will boast its clear image and reputation as a
Phoenix rising from its own ashes, the post-industrial city reborn as a
creative center and capital of an unique European cultural territory. We
will no longer be left in isolation, but rather open to and welcoming of
any culture, true to our most solid value, hospitality.
The cultural strategy’s mission is to develop all types of culture related
capital existing in a city: social, cultural, economic, physical and
symbolic. Consequently, our actions are focused on these general goals
and operationalized by means of more specific objectives, targeting
current situations and problems, taking and creating opportunities in a
pro-active manner and turning them into success stories.
13
We seek to prototype and scale innovative projects, using the lean startup model in creative industries, as well as in the public and educational
sectors, improving know-how transfer speeds. Our goal is to promote,
test, implement and export a new sustainable model of economy
based on culture and creativity, one that can fill the credibility gap of
entrepreneurship and macroeconomics practices, as a result of the crisis
of 2008.
We plan on building expertise by hosting international experts
and cascading knowledge within the local community, developing
entrepreneurship, empathy, lateral thinking, communication and
technical skills. Moreover, our mission is to erase borders and
barriers by fostering collaborations, initiating new partnerships and
multinational residencies and programs, in order to enhance the
exchange of cultural products and services within the Central and
Eastern European space.
Such a revolution of the cultural industry and the city as well is difficult
to achieve without the strong support of a competitive and dynamic
administration. This is why, one of our goals is to build a human
centric apparatus, using a fresh recruitment policy, determined to
attract and to nurture talents with strong technical, management and
communicational skills.
The development of the cultural and creative sector requires action on
several layers, targeting operators, products and services, audiences,
financing and nonetheless infrastructure, using both bottom up and
top down approaches, involving every stakeholder and shaping the city
with courage and resilience. We set out to consolidate the local cultural
peer system and address targeted audiences by offering a wide range of
specific events, as well as developing cultural decoding skills according
to differentiated needs of specific groups.
14
We strongly believe that change has its roots in education and habits
are built within the family, the peer structure of our community.
Cultural education is developed and nurtured in the fertile territory of
our families. To this extent, we have identified women and mothers to
be a strong agent for social change, as they represent universality, they
tend to be flexible, intuitive and determined and they are the first to
embrace change and foster social practices. Also, one of the peers we
plan on using are the Romanian and local natives that reside all over
the world, transforming them in active vectors of communication,
in order to promote and multiply the scope of the local cultural and
creative goods.
We seek to preserve local heritage by encouraging the study and
promotion of customs, lifestyle and culture, translating tradition into
modern day creative products and habits. Our solid and diverse city
offer and our status as the gateway to Maramureș constitute a guarantee
for developing the city into a destination of choice when it comes to
cultural, family and eco-tourism. We aim to create new versatile venues
for cultural events and creative activities, as well as transform existing
spaces using the city as a cultural stage and reshaping social interaction
as the core of city life.
The Phoenix Tower will become a
symbol of the city’s revival as a
culture and innovation hub.
Our strategy sets the ground for a successful European Capital of
Culture, raising budgets for culture and creating networks and
infrastructure hotspots, while empowering the capacity of operators
and building audiences by means of education and sustainable
development in creative industries. It is not built around the action,
but rather in the same frame, constructed on the same pillars in a
continuous flow process, where the ECoC is an activation instrument
for the development of all five types of capital: cultural, economic,
social, physical and symbolic, as mapped in our process.
The strategy’s actions build up momentum for 2021, projected as
a breakthrough moment, rather than a crowning of our efforts.
We take to the ECoC as a tool to accelerate different aspects of our
mission, in order to fulfill our vision for 2030. Its purpose is to create
opportunities and facilitate structural change, investor attractiveness,
cultural development and social cohesion, as it has already started
to do so, given the fact that 93% of our citizens have one common
voice concerning the action, stating that it is beneficial, positive and
powerful.
The Cultural Program proposed for 2021 is considerably broader
in scope and intensity than the habitual agenda of the city. Yet,
the transversal principles and key components it is build upon –
education, sustainability, social inclusion, technology, networking and
environmental responsibility – are to be found in all of our strategic
documents. Thus, its integration in the development process of the city
is natural and its impact coherent.
As we take to develop culture and creativity success stories using the
lean start-up model, it is inherent that the European Capital of Culture
will produce strong legacies in terms of audience building, cultural
quality and expertise as well as economic welfare. Moreover, our
resource efficient and step-by-step approach ensures that infrastructures
of 2021 will not be abandoned or underused after the year of the title.
We plan on keeping a proportionate budget to the one set for 2020
and we look to raise fund absorption ratios, enlarge extra-community
partnerships, while using education to further the program’s legacy.
We have envisioned 2021 to be a starting point and also the factor that
can help shift the gravity of creative and cultural sectors from public to
private, from dependent to independent, creating a solid community of
experts, making producers out of operators and capitalizing their new
gained know-how, thus bringing prosperity and dynamism to the city’s
economy.
We aim to ensure and consolidate the sustainability of our actions
beyond 2021 by means of creating dedicated programs for investors,
with incentives to use CSR as a pillar in supporting culture and
creativity. Also, we set out to establish a long-term collaboration
between the cultural sector and touristic and service operators, with an
improved capacity after the title year, in order to empower synergies
and create mutual growth, while using the latter as dynamic cultural
tour-operators. Accessing regional resources is one of the power lines
of our strategy to ensure growth after 2021, by creating a cross-border
structure that can integrate, oversee and promote investments in
culture and creativity in 5 neighboring and trans-Carpathian countries
(Romania, Ukraine, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia). This endeavor
will help spread beneficial effects of Baia Mare’s polarized legacy, while
cementing European cohesion and truthfully promoting the sense of
belonging to a mutual cultural space.
15
CULTURAL SUPPORT
PROJECTS
STRATEGIC
DEVELOPMENT
PROJECTS
• six multipurpose educational and cultural
versatile spaces
• free to use for all citizens and visitors
• include all the necessary technology
support – computers, printer, projector, audio
system
• serve as a tele-centers for the management
and initiation of small scale projects,
volunteer centers, but also as alternative
exhibition and event spaces
Multimedia Hub and Makerspace
Center for Support and
Microfinancing in Tourism
• supported by the municipality and the University;
• internationally funded using structural funds;
• includes a mixing studio, workstations for film and
visual editing, photography and filming equipment;
• includes a projection and audition room that can
serve as alternative cinema;
• offers technical assistance and guidance for media
projects;
• has a core educational vocation, offering free
usage of space in educational activities performed
by schools and NGOs;
• includes 3D printing and industrial design facilities
as cutting and finishing equipment.
• supported by the municipality
• internationally funded using structural
funds, privately funded in a partnership with
a banking institution;
• offers training for cultural and touristic
guides;
• offers consultancy for attracting funding for
touristic hard and soft investments;
• offers courses and trainings for the
entrepreneurs, personnel and managers;
• organizes, regulates and licenses the
”cultural couch surfing” program.
Center for Excellency in Cultural
Management
Baia Mare 2021 - Capitală Europeană a Culturii
Cultural community centers covering
all city’s neighborhoods
• supported by the municipality;
• internationally funded using structural funds;
• training center for cultural auditors, training center
for cultural advocacy and fundraising;
• offers courses of cultural management for both
public and private operators;
• offers courses of marketing and communication
for cultural endeavors;
• offers consultancy for attracting and managing
corporate sponsorship, as well as national and
European funding;
• offers training for volunteers.
Cuprom Creative Industries Center
• center for creative industries, art residences
and art interventions;
• developed in a public-private partnership;
• decontamination and rebuilding insured by
means of public and European funding;
• creative business incubator and accelerator;
• includes a formation center that offers and
hosts specialized trainings;
• Includes a conference center for events that
attract large audiences.
SMART CITY
SOLUTIONS
The Cultural Multipass card
The interconnected display network
• access and monitoring solution system
implemented by public operators in partnership
with banking institutions;
• implemented as check-in solution or ticketing
solution by all cultural operators by 2018;
• useful for real time monitoring and evaluating
of audiences participation to cultural events;
• generates in-depth reports and evaluations
regarding the participation to cultural events
based on demographic data;
• allows a transparent and centralized
distribution of subsidies for categories at risk
in order to insure and increase their access to
cultural events;
• supports contact-less payments and can
aggregate promotional discounts from
commercial partners;
• environmental-friendly solution for the
promotion of cultural events in a dynamic
manner;
• working as an alternative TV dedicated to
cultural events, broadcasting video or graphic
events promos;
• reduces drastically the promotion costs and
allows remote control for cultural managers and
promoters organizing events in Baia Mare;
• by 2018, will include 300 LCD displays placed
in cultural and social hotspots: cafes, hotels,
restaurants, libraries, public institutions,
cultural institutions;
• easy to scale as any interested partner can
join the network for free using a user-friendly
setup;
• servicing, maintenance, listing and assistance
will be provided free-of-charge;
• an important step toward our vision for
Baia Mare as a technology enabled cultural
motherboard.
The culture mobile app
• will include a detailed map of venues aggregated with a
calendar of events;
• offers real time events alerts using geolocation services
and personalizes the recommendations based on previous
choices;
• allows instant rating of an event by users and instant
sharing of live or recorded videos, photos or status updates
in major social networks;
• important in order to raise the participation and the
interaction with both public and private cultural events;
• an important step toward our vision for Baia Mare as a
technology enabled cultural motherboard.
Baia Mare can become the textbook definition of an urban regeneration
success story by means of using European healthy cultural policies.
Why would it be so? Looking from a historic perspective, it is clear
that we have challenged ourselves before and made it. Currently,
we are on the verge of a tipping point, where cultural and creative
industries can make a difference by increasing the city’s attractiveness
to investors, tourists and young people willing to move in to enjoy
healthy opportunities and great life quality. Even though we are facing
numerous economic and social issues, we are on a steady growth rate in
most aspects concerning our community.
The economy is performing better each year and has considerably risen
in volume in the last five years as proven by a 25% increase in local
GDP. Local initiatives and entrepreneurship examples are becoming
more and more successful and present. Half of the local NGOs
are engaged in educational activities, while the County Schooling
Inspectorate is currently undertaking a large European funded program
with more than 15000 pupils learning about creative industries as
career choices. Baia Mare is home to an emergent social enterprises
cluster and is engaging more funds than all of the other regional cities
into social integration by means of education, while proeminent local
NGO’s such as Hopes and Homes Romania are setting international
standards in social integrations for children and fundraising. The
administration is becoming more dynamic by the year, with a new
human resource approach that focuses on attracting and nurturing
talents. Like Malcom Gladwell would point out, it takes three factors
to produce growth when at a tipping point: a minority of connectors
that are able to spread know-how, the power of success stories that can
deliver both gratification and hopeful behavior within the community
and a powerful context to make it all happen turning underdogs into
mainstreamers.
We strongly believe that by becoming the European Capital of Culture
in 2021, we will create a powerful vehicle to accelerate our growth
in a sustainable manner and generate a hybrid approach, a mutation
with mutual beneficial effects. Our strategic fields have attracted a
large numbers of connectors: young leaders and artists, managers and
curators, creative people and sales people, performing social enterprises
and NGOs, education professionals and researchers. We have started
and will continue to create success stories based on our strategic
principles. We are ready to foster intelligent, sustainable and inclusive
developments. This is why the power of context is important to us,
because this title can light up the spark that will carry our process
forward and we are ready to start this challenging journey.
18
The social impact of the title year will be perceived on multiple levels.
Investments in amenities, city infrastructure and the broadened scope
and quality of the cultural offer will certainly increase life quality and
overall experience of Baia Mare. The enhanced accessibility and increase
in mobility within the area will dilute the arbitrary borders that have
kept us in the remote, making us feel more European and aware of
our cultural diversity as inhabitants of a cross-border region. Last, but
not least, all of our efforts to raise social cohesion will have paid off,
creating a sense of pride in belonging to a polychromatic community
that provides targeted and efficient care and protection for all categories
of citizens, in a healthy social climate.
In terms of economic impact, the title year will directly contribute to a
better management of regional competition, with a higher power of the
local market. More and more companies active in the creative industries
will have appeared, creating new job opportunities, as entrepreneurs
are sure to follow talent we are educating and fostering, as well as the
investors we are aiming to involve. Moreover, investments in real estate
and a better usage of the land will consolidated the local budget, able to
face a new stage of development. The hosting infrastructure is expected
to triple, as we have planned to efficiently convert and sustainably
develop new touristic structures. The urban rebranding and enhanced
offer is expected to triple the 2015 incoming visits and annually receive
half a million tourists starting 2022.
The cultural impact of the title year will be, perhaps, the most visible,
as the diverse and targeted offering of the city will have grown five
times the size it shows today, as a result of our bidding and preparing
period strategic actions and the opening of our cultural agenda to
stakeholders from all over Europe. Public cultural operators will be
part of dynamic and open networks, bridging the public and the
private and boasting a new found independence and dynamism, due
to the know-how acquired in the seven year process and the enhanced
budgets and procedures. Diverse audiences and high participation rates
to cultural events will indicate the existence of a mature public with
healthy cultural consumption habits, nurtured by means of education
and code-building.
All these effects contribute to one of the most powerful results of a
European Capital of Culture, the increase in prestige and symbolic
capital. The city’s image will benefit from a new positive outlook as a
success story, promoting responsibility and proactive attitude as key
values of a European community.
19
Meet: Izabella, single mother
I am Izabella, a single mom of two, trying to balance my life between my work in an educational NGO and my personal life.
Each day of every week, I am constantly going from one place to the other, handling professional activities, the kids and the house chores.
A hectic day in 2015
A single’s mom proactive day in 2030
6:00 AM – I hate my alarm clock! I don’t have the time for my morning exercises, I have
to prepare lunch and breakfast. I try to feed my kids as healthy as possible; everything I cook
for them is organic, from the market and other trustful sources, even if that is a quite time
consuming. The health of my kids is worth it though.
7.30 AM – I can wake up the kids now, serve them breakfast and put them on the school
bus. They are attending the Art School.
7.30 AM – The traffic is unusually crowded this morning, everybody wants to drop their
8.00 AM
kids in front of the school gate. I’m leaving home early, parking the car on a side street so
we can walk a bit to school. I want to teach them to safely cross the street and enjoy a few
minutes in the morning fresh air.
8.30 AM – I have a meeting in the city center with one of the local businessmen; I want to
convince him to become a donor for my NGO’s activities. The meeting point is not the best
option I would choose for a business meeting, but it is the restaurant where my partner is
having his coffee every morning. Their Wi-Fi is weak, and the music is a bit too loud for me.
10.00 AM – The meeting wasn’t very promising. As most of the businessmen in Baia
Mare, he doesn’t get involved to much in cultural activities, forgetting the fact that many
of our youth are using art as a way to express their feelings and needs. Sometimes I feel like
fundraising alone is so difficult.
10.30 AM – I am waiting in line at the Trade Register. I have to add a new domain
of activity to my company record in order to open an after-school business. Loads of
documents to print, papers to sign, authorizations to be obtained, walking from one door to
another... plenty of time lost.
1.00 PM – The kids are waiting for me in front of the school gate. I am late, as always.
The old one asks me once again why they cannot stay at school until 4 PM with her
colleagues. . I answer her that I want to spend more time with them. In fact, I don’t want
them to eat the poor food at the school cafeteria, nor to spend time doing homework in class
and not learning how to learn by themselves.
1.30 PM – We have the lunch I’ve made in the morning. At least it is healthy. Note to self:
call the diary provider for new supplies. Kids change their clothes and off we go again. I have
to be at the office at 14.45, but we can make a quick stop in the park.
2.45 PM – Participants are arriving, class is almost full. For the next 3 hours I will be
7.00 AM – Time to get up for a brand new day and start it with my morning run.
– I am connecting my tablet to the TV and making some online shopping. The
farmers I am buying groceries from will come tomorrow in the city, so the order must be
placed today. It’s a beautiful day and I decide to ride my bike to the office.
9.00 AM – At the office everybody is enthusiastic. We have successfully crowdfunded the
amount needed for the commedia dell’ arte show that will take place in the old city center
next week. I am really proud of our volunteers. They’ve made a great interactive short film
that promotes the show and the actors.
10.30 AM – We start the staff-meeting, we have to plan the activities for the Youth Center
I’m Paul Manolescu, a film director, photographer and musician from Bucharest. I’m going to Baia Mare to shoot
a medium feature documentary with a local crew. Time management is critical in my line of work.
A creative industry professional in 2015
A film producer’s work experience in Baia Mare, 2030
6.00 AM – It’s Monday, I’ve arrived in Baia Mare by train, after a 10 hours journey. There
is no plane connection from Bucharest to Baia Mare with a Monday morning landing. I
wonder why…
7.30 AM – My plane just landed in Baia Mare, after a 40 minutes flight from Bucharest.
I’ve rented a car online and it is waiting for me at the airport. I have booked, as usual, a room
in a central apart-hotel on Airbnb.
7.30 AM – I arrive at my inn for the check in. Surprise! I have to wait, they say. 20
minutes, for the night switch to be changed. I am asking for internet connection, maybe I
could work in the meantime.
8.00 AM – I am in the Old Center enjoying one of the best coffees ever and a
8.00 AM – Finally, I have my room, my Wi-Fi password and complementary filter coffee
8.15 AM – I have a conference call with one of my partners from Cape Town. I can connect
to the free Wi-Fi hotspot provided by the local administration. The waiters ask me if I want to
use one of the meeting rooms provided by the café.
in the lobby waiting for my ride.
8.40 AM – I meet my local crew in the city’s Old Center. Nice bar, nice music, only one
table busy, ours. Baia Mare is a really small town compared to Bucharest. The good part is
that we could have come here by foot.
complementary iPad to read the news. The city is slowly getting alive. A stage is being built
up for a concert this evening, and some photo enthusiasts experiment with the morning light.
8.30 AM – The film team arrives. Everything is in place. We have all the gear requested
online waiting for us in the lobby of the Creative Hub. Apparently they also can provide a
screening room for free. We revise the script on the terrace.
9.00 AM – We have to rent some gear from Cluj-Napoca. The local setup is decent but I
need a high speed camera. I have to send someone right now. There is no online alternative
for that.
9.30 AM – We have a stroll to the office. The city seems more active than the last time. I
12.30 PM – I want to register a fundraising consultancy startup, so I access by mobile phone
the Trade Register platform, upload the documents in order to receive the authorization.
Status: your request is being processed. Estimated time to receive the confirmation:
30 minutes.
10.00 AM – We hit the road, by foot this time, to scout the city and make the shooting
strategy for the next filming days. I would like to rent a car and to see the surroundings as
well, but it seems complicated. One of the guys offers to be my ride… Talking about local
hospitality!
1:45 PM – I’m having an operative Skype meeting with our fundraising board. Our mentor
12.15 PM – I would like to find some good Italian food and a nice conversation. I have to
9.45 AM – Their office is hosted by a Startup Incubator close to the administrative
complex. The authorities like to keep close to the private sector: if you start a creative business
here you can get subsidize rent for two years office with all the logistic support included. In
one of the offices next door, a young former student of the Baia Mare University, has a 30
employees company developing live translation software.
from Cape Town gives us some tips.
2:00 PM – The school bus arrives. We will have lunch at our favorite bio restaurant, were
choose. Italian food or artistic crowd. Italian food is too expensive for artists. And I find out
that artists don’t meet for lunch, so I’ll go for Italian.
we will meet my mom. I am also placing my order for dinner that will be delivered home,
warm, in the evening. Mom is taking the kids in the park, as I go back to the office to
prepare the workshop for this evening. It will be facilitated by one of our junior trainers on
Human Rights Education in Youth Work, a young Syrian.
12.30 PM – Nice and cozy place, this restaurant. Pretty busy, so the food must be good
here. And it is. The menu is both in Romanian and Italian. But where are the Italians? OK,
in the kitchen, I got it!
4:00 PM – I took the kids to their theater classes. Now I can write for 3 hours on our
my meeting with the Project Team, at 6 PM. I go for the public library. I would prefer a
coworking space with some nice coffee, but I hear that the local Creative Hub will open next
year.
project in the office coffee shop, nearby.
8.00 PM – Finally at home. In 10 minutes, dinner will arrive. Kids are playing the “guess
7.30 PM – Kids are still outside, alone, in the park. For the other kids, is a bit too late,
apparently. I am making dinner and hopefully they’ll be in bed by nine.
We read a bit and fall asleep.
sleeping, the phone stopped ringing, all is quiet. I can focus, finally.
Meet: PAUL, FILM DIRECTOR
until the end of next the year. We have a conference call with our partners in Finland. On
Friday, 15 Finnish youth workers from Finland will come to Baia Mare to implement a pilot
educational project.
speaking about Human Rights Education in Youth Work in front of 30 local activists
on Human Rights. One of my NGO volunteers will take care of the girls who are doing
homework at my office.
10.00 PM – Finally I can stay still in one place and write on our project draft. The kids are
A one day
journey.
Now
and then.
In order to get a real feel of how
Baia Mare is going to be like 14
years after being nominated the
European Capital of Culture in
2021, we simulated a couple of
before and after interviews with
two real life characters in order
to see the real impact it would
have on their lives. Their visions
and needs made us understand
in-depth the potential impact of
the ECoC title and the projected
results of our strategy.
on what’s for dinner tonight” game and never give the right answer.
9.30 PM – We are ready to sleep. Kids want to video call my mom to tell “good night”.
2.00 PM – I need a place with good internet connection and a printer. I have to prepare
5.30 PM – On my way to the meeting with the Project Team. I have only two things in
mind: to buy an external battery for my phone and to find a place with some privacy and a
stable connection for my Skype calls tomorrow.
love the air and the smell of the woods.
12.30 PM – Time for lunch now. The incubator has a cool cafeteria open as a social
enterprise – all the profits are reinvested in cultural funding. Our food arrives. The delivery
girl is from Helsinki and an exchange student. We talked in English, Romanian language
wasn’t yet an option. She just started language courses at the local youth center.
4.00 PM – I need to get my car back from the old city center, so I book a bike using the
city mobility mobile app. This service is for free for the tourists.
7.30 PM – I am having a salad in the living room, waiting for the evening to come. I could
choose from a variety of hotels, but I am a regular guest here and it feels like home.
10.00 PM – Back in the Old Center just in time for the concert. A Hungarian band is
already on stage. The interactive public displays advertise a standup comedy show and a cafétheater show happening nearby. You would not say it’s Monday.
6.00 PM – I’ve arrived in time for my meeting with the Project Team at their office. We
managed to get along regarding the calendar. The team wants to take me to a pub, for a
concert. I am not sure about that, still I’ll follow the group. Apparently is bad luck to refuse
an invitation.
11.00 PM – Back in my hotel room, after an amazing experience at the pub. A local band
was jamming some amazing jazz in some sort of restaurant.
20
21
Describe your plans for
monitoring and evaluating
the impact of the title
on your city and for
disseminating the results of
the evaluation.
An endeavor of such proportions as the European Capital of Culture requires,
on behalf of all stakeholders involved, a continuous evaluation process, a
succession of trials and evaluations, of constant monitoring and improvement.
Designing and implementing a 15 year long cultural strategy means having the
ability and strength to adapt, to cease new opportunities and integrate them
within the desired framework, in order to be flexible and embrace change,
whenever it may occur. It means planning in advance, start implementing,
evaluating, reshaping and adapting to the new condition then acting again,
according to Deming’s cycle: plan, do, check, action. We imported the Lean
Start-Up principle as a backbone for developing our strategy, an approach that
provides us with tools to continuously test our vision. We set out to design
scalable programs, showcasing them to the community, always updating to make
them grow exponentially and reach their performance targets.
The monitoring and evaluation processes have been programmed as a part of
Baia Mare’s Cultural Strategy, that take to the European Capital of Culture
Program as a development core. All evaluations, with certain exceptions
regarding frequency (the evaluation process will take place at the beginning and
the end of the year), will be faithful to the principles, indicators and proceedings
for evaluation, created and undertaken in the cultural strategy. Moreover, we
have developed a set of KPIs, meant to measure specific results and provide
managerial and expert teams with 360° information on the status-quo. They do
also show to what extent our set targets have been reached. We have chosen a
balanced approach to measure results and success, covering learning and growth,
internal processes, environmental impact, financial and last, but not least, a
client/beneficiary perspective.
22
The monitoring and evaluation process will follow a cascaded structure, in an
approach that engages internal and external teams of experts. Yearly internal
auditing for each local cultural operator involved in the program will be
mandatory, while external evaluations by the expert teams will monitor and
assess the entire cultural program, as well as the efficiency of actions meant
to accomplish the strategic mission and objectives. Consequently, based on
the external experts’ reports and recommendations, every component will be
adapted and improved accordingly.
In order to achieve this, local cultural operators will be trained and re-trained in
the field of cultural auditing, monitoring, and evaluation, whereas the team of
external experts will be carefully chosen from various research fields, in order to
thoroughly cover all the areas we plan to foster and grow, and also offer valuable
input and insight regarding the status-quo of the cultural strategy at a certain
moment in time. Hence, the external evaluation team will cover the following
areas: sociology and cultural studies, cultural management, financial planning
and fundraising, architecture/ urban development, tourism, creative industries,
education, and media/ communication. External evaluations will be carried
out in 2017, 2019, 2021 (the beginning and the end of the ECoC year), 2024,
2026, 2028, 2030.
As practice has shown, many cultural initiatives have failed to develop properly
because of the lack of adequate evaluation or lack of experts to propose costefficient and viable solutions. To extrapolate, let’s think of a physician-patient
relationship: many times, doctors fail to prescribe the right treatment, as they
treat the effect, not the cause. Now think of a city and its planned cultural
strategy (including the ECoC year) as being a living body that constantly
needs to be nurtured, fed, and treated properly. We believe in the cause-effect
principle, we strive for cost-benefit analyses and innovative solutions, we
apply the Pareto principle and measure constantly in order to sustainably and
organically grow into what we have declared to be our vision.
Such an endeavor needs to be measured, improved, and adapted according
to the data gathered, a set of proposed indicators and assumed by everyone
involved. Success means for us reaching the objectives listed bellow and
creating positive trends consistent with our strategy for each identified field of
monitoring. Success means also being able to learn the proper lessons when
they’re due in order to fix what we may underperform and enhance our actions
with positive outcomes. In order to create value, we need to measure and have
a look at the big picture, to create a dashboard that can provide management
teams with a clear view of the status-quo. Hence, we came up with a set of key
performance indicators, all of them linked to the cultural strategy objectives.
Most of the data is to be collected at grass root levels, by local operators as part
of their assumed obligations in supporting this bid. Other general information
concerning economic, social or urban development technical data will be
obtained by means of collaboration with public institutions whose purpose is to
gather such input. Moreover, three main sociology studies will be carried out,
on both Romanian and European audiences, evaluating the Euro-belonging
sense, local pride statuses, brand recognition and other test areas ECoC-related.
Such complex research shall be carried by one of the largest sociological study
centers in Romania, with whom we have chosen to partner. In addition to that,
a research study will be made, assessing the quantity and quality of national and
international media coverage regarding Baia Mare as the European Capital of
Culture in 2021, in different time-frames. Such a study will be conducted by an
independent entity, specialized in measuring media coverage and audiences. All
evaluation costs are built within our proposed budget.
A yearly summary of the evaluation and monitoring process will be included in
a public report, subject to a open meeting with our local stakeholders, published
online and printed. These reports will be available on the project website in
a dedicated section. The extended reports and analysis will be available upon
request for any relevant partner or financing institution. Contribution to the long-term strategy
23
European
dimension
Elaborate on the scope and quality
of the activities:
Promoting the cultural diversity
of Europe, intercultural dialogue
and greater mutual understanding
between European citizens
Highlighting the common aspects
of European cultures, heritage
and history, as well as European
integration and current European
themes
Featuring European artists,
cooperation with operators and
cities in different countries,
and transnational partnerships
Name some European and
international artists, operators
and cities with which cooperation
is envisaged and specify the type
of exchanges in question. Name the
transnational partnerships your
city has already established or plans
to establish
24
The city of Baia Mare is situated near the intersection of three borders and
shares a rich cultural heritage with Hungary, Ukraine or Poland. Throughout its
history, our city was a faithful host for different cultures and nationalities,
a crossing point and peaceful shelter. Our candidacy elaborates on this legacy
and explores our roles as translators, mediators and facilitators.
Our candidacy received the confirmation of support from our sister cities:
Bielsko-Biala, Poland; Ivano Frankivsk, Ukraine; Combs-la-Ville Cedex,
France; Hollywood, Florida; Gyula, Hungary; Hódmezővásárhely, Hungary;
Nyiregyháza, Hungary; Szolnok, Hungary; Lotzorai, Italy; Serino, Italy; Wels,
Austria.
Can you explain your strategy to attract
the interest of a broad European and
international public?
Both our cultural programming and our cultural strategy were built around
the need to consolidate and to promote the cultural diversity of Europe, the
intercultural dialogue and the greater mutual understanding between European
citizens. You will recognize this values page by page, in every layer of our strategy
or cultural programming, as they cannot be resumed in a chapter of
this bid-book.
The strategic approach focuses on institutional partnerships, rather than on the
direct approach of artists and creators, as currently most of the prominent artists
are represented by cultural operators or managers. Our cultural programming
is the result of an open-call based process, doubled or supported by a curatorial
process for each strategic line of programs, therefore in this stage of our
candidacy an extended list of artist will not be relevant. However, for our big,
shared moments, the events that can become reasons to visit Baia Mare, the
wish list includes musicians and performers such as Nigel Kennedy or Bjork,
designers and architects such as Ron Arad or Erwan Bouroullec, film directors
such as Romain Gavras or Jean-Pierre Jeunet and artists such as Anish Kapoor
or Adrian Ghenie.
Our program envisages to attract the interest of a broad European
and international public, for which we designed a marketing and
communication awareness campaign to get an international reach of
at least 5.000.000 people. This campaign is aimed at announcing the
attribution of the title. The marketing strategy further detailed in this
bid-book includes several engagement tools and activation campaigns
that will increase our reach during 2021 to at least 20.000.000 people
from Europe and abroad.
You will discover program lines that bring together several European minorities
in a single festival, in order to celebrate their commonalities and express their
particularities, international art interventions that tackle local social integration
issues, and art festivals or conventions connecting local context with a European
framework. You will explore our systemic approach to help the city’s cultural
operators to foster new international partnerships. You will explore a marketing
approach that combines awareness campaigns and out-of-the-box tactics
maximizing and contextualizing the touristic offer.
Our city multicultural heritage and background forged the concept of our
candidacy – Culture of Hosting. We are devoted to our mission to create spaces
and events, as well as long term programs that can bring together different
cultures and audiences, enabling them to explore and work together. As one
will notice, the vast majority of the content featured in our cultural agenda
has a European dimension involving cultural operators, artists, managers or
organizations actively involved in the European space and in transnational
projects and partnerships.
We dedicated two of our strategic lines of programs, Open Embassies –
expanding borders, affirming identities and Pulse – Encounters in the
Soul of Europe to the enhanced cultural exchanges involved by the present
political context. Our cultural programming addresses current issues such as
migration, tolerance, exile, workforce mobility, local and regional identity or
minorities. We have dedicated special projects and events to ever trending topics
such as continuous education, social cohesion, active aging or smart cities.
Another strategic line of programs, detailed further on, is dedicated to social
interventions using culture and art, exploring new interactions and mediation
tools between cultures and communities.
For us to implement our strategy and our cultural agenda, we need to forge
partnerships with other European cities, thus accessing key resources, know-how,
or sharing cultural infrastructure. We have explored collaboration opportunities
and initiated contacts with the following cities: Bilbao, Glasgow, Manchester,
Essen, Berlin, Valletta, Turku, Leipzig, Pilsen, Pecs, Salzburg, Cernăuți, Tripoli
and Marseille. In order to gain international audiences and an enhanced reach,
we researched potential partnerships with cities from outside Europe: Santiago
de Chile, Guadalajara, Portland, Detroit, Seattle, Toronto, Nagoya and Busan,
opening the gate toward new publics and new funding opportunities.
An important pillar designed to increase our appeal to international
audiences is defined by the big shared moments included in our
cultural programming. The proposed agenda for 2021 includes
15 festivals, fairs, competitions or galas with an international
participation, covering an inclusive range of trending cultural
interests – music, design, fashion, photography, digital art, and
theater. Moreover, the agenda will sum up over 50 events engaging
international participation – conferences, workshops, conventions,
competitions – dedicated to specialized publics that can multiply
our message – artists, cultural managers and operators, or creative
industries entrepreneurs.
In order to improve our approach regarding news technologies and new trends
in digital arts, we aim to develop partnerships consisting of know-how exchange
and joint public projects with the following institutions and organizations:
the Madeira Interactive Technologies Institute, the Design Research Lab of
University of the Arts Berlin, Zentrum Für Kunst und Urbanistik Berlin,
SUPERMARKT, Inter:est, Betterplace Lab, ZKM Karlsruhe, ARS Electronica
Linz. To increase our capacity, infrastructure and performance in the educational
field and foster cultural capital, we aim to collaborate, among others, with
the following institutions and organizations: The University Network of the
European Capitals of Culture (UNeECC), the European Confederation of
Youth Clubs, CEMEA (Training Centers in Methods of Active Education),
a.pass, Ticket for Change, Bureau Europa, École de Recherche Graphique &
Animation and ESCP Europe Paris.
Moreover, we would like to emphasize that our cultural agenda
features a strategic line of programs that opens the call to projects,
performances and cultural products from non-European countries
such as Japan, Korea, Chile, Mexico, and Canada. We believe that a
rich and diversified cultural offer has the potential to appeal to large
audiences from all over the world.
For the components of our programs that focus on theater and performing arts,
the list of collaborations will include: the Peter Brook Company, The Wooster
Group, Performance Space 122, Needcompany, Big Art Group, Schaubühne
and TUSCH.
In order to translate and valorize the local and European cultural heritage
and traditions – in exhibitions, research projects, publications and media
productions – we charted partnerships with: Horniman Museum and Gardens
of London, the Textile Museum of Canada (TMC), Musée d’ethnographie de
Genève, Centro de Investigación del Patrimonio Etnológico of Madrid, The
Jordan Archaeological Museum and Museo Textil de Oaxaca, Mexic.
Last but not least, we will promote and develop our city as a
user-friendly space that can offer memorable experiences to large
audiences as well as to groups and individuals with special needs or
requirements. Baia Mare is a family-friendly, bike-friendly, disabledfriendly, eco-friendly, kids-friendly, budget-friendly, multicultural and
tolerant community, a perfect destination for holidays, city-breaks,
cultural or adventure tourism, and, of course, for business.
Other important institutional partnership explored in the design of our strategy
are related to organizations such as: Biennial Foundation (Holland), Eurozine
(Austria), Literaturhaus Berlin (Germany), Rijks Museum (Holland), Royal
College of Art London (UK), Speos Photographic Institute – Paris (France),
IED – Istituto Europeo di Design (Italy), FH Dortmund (Germany), RITCS
– Royal Institute for Theater, Cinema and Sound (Belgium) and International
Community Arts Festival (Holland).
Cultural and artistic content
To what extent do you plan to develop
links between your cultural programme
and the cultural programme of other
cities holding the European Capital of
Culture title?
Being a European Capital of Culture means, above all, being open to
the European values and programs. We believe that the partnerships
with other cities, holding or being nominated for the title of ECoC,
are mandatory in order to enrich the cultural exchange, to increase
the cross-border artistic mobility and to create solid frames of
implementation for large scale projects. We are already in contact
and we plan to develop strategic partnerships with the cities of Pilsen
(ECoC 2015), Glasgow (ECoC 1990), Essen (ECoC 2010), Valletta
(ECoC 2018), Pecs (ECoC 2010) and Turku (ECoC 2011). We
envisage partnerships with cities that share similar textures, history,
demographics, and socio-cultural backgrounds. We have a special
interest for urban spaces that have changed their vocation and have
risen from being sinking industrial cities to flourishing post-industrial
beacons of urban regeneration, such as Essen or Glasgow. On the
other hand, we are interested in developing tactical partnerships
in specific areas such as film industry (Valletta) or educational and
cultural management (Turku).
From the Greek cities that expressed their interest for the ECoC
title, we have a particular interest for Tripolis, as we share a common
demographic background and a similar size, and Rhodes, a city
similar to ours in terms of rich spiritual heritage, traditions, and
demographics.
We will not limit our partnerships or availability for cooperation to
the cited cities, as we declare ourselves open for any proposal or calls
for participations that are coherent with our strategy, mission and
vision.
25
What is the artistic
vision and strategy
for the cultural
programme of
the year?
26
Our cultural programming vision is based on the synergy of all
the fields of artistic expression and the convergence of the creative
industries. We encourage hybrid events and projects that explicitly
cross the formal barriers of the art branches. We aim to put events
with traditional audiences or specific outcomes, such as art exhibitions,
concerts or theater shows, in high public impact contexts, expanding
their reach, their lifespan and their results, translating them to the local
public and broadcasting them to the digitally connected international
communities.
Setting the frame
All our ten main strategic program lines are faithful to our affirmed
vocation as a host and serve as open platforms for local and
international partnerships, bringing together a variety of performers
and experts, cultural operators and generators, in a dedicated effort
to broaden and diversify our audiences, to explore new cultural
interfaces. Furthermore, the program lines allow the participation and
the ownership of a large array of stakeholders: from small business to
NGOs, from institutions supported by the local administration to
informal grassroot initiatives, as it is our firm belief that culture relays
not only on the freedom of expression, but also on the freedom of
involvement. This openness translates in the effective cohabitation of
local and national initiatives, with confirmed international programs
and institutions staging top-level artistic mastery. We believe that our
mission is to catalyze, contextualize and contain, to create a generous
state-of-the art scene where performers and performance can find the
deserved spotlight and public, calling off restrictions based on their
magnitude or artistic origin. Our aim is to become a user-friendly
interface between performers and their public, between international
acts of culture and their local reflections or counterparts.
Each activity listed under the main program lines respects the internal
logic of a start-up, following the cycle: prototyping – proof of concept
– beta testing – proof of market – production – evaluation – scaling.
As an example, a projected international design fair for 2021 must be
supported by seminal events and projects – exhibitions, workshops,
publications – happening in the timeframe 2015-2018, and must be
concluded by a series of follow-up events. Another approach we have
used in our cultural programming is the recalibration or valorization of
success stories – events or projects that haave become local traditions,
with a relevant history and a proven concept, from sculpture and
poetry camps to photography workshops, from semiotics conventions
to private museum exhibitions.
This approach allows us to constantly test the audiences’ interest, as
well as the appeal of the project for stakeholders, investors, donors or
financing authorities. Our most important criteria in the evaluation
and development of projects and activities are: public impact, financial
viability and autonomy, as well as potential of replication or growth.
Keeping this in mind, we avoid events and activities that either don’t
have a clear value proposition for the local and national communities,
or lack the relevance for transregional and international audiences. We
therefore want to keep a healthy balance between projects born and
raised in unexplored cultural fields and broad audience projects coming
from the already crowded markets, such as festivals, which imply a
degree of risk in terms of memorability and durability.
27
Education
Integration
One of our main challenges is to create an efficient alternative and
parallel educational infrastructure. In a five year timeframe we
must focus on the development of taste of the local and regional
communities, including all age and social groups, regardless of gender,
ethnicity or religious beliefs. Another objective is the formation of
a new wave of cultural managers, experts and executives, in order to
increase our implementation capacity and also to maximize the knowhow transfer from our guests. On the other hand, our candidacy is a
major opportunity to develop and consolidate the local academic offer
with a focus on cultural management, creative industries, arts and
media.
We have carefully built our programs around the active integration
of minorities and other groups at risk, including the physically
or mentally challenged. Accessibility is an aspect that has been
considered in all our strategic program lines, in order to make sure
that the proposed activities and events are open to otherwise excluded
audiences. Another principle put to work is the active involvement
of representatives of these groups, be it directly or through relevant
organizations. To guarantee the relevance and the projection of their
needs and values on the activities canvas of 2021, we will engage these
groups into the design process and the cultural planning. Aiming for
social impact with tangible results and clear benefits for these groups
and communities, we have dedicated them a strategic program line
consisting in art interventions and educational programs.
Organizational sustainability
Transversal values
Following the consultation with our extended
board of experts, we established six
transversal values that every program line
must support, affirm, and translate. These
values enrich the content of our program
and guarantee a transparent evaluation
grid for call-for-projects, proposals or
partnerships. They also serve as a guide for
the implementation of any project, being easily
translated into milestones, action plans and
KPI’s.
28
Through our projects we want to build strong entrepreneurship and
intrapreneurship skills for all the stakeholders involved: individuals,
NGOs, local institutions, the business sector or educational partners.
We focus on sustainable projects that can achieve financial and
management independence, pushing them away from the assisted
mentality relying exclusively on public or international funding.
Our aim is to discover, build and promote replicable and scalable
success stories and to increase their organizational capacity and
traction. Furthermore, we are pursuing partnerships with European
organizations that prove solid operational capacities, willing to share
their know-how and their procedures.
Networking
No matter the scale of the project proposed, we believe that it must
include a networking component. The programs projection for 2021
follows the creation of a cultural and creative ecosystem that can ensure
the optimal exchange of information and good practices, as well as the
birth of new projects and cultural opportunities. This goal is essential
to enhance the impact of the nominalization to local and national
communities, as well as to further a healthy development of initiatives
and projects. In order for this to happen, we encourage niche events,
such as seminars and workshops, to include a public component – such
as lectures, public demonstrations, book launches – that allow broad
audiences to interact freely with the content and the values. In the
same spirit, we designed formal and informal occasions for experts
and performers involved in public events to interact with the local
professional and artistic communities. Expanding the network of
collaborations, references and partnerships are crucial for the European
dimension as well as the success of our programs.
Environmental responsibility
Our city is the only Romanian city with an ecological conservation
included in the urban area, while the region hosts an impressive
number of protected areas, with unique ecosystems. The environmental
responsibility is therefore a mandatory component in all our programs,
translated in direct actions and sustainable development strategies. Our
vision for 2021 includes a minimum carbon fingerprint objective for all
the activities related to the title of European Capital of Culture, with
multiple implications: ranging from educational projects and awareness
campaigns to innovative waste management solutions and the usage of
alternative energy sources.
Technology
A program projection for 2021 cannot be complete without a clear
technological vision. Besides a special program line dedicated to
new technologies, most of our programs make use of interconnected
innovative communication and interaction solutions, profiling a city
that will work as a plug-and-play cultural motherboard. Our programs
explore the interactions between culture, arts and technology, but also
the effective way in which the interaction between the audience and
culture can be optimized or amplified.
What is the artistic vision and strategy for the cultural programme of the year?
How will the cultural programme combine local cultural heritage and traditional
art forms with new, innovative and experimental cultural expressions?
Our cultural programming combines the director-based curatorial process
with an open-call based process, in order to ensure the coherence of our
strategic vision, but also to have a constant input and feedback from the artistic
community and the creative industries. We encourage project ownership and
self-sustaining initiatives; this is why our cultural strategy has flexibility and
dialogue at its core.
As good hosts, we care for our cultural offer for 2021 to attract the interest of a
broad international audience, featuring twelve international festivals, fairs and
competitions that cover several artistic fields: music, arts, fashion, photography,
gastronomy, design, theater and literature. In the meantime, our ten strategic
program lines should be considered as open platforms, ready for proposals
and initiatives coming from independent organizers, entrepreneurs or cultural
operators. As a matter of fact, based on our lean start-up approach, we expect
these endeavours to match our cultural agenda propositions. We believe that
the ECoC title should be a reason for celebration and involvement for all
the cultural communities of Romania and abroad, therefore we focused on
developing generous, yet clear program directions, as well as decision making
procedures that allow the involvement of third parties in the organizational
process.
Looking at our cultural agenda, you will find a careful balance between events
with a long lifespan – exhibitions, residencies, urban intervention, festivals –
and specific events that target specific communities – workshops, conferences or
performances. This balance is mandatory to maintain a relevant and consistent
flow of events during the entire year of 2021 for all categories of public.
Our urban development approach values the concept of ”City as a Stage”,
which transforms the vast majority of public spaces – squares and plazas, parks
and recreation areas, promenades and vantage points – into potential open
scenes or exhibition spaces for ECoC related or independent events. By 2021
the city’s consolidated capacity to host public events will reach a 150.000
spectators quota. In the meantime, an itinerary of more than 20 kilometres will
be available for outdoor exhibitions, public fairs, street performances or artistic
installations. By using this approach, we can make sure that the incoming
visitor flux will have unrestricted access to a broad offer of public cultural
events. The no-fee policy is a warranty for an interesting and enriched cultural
offer for niche incoming tourists – city-break tourists, backpackers – but also
a proof of our dedication to promote quality cultural products independent of
the purchasing power of the audiences. The one year long offer of events will
include jazz concerts, DJ nights, photography exhibitions, culminating with
the popular Chestnut Festival that marks the beginning of autumn with a large
variety of concerts and open-air events, currently attracting over one hundred
thousand attendants.
Our vision is to create a flexible, modular and scalable cultural circuit that includes a variety of
urban landscapes. This is a mandatory approach, as we will keep a decentralized cultural offer
and nurture the development of artistic projects outside the established, yet easy to deplete
points of interest: the Historical Center, the parks or the museum area. Thus, we strive to reach
our objectives in terms of social inclusion, being a guarantee of the correct distribution of the
cultural message and programs across the entire city, leading subsequently to a just sharing of
the economic benefits.
Upon reading the following pages, you will notice that the cultural and historical heritage of
the city – the mining history, the Baia Mare School of Painters, the woodcraft tradition, the
sacred architecture, the rich folklore, the culinary traditions, the nature preservations – has
been translated into dedicated or integrated cultural content, functioning as a pillar of our
strategy. We avoided isolating our relationship with our cultural heritage in one specific chapter
of the cultural programming, preferring to keep it as a vivid background for a great number of
the proposed programs. Digitally enhanced or experimental forms of artistic expression coexist
with our cultural tradition under the same strategic program lines, offering new translation
opportunities for new categories of public. As a cultural hosting space in 2021, Baia Mare has
the mission to find and to promote common grounds for apparently irreconcilable fields of
cultural expression.
As stated before, the cultural programming focuses on long-term development and project
sustainability, in an effort to build a solid frame for cultural operators and artists. Nevertheless,
we understand the importance of big, shared moments that can attract visitors from long
distances and can appeal to a broad international audience. These specific moments increase
the potential of our marketing and communication strategy, building and consolidating
our cultural brand. From the events featured in the cultural agenda, the followings have the
magnitude and the degree of general interest to become ”reasons to come” to Baia Mare in
2021: Atelier – the contemporary theater festival, HAI! – the European minorities’ festival,
The Road – the international music and tradition festival, Heritage – the series of fashion
and music events, Point it Out – the international digital photography festival and Autor –
the contemporary jewellery fair and exhibition. These large scale events combine the high
professionalism of creators and performers with the large public accessibility. The offer will
be completed by international art exhibitions hosted under the program Baia Mare School
of Painters – 125 years of European metaculture, the kinetic art and interactive installations
gathered under the program Ars Machina, or the industrial and interior design fair Form &
Function. Another layer of programs will become a reason to come to Baia Mare in 2021 is
the one dedicated to non-European culture, featuring artists and cultural projects from Asia,
South America and the Middle East, rarely presented in Eastern Europe. While designing
the cultural offer for 2021, our curatorial decisions favoured artistic fields that are currently
underrepresented in Romania in the context of large public events, as well as emerging or
trending directions of artistic expression.
- The opening of Know-Now 2021 Festival. This
initiative aims to become the biggest public
educational event hosted in Europe, bringing
together the most influential thinkers and
creators of the moment. Covering a seven day
period, the wishlist line-up for the festival
includes preeminent names of innovators and
game changers: Marina Abramovic, Slavoj
Žižek, Ron Arad, Daft Punk, Ken Robinson,
Malcolm Gladwell, Alejandro Inarritu, Jon Gnarr,
Muhammad Yunus, Simon Sinek and Bjork.
The official opening ceremony is a crucial moment for the success of the following year.
Therefore, we projected a mix of high-profile events, inaugurations and premieres that will
define our mission and vision for 2021, as well as our leading values:
- The first leg of our program The secret life of
buildings – showcasing video mapping and light
design projects built upon the 351 metres high
iconic Phoenix Tower.
- The inauguration of the international
retrospective exhibition Baia Mare School of
Painters – 125 years of European metaculture
bringing together over 500 paintings from 20
different European museums and galleries.
- The premiere of a solo show by Adrian Ghenie
– the most celebrated Romanian artist of the
moment.
29
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Technology helped us make the transition toward a democracy of
creativity, enabling instant free expression and an ever-growing network
of cultural producers. We developed a series of programs that explore
and put in context established forms of digital arts, as well as dedicated
programs showcasing latest trends and experiments.
Developing a learning ecosystem
This line of programs sets out to upgrade the audience’s relation
with new media and new technology, prototyping new solutions and
educational approaches.
This strategic line of programs has a significant aperture toward large
audiences and is aimed to become one of main ”reasons to come”
for 2021.
In the last years, influential thinkers have gained a popularity status
similar to that of rock stars. They amass impressive audiences, online
and offline, in internal conferences such as the TED franchise, their
“knowledgetainment” books are constantly bestsellers, they have their
own TV shows and YouTube channels. Putting this momentum to
use, we believe that education must be understood as a living process,
independent from institutions and curricula. The ability to learn and
relearn must not be related to age or to a specific context, must be
treated instead as inherent to progress and innovation and prerequisite
for the access to culture.
SELECTED LIST OF PROGRAMS
This program line will also provide a constant link to each and
every educational and cultural structure in Baia Mare. It stands as a
commitment to thoroughly implement and it functions as a catalyst
and platform to enhance cooperation between cultural, social and
educational agents, to promote new forms of artistic expression and
transcultural cooperation, to serve as a tool for building social and
cultural capital. The cultural and educational programs will cover a
wide range of specialties, from cultural initiatives to creative industries
and supporting domains – fundraising, logistics or financing. We
adopted an extensive approach for the educational field, including in
our programs elements specific to continuing education, e-learning,
adult learning, training, mentoring, vocational learning, and, of course,
education through art.
• Point it Out – International Digital Photography Festival
A one-month long festival dedicated to digital photography, including
exhibitions of acclaimed European artists, workshops, photo-tours,
catalogues and collection launches. It is preceded and followed by
smaller scale events in order to maximize its impact.
• Ars Machina – kinetic arts, robotics and interactive installations
A summer-long program that aims to showcase to audiences of
tens of thousands the latest trends and breakthroughs in robotics,
interactional design, device art and installations or kinetic sculpture,
bringing to Baia Mare the spirit of Ars Electronica or Burning Man.
• Central European DJ, Light Design and Sound Engineering Academy
A year-long program that consists in master-classes, public shows
and demonstrations, award ceremonies and concerts celebrating
excellence in DJing, sound engineering and light design. The program
includes over 300 participants and addresses large audiences.
• The secret life of buildings – video mapping and light design
competition. A year-long competition based on an international open
call for entries that targets the most innovative artists in videomapping and light design. They will have the chance to bring a new
life to iconic buildings from Baia Mare, reimagining historical and
industrial spaces.
• Coding Culture – hackaton for cultural causes.
• Know-Now Festival 2021 - An opening event for the ECoC year that
brings together, for one week, the most influential thinkers and artists
of the moment on the same stage: from Macolm Gladwell to Marina
Abramovic, from Ken Robinson to Nick Cave. Includes a TEDx section
exclusively dedicated to art.
• The Art of Taste Festival – Regional cuisine from cooking to food
science. The one-month long autumn festival explores the common
traits of the regional cuisine, bridging traditions with the latest
fusion trends. It aims for international participation of exhibitors and
performers, as well as large audiences.
• Beyond the Lines – Drama and Screen Writing Master Classes
Center - A year-long program that brings forth best practices in drama
and screenwriting through workshops and open text rehearsals. Its
results include published books and collections, as well as theater
shows featured in a special section in the international Atelier theater
festival.
• Urbanism & Activism – In the search of change accelerators.
Residencies and exhibitons.
• Aristoteles Workshop – The 11th edition of Artistoteles Workshop
will bring together teams of editors, producers, directors and
operators from all over Europe, giving them a one month time span to
produce a documentary movie on a local subject. Includes private and
public projections, workshops and DVD launches.
• European Digital Publishing Convention.
• Internet of Things, a search for meaning – open source solutions for cultural mapping.
• The Alternative University – a working proposal for a European
educational revolution - A year-long program to share best practices
and connect practitioners in education from all over Europe, with an
estimate participation of 2.000 people directly involved in conferences,
open door events, workshops and publication launches.
• Culture 3.0 – innovation conference for cultural agents and
operators. Writing, implementing and funding successful project ideas.
Open Embassies
Expanding borders and affirming identities
We believe that our mission, as a symbolic Capital of Europe, is to
open new cultural embassies and to consolidate international relations
with the rest of the world, as the title of ECoC must not be perceived
as a limitation to aggregate and express the European culture to a
European public. Right now, Europe is facing multiple challenges in
terms of identity and international mission, passing a maturity test
that evaluates the strength of its institutions and its policies, together
with the cohesion of its cultures. We believe that the acceleration of
international cultural exchanges is a key element in reimagining the
role and faith of the European Space.
The purpose of the programs listed below is not only to attract a
broader international audience, as well as cultural performers and
operator from around the world, but it also represents a unique
occasion to address issues of great interest such as the new wave of
migrations, the cultural and political crisis in the Middle East or the
economic, and cultural feedback from Asia. We are talking about
a forward thinking exercise that may set the frame for common
European programs and tactics, providing insights, documentation and
organizational infrastructure.
• Cultural Migrations – A year-long line of activities consisting in
conferences, exhibitions, concerts and publication launches, set to
explore and to chart the subject of current cultural migrations.
• Big in Japan – A subjective history of counterculture
This line of programs opens new cultural partnerships with Japan,
offering open-air movie projections, concerts and exhibitions to large
audiences. The proposed subject – the way Western counterculture
was mirrored in the Japanese culture during the last century – strives
to attract and is designed for large international audiences.
• The Middle East Cultural Studies Hub - During the title year, Baia
Mare will host a temporary hub dedicated to cultural studies on the
Middle East. This line of activities will be open to scholars and experts
from all over the world, but also to large audiences through open
events such as concerts or screenings.
• Digital Bridges with South America. Film and digital publishing joint
projects.
• Exile – Culture and Borders - This line of programs proposes,
through a series of exhibitions, documentary film screenings and book
launches, an alternate history of the Balkan exile in Western Europe,
United States and Canada. We designed it as a one year-long program
to showcase preeminent creators and artists who were forced to leave
their countries of origin.
• The Korean Corners – Shape shifting projections. Exhibitions and
movie projections.
• Language as software / Language as virus - International
convention.
• Crimes of culture - Dissidents, activists and terrorists. Interactive
installations and exhibitions.
• Romanian Ambassadors of Culture – rewriting the Romanian brand
mile by mile
ArteCrafts
Take matter into your own hands
The traditional and new school crafts have recently gained the attention
and dedication of the audiences, as an organic response to a cultural
marketplace dominated by mass production, consumerism and short
lifespan artefacts. Our programs celebrate the diversity and mastership
of crafts and applied arts, offering exposure to less promoted fields of
creation.
This way, we are taking a very important step towards restarting the
craftsmanship tradition of the Maramureș region, opening at the
same time new opportunities for investors and creative industries
entrepreneurs in fields such as fashion, contemporary jewellery, or film
industry related services.
• Autor – Contemporary Jewellery Fair and Exhibition
The 2021 edition of the fair and exhibition will focus on ephemeral
jewellery, inviting Romanian and international artists to explore new
materials and techniques that celebrate beauty and the value of
each moment. This line of events has the potential to attract both
specialised and large audiences.
• International Woodworking Workshops - Architects, artists,
craftsmen and designers will be invited, by using an open call, to enrol
in a series of workshops that use wood as a medium for public art and
artistic intervention in the public space. This line of programs bridges
international trends with local know-how, promoting local traditions
as a valuable European assets.
• Form & Function – Industrial & Interior Design Fair
In 2021 Baia Mare will host its first international industrial and
interior design fair, profiling itself as a regional center that follows
the footsteps of Cologne or Milano. The one-month event will include
exhibitions, but also a fair section featuring the most important local
and European designers and producers.
• Make it happen – European Makerspaces Network Meeting
• Highlights – European Costume, Makeup and Set Design Awards
The first edition of the Highlights Award will celebrate the excellence in
support jobs for the film industry, theater and performing arts. It will
bring together professionals and artists from all over Europe in a show
crafted for large audiences.
• Convertible divas – Product & fashion design exhibitions
• Reinventing the wheel – Traditional crafts workshops for social
inclusion, economic development, and boosting creative industries
• Engraving International Competition & Workshops
Play along!
Portal
Gamification and Play Ethics
Gamification – the use of game design elements in cultural or social
contexts – is an innovative approach that incites the access and
involvement of the audiences, and an effective way to appeal to the
international public in search for new experiences. We decided to
translate, into the cultural field of today, worldwide crazes such as the
escape room phenomenon or mass treasure hunts, as a solution to
broaden our audiences and diversify the interfaces to culture and local
history. Gamified activities are proven solutions to engage traditionally
excluded or ignored age groups, such as infants or elders, but also a
great answer for family time.
We are determined to promote and support the adoption of the Play
Ethic in social and educational programs, taking into consideration the
role of this vision as a catalyst for creativity and inclusion.
Signs & Rituals
Pilot projects that make use of online tools and have a competitive
layer can boost the confidence of the cultural institutions, encouraging
organizational cooperation, intrapreneurship and a more assertive
relation with their audiences.
The raised Play Along cultural flag is a great opportunity to rally new
categories of tourists and to diversify our calendar of activities covering
new meanings and interpretations of contemporary culture: the video
and online gaming industry or the active sports subculture with its
associated arts – electronic music, turntablism, VJing, graffiti and other
hybrid forms of street art.
The Maramureș region is very rich in terms of spirituality, being an
epicenter of legends and myths, magical and sacred practices, spiritual
art and architecture. Its religious background is eclectic, hosting in
harmony all the main Christian churches and confessions, as well as
other religious or spiritual practices. The traditional art of the region
gathers powerful symbols that can be found in an amazing variety of
cultures from all over the world.
We want to valorize this unique particularity through a series of
programs that expand the limits of interpretation and perception of
spirituality, reactivating sacred spaces through out-of-the-box cultural
projects, putting traditions into new lights.
• Unseen Stories – interactive shows in mining galleries.
A year-long program that brings to light the mining tradition of Baia
Mare through a series of exhibitions – fashion, traditional art, local
mythology, folklore – as well as concerts or theater shows taking place
in old mining galleries.
• Sound & Spirit – Opening churches for concerts
A year-long series of events that bring classical music, opera and
contemporary music in sacred spaces. The joint capacity to host
audiences in the churches of Baia Mare surpass 10.000 seats, making
them perfect destinations for this type of cultural events.
• One night at the museum – treasure hunt tours of museums
at night - A line of activities scheduled to take place in spring and
autumn, on weekend nights that will allow visitors to explore the city’s
museums in gamified tours. A perfect way to engage local audiences
as well as tourists in symbolic competitions.
• Play Again – educational programs, therapy and learning through
games - A year long program dedicated to otherwise marginalized
categories of public, such as seniors or children. It will make use of
games and direct interaction to engage large categories of public in
open space and indoor events.
• The Road – international music and tradition festival
Hosted by the acclaimed musician Grigore Leșe, the festival will
assemble traditional performers from Nepal, Korea, Middle East,
Eastern Europe and South America. The festival will explore ritual
music and dances in a contemporary frame.
• Cultural EcoTours – discover the wooden churches of Maramureș
by bike.
• North ComiCon - European Competition of eSports and Digital Arts
Digital arts, cosplay and eSports attract live audiences of tens of
thousands and reach millions of views online. We dedicated a weeklong event to this field of activity in order to reach young international
audiences and specialized media.
• Jump of faith – The active sports scene proposes a vibrant
subculture including art, fashion, music, photography and cinema.
This summer long activities line will combine sports and arts,
demonstrations and concerts, and will include a Special Olympics
section.
• Romanian Constellations – explore regional folklore through
astronomy
A continuous program that lets visitors at the City Observatory
learn more about the local folklore and mythology by exploring old
constellations featured in ancient myths and stories.
• Layers – sacred architecture. Churches, sanctuaries, powernodes.
Tours and exhibitions.
• Escape Games – Explore the history of art and the history of
our city - Escape rooms and escape games are an emerging
entertainment trend all over Europe, attracting masses of loyal
enthusiasts. Our program aims to open at least ten thematic rooms
that will allow thousands of tourists to experience our culture in an
entertaining manner.
• Cool School – mobile art labs
• Heritage – Fashion and Music Events
A summer-long series of events designed for broad audiences,
showcasing fashion and accessories collections from all over the
world, inspired by the traditional arts and crafts. Includes exhibitions,
concerts and magazine launches.
• Smart Cities – a better living gamified. Interactive digital
installations for cultural tourism, designed for mobile devices.
• Game design workshops – solving social issues level by level
• The limit of visual memory. International media and anthropology
workshops and exhibitions.
Translating traditions
PuLSE
Bringing history and the cultural heritage to life is a mandatory
objective for each cultural capital, an objective that demands a display
of vision and clear selection criteria. This line of programs has a very
important role for the development of audiences expectations and their
abilities to interact with the cultural phenomenon.
Baia Mare is, at least geographically, the Soul of Europe. We want to
emphasize this particular trait through several programs that showcase
possible interpretations of the soul of Europe, the immaterial bond that
keeps together so many cultures and nations. This line of programs
is highlighting the importance of cultural and artistic mobility,
and advocates the actual practice of interculturality at a personal or
institutional level.
In search of new audiences
The main goal that we address is to put a vast array of information
in context and to develop effective interfaces for the public and the
cultural operators.
Encounters in the Soul of Europe
We aim to establish and chart common grounds, encouraging
translation programs and building networks of multipurpose cultural
touch-point such as libraries, creating long term constructive initiatives.
We are also interested to promote the diversity, the differences that
define our cultural landscape: the specificity of national minorities
cultural development or the evolution abroad of Romanian artists. This
search for new idioms of a European artistic lingua franca cannot and
will not avoid territories that are already developing their translanguage
such as: experimental films, poetry and sculpture.
• Art & Parenting – good taste begins at home! - We plan to host
and interact with over 500 families in a year-long program, exploring
arts as a family building activity. From educational tours to parenting
camps, we want to offer a broad selection of tools and contexts in
order to foster new approaches into parenting and the development of
cultural capital.
• The Wandering Gallery - As maximizing the access to culture and
our cultural offer is paramount, we will inaugurate an art caravan,
travelling throughout the city and the region for a whole year. The
caravan will function as a mobile exhibition and cinema, as well as an
info point promoting the cultural agenda.
• Transcending shapes – from sculpture to 3D printing - In a series
of public workshops and demonstrations we want to bring large
audiences closer to the essential shapes and forms that can be
identified in all the major cultural traditions. Artists, craftsmen and
designers will interact and remix the old and new in everyday design
projects and public art throughout the summer months.
• European Gala of Ballet and Opera - In November 2021 we plan to
host a large scale European event, opening the magic world of classical
ballet and opera to large international audiences. The one-week event
will combine live performances and conferences, digital shows and
album launches.
• Secular foods – Food as a performing medium. Workshops and
public demonstrations
• Baia Mare School of Painters – 125 years of European metaculture
The School of Painters founded 120 years ago was an iconic moment
in the history of the city, an example of interculturality and crossborder cooperation that previewed the values of the European Union.
This program will include retrospective exhibitions, interactive
installations, anniversary publishing as well as conferences and
workshops.
• Read our future – European librarians’ convention - The City
library will host a large scale convention of publishers and librarians,
celebrating new forms of interaction with the readers as well as
international success stories. It will include book and new collections
launches, as well as launches of cooperative projects.
• HAI! – European minorities’ festival - Focusing on Ukraine and
Hungary, the HAI! Festival aims for becoming a two weeks meeting
place for minorities from all over Europe. It will aggregate folklore and
electronic music, live performances and exhibitions and is open to
large international audiences.
• Experimental movies marathons from private international
collections
• An animated history of European Arts. International animation
competition and exhibition
• Summer Express – youth summer master classes for music, dance,
performing arts
• The long way home – exhibitions, concerts and conferences of
internationally appraised local artists
• Atelier – the contemporary theater festival - Founded in 1992,
the international Atelier Festival has set out to celebrate, during the
title year, audience records of tens of thousands spectators, focusing
on open-air shows, street performances and events taking place in
unconventional spaces.
• Eastern Europe, an interpreter heaven - International convention.
• International Sculpture and Poetry Camp
You are welcome!
Social Art & Interventions
We are dedicated to transform our city in a canvas for artistic
expression, but also to create institutions and collaboration occasions
for professionals. We plan to maximize the urban impact of creativity,
expressed throughout the whole year of 2021, and to help creators
translate it in long-lasting results: urban reconversion projects, public
art, publications, reports or multimedia products. We believe that one of the active leading roles of contemporary art is
to contextualize and mediate social issues that escape the authority and
competence of conventional institutions or social actors. Art in itself is
a vehicle for change, an accelerator of social processes and a testimony
of inconvenient truths.
Reinventing the city together
Considering the devastating effects of the late economic crisis on the
journalism ethics, we take responsibility in offering full support to the
media sector, welcoming journalists and producers and giving them the
necessary tools and means for excellence.
Our approach to public relations is a constructive one, as we position
ourselves to be a non-intrusive partner and supporter of quality
reporting and free speech.
Completing our mission as hosts, we want to open thousands of
doors all over our city, this cultural circuit including not only official
institutions and public business, but also private museums and even
private residences.
• The Loft Project – industrial reconversion of multifunctional
spaces - Using an international call for projects, two industrial spaces
will be open for reconversion throughout the entire year. The elected
architects and designers will have our support for transforming the
spaces into temporary living and working quarters open to the public.
• Nomad MakerSpace – internships and residencies for new
technology projects - During the whole year, we’ll open our city for
residencies and internships that explore new technologies and new
forms of interactions between cultural operators and their audiences.
Social inequity, marginalization or discrimination are some of the issues
that we want to address by starting a series of programs that explore
the power of artistic intervention and mediation. This line of programs
is very important for increasing local social cohesion, as well as for
promoting good practices in terms of tolerance and solidarity.
LIST OF PROGRAMS
selected LIST OF PROGRAMS
• Open houses, private museums and private exhibitions month
For one month during the summer, the cultural circuit will include
private art collections, work spaces, and private events, opening to the
public new layers of our cultural heritage and artistic life. By 2021 we
aim to have at least 30 private spaces enlisted in this program.
Open hearts for open futures
• Break down the walls – 12 cultural interventions for communities at
risk - In order to insure the inclusion of all communities, each month
of 2021 will host a cultural intervention in a specific local community
at risk. The interventions will range from community theater shows
to landscaping, architecture or street art and will facilitate the
involvement of the direct beneficiaries.
• Printed in Baia Mare. One-month residencies for printed and online
magazines
• Music is my Passport – social activism music festival - This spring
festival sets out to mix activism and music using the city open spaces
as stages, in an attempt to maximize the impact and the audiences.
We propose an open platform for hip-hop, world music, punk, rock and
electronic music with a social dimension, bridging Berlin with Belgrade,
and Marseille with Sofia.
• One week = One story. International residencies for journalists
• Charity Auctions & Fundraising Excellence School
• MeltingPotRadio – the international online radio station project
• Cultural CouchSurfing – explore new cultures at home
• Cultural Management Summit
• Artistic research and trend watching residency
• The Phoenix Challenges – street art and urban Interventions
A program designed to open the old industrial platform, including the
Cuprom Phoenix Tower, for street art interventions. Meant to last for
the whole summer of 2021, the concept is based on an international
call for proposals. This line of programs will include workshops and
demonstrations, as well as side activities such as album launches or
concerts.
• Write your world, write yourself – creative writing for social
integration workshops
• Social Theater & Theater Forum Convention
• Educational Social Enterprises & Impact Investment Convention
How has the city
involved, or how does
it plan to involve,
local artists and
cultural organizations
in the conception and
implementation of the
cultural program?
Our success depends on the ownership developed and assumed by the local community
for the concept, cultural programming, and specific events. We have design an
implementation frame for programs that encourages and even builds upon the open
participation and collaboration of local institutions and artists, aiming to discover,
nourish and accomplish their hosting skills.
We believe that cultural interventions and programs that don’t have the formal or
informal support of the local communities are eventually intrusive and ineffective.
Every single event of our program has a local pillar and profits from the involvement
of local operators, experts or artists. The local involvement ranges from the technical or
logistic support to the creative involvement in the design of the projects and the events.
Our main logistic partners, with a proven capacity to host international events and manage elaborate programs and partnerships are: the Museum
of Art, the Museum of History and Archeology, the Museum of Ethnography and Popular Art, the Village Museum, the Museum of Mineralogy,
The County Center for the Conservation and Promotion of the Traditional Culture, the Union of Artists, The City Theater and The City Library.
All of the institutions listed above have proficient international partnerships, a consolidated operational capacity and their own marketing and
communication tools. For instance, the City Library is also active at an international level with subsidiaries servicing Romanian communities
and international scholars in Moldavia, Ukraine, Spain, Hungary, Portugal, Scotland and Canada. The Union of Artists has strong regional
connections with similar entities in Hungary, Ukraine and Poland, translated into exhibitions, art camps and residence programs. Several of our
programs are naturally build around the already set up infrastructure and these existing opportunities, as we mutually decided to increase their
scale, audience, international dimension or overall impact.
In order to develop of know-how transfer capacity and to benefit from their big-scale vision and expertise, we have worked closely in the cultural
programming with local based major players from the non-governmental field: WWF Romania, the Hope and Homes for Children Foundation
and ASSOC – the most successful Romanian cluster of social enterprises destined for communities at risk. These powerful organizations support
our efforts as consultants, shaping our procedures and approach in key fields for the management of our project: fundraising, international
funding, budgeting, recruitment and management of volunteers. Furthermore, we value them as strategic partners in order to project a strong
strategy and reach meaningful objectives in terms of integration of socially challenge communities in our programs as well as sustainable
development and environmental responsibility.
40
Organizational structure
Our focus on education implies a strong and dedicated connection
with the relevant local institutions. We have a working partnership
with the County’s Schooling Authority, manifested, among other
programs, in a unique professional orientation campaign focused
on creative industries that targets 15.000 teenagers from Baia Mare
and the surrounding area. The Schooling Authority is an effective
gateway and an experience facilitator that intermediates our access
to nearly 60 schools and educational institution, one of our main
target-groups in terms of audience formation. We are also developing a
strategic partnership North University Center focused on innovation,
technology consultancy and smart city infrastructure prototyping. On
the other hand, we are committed to work closely with local NGOs
which have solid backgrounds in the formation as well as volunteer
hosting fields, such as: D.E.I.S. (focused on youth workers formation
and educational programs), Team for Youth (part of the European
Volunteer Service), Greentin, YMCA Baia Mare, Somaschi Volunteer
Foundation, Go Serv, Young Roma Maramureș - YRMM, American
International School of Transylvania or Reinvent Association.
A secondary, yet crucial, support layer is defined by independent
collectors, private museums and theaters: the ethnology museum of
Desești, the Artscape Theater, or the Florean Museum – curator of one
of the biggest private collections of contemporary art in Romania.
In the same capacity building spirit, we are proud to announce a public
declaration of support for our initiative assumed in a joint protocol by
the main churches and spiritual confessions active in Baia Mare.
The local creative industries are a pivot for the medium and long term
sustainability of our programs. We have productive collaborations
with local IT&C companies such as Trencadis and Quick Mobile,
who proved themselves to be active and valuable partners in the
development of the digital infrastructure, online dissemination
and of the data warehouse solutions required for the success of our
programs. We have also accomplished solid partnerships in the field
of product and interior design with local startups or major companies
such as Aramis. We also would like to emphasize the strong support
received from the local media, counting six newspapers, two televisions
channels, two radios and eight online news portals.
Our cultural programs leans on the support, participation and representation
of the local artists. They inspired or expanded our concepts and their knowhow is crucial for the success of our endeavor. We count on the direct support
and involvement of the local art community including: Dan Aurel (painter and
art theorist), Mircea Bochiș (painter, visual artist), Gyorgi Csaba (sculptor and
cultural manager), Tiberiu Alexa (director of the Art Museum, historian and art
critic), Mircea Ciplea (visual artist), Ioan Anghel Negreanu (painter), Valentin
Itu (painter), Nicolae Apostol (painter), Dorel Petrehuș (painter), Ion Marchiș
(sculptor). We have already established an active collaboration with the local
community of photographers that includes reputed names such as: Dan
Vezentan, Mihai Grigorescu, Laszlo-Tibor Olah, Hajdu Tamas, Vasile Dorolți or
Silviu Gheție. Representatives of Baia Mare’s active community of writers –
Marian Ilea, Nicolae Scheianu, Romeo Roșiianu, Ștefan Mariș – gathered around
the online platform and the magazine e-creator.ro, were also included in the
content of the cultural programming.
Our endeavors would not be complete without the involvement of
grass-roots initiatives and of informal, yet goal-oriented, communities.
We have the manifested support of the local riders and active sports
event organizers – a fast-growing community of enthusiasts with a
visible international profile composed of snowboarders, bikers, DJs,
promoters, graphic designers and musicians. In the same field of
informal group, we value the collaboration of the Hungarian ethnic
community, organizing already traditional festivals and events such
as the Foter Festival, but also fervent promoters and producers of
independently funded exhibitions, concerts or publications.
During the organizational set-up of our candidacy, we received positive
and proactive feedback from the hospitality industry, including a dozen
of clubs, bars and pub that host theater plays, standup shows, concerts,
poetry readings and exhibitions, but also from several hotels and hostels
interested in articulating a common network that can consolidate our
hosting and event organizing capacity.
In order to maximize the effects of their involvement most of the mentioned
artists and creators are included in the Core Team, Local Initiative Group of the
Extended Board of our organization, along representatives of the local cultural
institutions: Radu Macrinici (writer and theater director, artistic director of the
City Theater), Laura Ghinea (visual artist, president of the Artist Union) or Teodor
Ardelean (professor and journalist, director of the City Library).
If the city receives the title of European Capital of Culture, the Extended Board
will be completed by artists born or educated in Baia Mare, who gained national
and international notoriety such: Cosmin Năsui (curator and art critic), Zoltan
Bela (painter), Mircea Suciu (painter), Adrian Ghenie (painter), Bogdan Rață
(sculptor) or George Remeș (actor, cultural manager).
All the collaboration listed above need more than a frame of reference; they need a frame of action. Therefore we started to implement five strategic infrastructure projects aimed to assist and operationalize their involvement
and initiatives and to function as interfaces for international partnerships: the cultural community centers, the Multimedia Hub and Makerspace, the Center for Excellency in Cultural Management and the Cuprom
Creative Industries Center.
41
Capacity to deliver
Please confirm and
evidence that you have
broad and strong
political support and a
sustainable commitment
from the relevant local,
regional and national
public authorities.
42
The City Council has initiated and established a series of partnerships
with the most relevant local and regional political forces and authorities
in order to assure a predictable and stable frame for the funding and
implementation of our programs and projects.
The County Council publicly and officially expressed their
determination to support directly the efforts of the organizing
association through funding of the cultural programs. They also
pledged the allocation of the necessary funds for the needed
infrastructure projects required in order to insure the city capacity to
deliver in terms of accessibility and cultural infrastructure.
Representatives of the local political forces signed a common protocol
that states their dedication to support the endeavor of the organizing
team. Representatives of the youth political organizations were
directly involved in the preparation of the bid book and of the overall
campaign.
Protocols of collaborations were also signed by representatives of four
sister cities and twin towns form Ukraine and Hungary, and also by the
Governor of the Transcarpathian Region. These protocols stated their
dedication to endorse and to support logistically the implementation
process.
The City Council and Cătălin Cherecheș the Mayor of Baia Mare
have launched a public call for solidarity addressed to the central
administration: The Presidential Administration, The Romanian
Parliament, The Romanian Government and the Ministries of Culture
and Education, as well as the representatives of all political groups
represented in the Parliament. In this open letter, supported and
broadcasted by local and national media, he calls for the unconditional
collaboration of all statesmen, regardless of their political background,
as the title of European Capital of Culture should be considered as a
program of national interest, no matter which city will be awarded the
title based on the applications. The call for solidarity received positive
responses from representatives of the political groups who expressed
their interest to transform it in a public protocol of collaboration.
It is important to emphasize the strong popular support that the
current local administration can count on. The elected Mayor, also
running for office in 2016, had won the elections of 2012 with one
the most impressive percentages of Romania, attracting 86% of the
cititzens’ votes. The public confidence in the performance of the
current administration is still high after the four yeas mandate, so we
can predict a stable political environment in the local administration
for the next four years that can assure the success of medium and long
term cultural projects and infrastructure projects.
What is the city’s
absorption capacity
in terms of tourists
accommodation?
Hosting is one of our core values, hence it is our mission to make our
guests feel welcome and enjoy a memorable experience, no matter who
they are and why they are here. Thus, we take to quality tourism as a
challenge, a duty to honor. Accommodating a visitor is not only about
ensuring a bed to sleep on, but rather about sharing a part of our lives,
in generosity, with new people. Local spontaneous happenings, great
restaurants, trending bars, cultural events, traditions and customs,
leisure activities, they all offer a glimpse of the local lifestyle, celebrating
diversity in unity and also, granting a chance to escape the mundane.
Currently, Baia Mare’ s capacity to accommodate tourists adds up to
about 650000 single layovers in 1785 available beds per one year, while
Maramureș holds almost triple that capacity in 4805 beds, in a timedistance basin of 30 minutes drive radius. What is interesting about
the local tourism market is that hotels provide less than half of the
accommodation capacity, while B&B-s, inns and guesthouses account
for the majority of beds.
Tourism is one of the most interesting sectors for investors, while prices
are medium and low, considering the quality of the services, as one
overnight stay ranges from 20 to 60 Euros a night. Baia Mare boasts a
high-end restaurant scene, with focus on traditional cuisine, but also
Italian specialties, developed by a strong community of expats that
chose this city to build flourishing businesses here.
Our city offer covers a wide range of accommodation and amenities
to suit every need: families looking for places to spend time together,
professionals set out to enjoy dynamism, seniors awaiting the chance to
relax and discover new things, youngsters looking for adventure, nature
and sporting enthusiast among mat others. Baia Mare turns out to be a
user friendly city for any guests or hosts, offering enhance accessibility
for the disabled and cycling enthusiasts.
The heads of the locally represented churches and religious
congregations also signed a collaboration protocol stating their
availability to endorse and to support the implementation process,
expressing their interest to host special events and programs.
Capacity to deliver
Capacity to deliver
The city stands testimony to its history, that has shaped it into a city of
both art and industry, of freedom fighters, of independent thinkers, of
bourgeois and miners aside. Touristic attractions in Baia Mare are rich
and diverse. From perfectly preserved medieval towers or fortresses to
diverse churches, museums of art or mineralogy, from dark mines to
beautiful chestnuts preservation park, each visitor stands to witness a
unique corner of European mixture and evolution.
The city’s polarization of Maramureș offers our visitors the chance to
easily reach and discover an untouched cultural space, that religiously
preserved the traditional way of life with modesty, determination and
dignity. The handcrafted architecture of Maramureș and its magnificent
wooden churches have been charted by the UNESCO as world heritage
values, with 8 such sites within half an hour reach from Baia Mare.
All of these are testimonies certifying the city’s great touristic
development potential that is being charted and shaped by a tourism
strategy of the city, currently undertaken by the municipality. We plan
to double at least the inner city’s accommodation capacity by means
of maximizing the existing infrastructure, converting heritage and
standard buildings into hotels, restaurants and other tourism-related
amenities. There are also plans to build new touristic infrastructure
in the next years, by the creation of the Firiza Eco Tourism Park by
2021 that will solely accommodate 2000 more beds. Moreover, in
accordance with our hosting values, we have started to develop a plan
to establish a couch-surfing, vacation rentals and subletting network,
inviting residents, but also locals that live throughout Europe and hold
a significant housing stock unused in the city, to open up their homes
to tourists or adventure seekers, thus creating new opportunities to
generate local income. These accommodations will be audited and
certified by the Center for Micro-financing in Tourism, planned to
operate starting mid 2016.
43
Baia Mare is situated in Northern Romania, at the epicenter of
geographic Europe. Just 50 km away from both the Hungarian and
Ukrainian border, the city stands at the heart of the TransCarpathian
region. In up to five hours driving distance on European roads and
highways, it is easily reachable by a number of nations: Hungarians,
Ukrainians, Slovaks, Czechs and, of course, Romanians.
What are the city’s
assets in terms
of accessibility
(regional, national
and international
transport)?
The regional capital of Maramureș is accessible via a numerous types of
transportation means. It is connected to the national railway system, it
has an international airport 10 km away from the city and express roads
link it to major cities in Romania, including the country’s capital city,
Bucharest. Public and private operators aside offer hour-to-hour road
transportation services to major cities in the region. Even if it is not
part of the TEN-T network, it is directly linked to the Mediterranean
corridor by means of connection to the Hungarian city of Debrecen,
only 167 km away, as well as the Rhine-Danube corridor, via Arad,
accessible in 350 km. Also, the largest airport hub in Transylvania, Cluj
Napoca, is reachable in 1 hour and 45 minutes drive.
While physically articulated to a wide variety of transportation
infrastructures, time-distance indicators are not yet at high accessibility
standards. This is why, by 2021, the county’s and the city’s conjugated
efforts are aiming at empowering the mobility and accessibility of Baia
Mare within the region, the country and Europe, as well.
The Baia Mare International Airport is currently undertaking a large
scale modernization project that will allow large airplanes to land by
the beginning of 2017.
Local authorities are already drafting a special incentive policy for
airways, in order to attract low-cost and line operators that engage
flights to important hubs such as Vienna, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Paris
and many others, thus easily connect Baia Mare to all European cities.
In terms of railway mobility, major investments in the rehabilitation of
the infrastructure connecting Baia Mare are planned as 2020 priorities
by the National Transportation MasterPlan that has just been approved
by the Government. Also, half of the county roads of Maramureș have
been recently modernized into Express Roads, and the other half is
set to be rehabilitated by the end of 2017. Moreover, by means of the
support partnership signed by the Local Council of Baia Mare and
the County Government, the latter has set out to invest whatever is
necessary in terms of accessibility and touristic infrastructure, in order
to meet all requirements of a hosting the European Capital of Culture
by 2021.
We believe that local mobility and accessibility is very relevant to a
successful ECoC. This is why we have started to innovate the local
transportation sector through a sustainable mobility plan, taking
bold measures to ensure low emission, but time-efficient, attractive
and affordable transportation. Even though our system is currently
well developed, our goal is to have the most efficient local and county
transportation in the region, ensuring high mobility of creative workers
in Baia Mare and Maramureș by 2021. Moreover, we’ve already
established a touristic free bus route within the city, connecting of the
cultural hotspots that we plan on extending early next year, enhancing
the experience of all our visitors.
In terms of cultural, urban and tourism infrastructure what are the
projects (including renovation projects) that your city plan to carry out
in connection with the European Capital of Culture action between now
and the year of the title? What is the planned timetable for this work?
Every infrastructure plan that the Integrated Urban Development
Strategy sets in motion is related to the ECoC action, as, alongside the
development of culture, creativity and life quality, it is listed as one of
the document’s main pillars. Our aim is to enhance the attractiveness,
accessibility and sustainability of the local economy by means of smart,
coherent and efficient public investments. It is our strong belief that
a successful ECoC city setting needs to integrate a variety of projects,
setting high standards in city aesthetics, urban services and amenities,
as well as hospitality facilities.
In terms of cultural infrastructure, we are planning to carry out
numerous projects in order to update, outsize, revive and create
generous spaces for creative activities. Existing museums will be
subjected to hard and soft interventions, rehabilitating what shows
such a need, but also granting a better experience in accordance with
requirements of a European prime touristic destination: proficient
guided tours, great promotional campaigns, multilingual information
facilitated by means of the highest technology available. We are also
creating new such spaces, converting and restoring heritage buildings
such as the Pokol Castle in the Borcutului Valley, or the House of John
Hunyadi into city museums of excellent quality, reviewing the binomial
relationship between the evolution of city and of its culture.
One of the most important projects related to the ECoC that we have
started and will be finishing by mid 2017 is the rehabilitation of the
Colony of Painters, the historical headquarters of the 125 year-old
School of Painting of Baia Mare, holding state of the art residencies for
artists and exhibition halls.
The circles mark a 15 minutes drive radius
44
Our plans also include the foundation of the Baia Mare Academy
of the Arts, set to operate in a converted historical building starting
2017, with a curriculum that teaches new and innovative approaches
to creativity and culture, also boasting a strong European dimension,
as most of the visiting professors will represent our educational partner
institutions.
As a result of an international contest open to all artists, the tallest
Eastern European tower, the Phoenix tower, rising 352 m above
the ground, will be transformed into the largest multimedia light
installation. This Lighthouse of Europe will be the symbol of our
rebirth, leading the way to Baia Mare and welcoming all of our guests
to shelter.
Recently, we have retrieved the “Minerul” Cinema, one of the most
representative culture spaces in the city, that was left to decay by its
previous owners. We are planning to restore it starting mid 2016,
turning it into a multi-purpose performance hall, but we have already
started to employ it, by hosting different cultural events and reclaiming
it as a core space of our community. Moreover, projects are currently
being drafted for the rehabilitation of the two buildings used by the
Municipal Theater, while legal proceedings are being filed in order to
retrieve and update the Dacia Cinema, as well as the Culture House.
We expect all of these spaces to be operational at high performance
standards by 2021.
The ”City as a stage” vision constitutes one of the basic pillars of the
2021 cultural programming. Hence, a consistent portfolio of projects
focuses on rehabilitating and upgrading public squares, targeting their
makeover into perfect hosts for a variety of events, in a contemporary
approach faithful to Jan Gehl’s human scale architecture and urban
planning vision. Rehabilitation projects of public squares prioritize
the capacity to host both outdoor and indoor cultural and commercial
activities, as well as spontaneous happenings in iconic settings.
Most city squares are bound to be open only for pedestrians, in a
sustainable urban mobility approach, favoring non-polluting means of
transportation.
The conversion of the abandoned industrial Phoenix platform into a
Creative Industries Center and City of the Arts is one of our flagship
projects in relation to the European Capital of Culture action.
Decontaminating and retrieving 55 hectares of valuable city center
land will represent the basis of establishing a best practice urban
regeneration project, employing all types of financial incentive policies
in order to accelerate the rebuilding process by means of public-private
partnerships.
The circles mark a 60 minutes drive radius
Capacity to deliver
Capacity to deliver
45
Rehabilitation
Conversion
The central cultural axis of Baia Mare will faithfully follow the course
of the Rivulus Dominarum, developing the shoreline of the Săsar River
into an iconic and unique system of public cultural outdoor and indoor
settings, aggregating social interaction and creativity as vertebrae of
Baia Mare’s city life. Moreover, alongside this spinal cord, the newlycreated University Square will entirely rebrand the modern city center.
The Heart-Shaped City Center ensemble will harbor the triptych of
renewed pedestrian public squares, with facilities including a large
scale underground parking: the Liberty, Peace and Citadel Squares.
The latter has just been finished early this summer, portraying the
quality of urban living-rooms that we propose for our City as a Stage
program, thus proving our capacity to deliver high-end urban spaces
for the ECoC. Renovation works of the Revolution Square are set
to begin in early 2016, while the ground-breaking of the Traditional
Marketplace renewal project is scheduled for summer 2016. Plans
to rebuild the Train-station Square are also in place, turning it into a
visionary antechamber of what bold Baia Mare sets out to be in 2021:
the European Capital of all Cultures.
Projects regarding tourism and infrastructure development also have
strong ECoC components, servicing and targeting needs that apply
to hosting such a large scale one-year-long event. The Touristic Eco
Park to be built in Firiza will include a traditional village set up as a
living museum, promoting the Maramureș way of life and customs,
enhancing not only accommodation capacities, but also the variety
of cultural experiences offered by the city. Moreover, our sustainable
mobility projects include a holistic network of bicycle lanes connecting
all important spots of the city, set to be finalized by 2018, that will
bring about possibilities to wander, explore and hit different cultural
events throughout the city.
Sports and leisure activities will be integrated within our cultural
program, as satellite components, faithful to our competitive values
and the culture of fair play, proven by our European sporting success
stories. We also plan on using the sports infrastructure for the ECoC
title year and for cross-thematic events. The Stadium’s rehabilitation
works have started and will be done by early 2017. Furthermore, we
set out to build the Olympic Lascăr Pană Center expecting for it to
become operational by 2021.
Five years time seems too little to develop and support major and
numerous investments, worth more than 100 million Euros, but we
have always faced challenges in a highly competitive approach, putting
all of our efforts in building a bold, but feasible project portfolio,
perfectly integrated and calibrated to our capacity to manage and
deliver. The timeframe and high quality standards of projects we have
developed or that are currently under construction constitute solid
proof of our commitment to rebrand Baia Mare as the European city of
the East with the highest life quality.
We have organized and structured a financing plan of the portfolio,
supported by a holistic contingency alternative plan. Its mixes
the usage of European funding, by means of Romanian available
operational programs (the Regional Operational Program, the Large
Infrastructure Operational Program etc.), government funding, local
funding, supplier’s credit services and public-private partnerships, in
order to dynamically develop all urban infrastructure projects set to be
operational by 2021, employing our basic principles: cost-efficiency,
sustainability and high-quality.
Projects regarding the development of
culture and creativity infrastructure
46
John Hunyadi Arts Museum
Pokol House Digital Museum
Colony of painters
Project ground-breaking: mid 2016
Project completion: mid 2017
Worth: 2 million Euros
Investment: European & local funding
ECoC component: arts museum and heritage center
Project ground-breaking: early 2019
ECoC component: museum of culture and city evolution
Investment: Local funding
ECoC component: artist residencies, exhibition halls
Cuprom City of the Arts and
Creative Industries
“Minerul” Multi-purpose
Performance Hall
Theater Rehabilitation
*Currently under legal acquirement proceedings
Project completion: early 2018
ECoC component: multi-purpose performance hall
Project completion: late 2020
Investment: European funding for decontamination, local
funding for acquirement, public - private partnerships for
development
ECoC component: Creative Industries Center, Tallest
European Light Instalation- the Phoenix Tower
*project currently under development, to be publicly funded by
the Local City Council
DACIA CINEMA
Culture House
Urban Infrastructure to host City as a Stage
LIBERTY SQUARE +
underground parking
Investment: European & local funding for the square,
public-private partnership for the parking
ECoC component: outdoor stage setting
48
Outreach
CITADEL SQUARE
Săsar Esplanade
Project ground-breaking: late 2012
ECoC component: intimate outdoor stage setting,
urban lounge
Investment: European & local funding, Public-private
partnerships
ECoC component: diverse outdoor urban stages, glass
pavilions for exhibition halls and other cultural activities
REVOLUTION SQUARE
Train-station Square
University Square
Project ground-breaking: late 2018
ECoC component: gateway to the city, urban lounge and
structure for outdoor alternative events
Investment: European & Local funding
ECoC component: outdoor urban lounge, glass pavilions
for cultural activities
PEACE SQUARE
“Izvoarele” MarketPlace
ECoC component: outdoor alternative spaces for
components of the ECoC program (cuisine, local flavors
etc.)
Explain how the
local population and
your civil society
have been involved in
the preparation of
the application and
will participate in
the implementation
of the year.
“It is a man who brings bliss to any place”. This is the saying that starts almost every
Romanian success story, the first step towards building communities, putting teams
together and giving a voice to the meaning and motivation that guide our everyday life.
The passionate involvement of people leads the path towards new, innovative projects
and brings about the feeling of success.
However, one cannot provide a thorough overview of a certain
community without first explaining the cultural and social background
of its very existence. The perception of the Maramureș people among
Romanians is that of an archaic, conservative society that has kept its
traditions untouched for a very long time. The very core of this identity
resides in the general perception of the locals as tough, straightforward
and fearless, on the one hand, welcoming, hardworking and a suitor of
life itself, on the other.
The Baia Mare community proved its spirit of cohesion and its
”maramuresean” particularity once again by supporting and getting
involved in our efforts to create the cultural strategy of the project,
although we didn’t want to contaminate public opinion with
programmed convictions and conceptions. However, the support
groups and pages created spontaneously by citizens of Baia Mare
on social media platforms are examples of enthusiastic grassroot
initiatives. Alongside online initiatives, the local community also
discussed the impact and the meaning of what being European Capital
of Culture would represent. This was carried out in over 20 formal
and informal gatherings that included over 1000 people, met in their
own environment, in their own district councils. The pathway to
exponentially grow this impact will start in every living room of the
city, spreading then to the neighborhoods, on the main streets towards
the city center, thus generating a snow ball effect. As pointed out in
the statistical survey carried out in august 2015, 95.67% respondents
wish for Baia Mare to become a cultural and touristic center. This
figure shows the common aim represented in every layer of the society.
Out of all respondents, 51,4% say they want to be actively involved in
the city’s metamorphosis. From the grassroots to the field of experts,
professionals and institutions, one in every two persons gathers his/her
forces and resources in order to reach this common goal.
A tight relationship has been established with the Baia Mare Artists
Union, which brings together teachers and independent visual artists,
who are a source of inspiration in the process of our application and
have offered their support and advice.
Our strategic partners, Hope and Home for Children, ASSOC
and Young Roma Maramures, have been systematically consulted
throughout the entire process of developing the strategy, with regard
to the social dimensions of our application. Based on their expertise
at local, national and international level, they provided realistic ways
and approaches of mixing culture and education in order to positively
impact even the most disadvantaged members of the Baia Mare
community.
WWF and the Center for Sustainable Development GREENTIN were
consulted regarding the ecological and sustainable aspects. Together
we will develop the ECO Charta for cultural events. Consequently,
each cultural operator or event producer must respect the ecological
criteria regarding the waste management, smart energy equipment,
environmental preservation.
The School Inspectorate of Maramures County, through its program “A
different kind of school-week”, has implemented an intensive cultural
education project among children, as they were put into different
contexts, those of art consumers. For one week, the youths became key
audiences, they turned into art critics, cultural managers or even artists
as they were exposed to live concerts and theater shows, museum visits
and exhibitions and, more importantly, they were given a voice by
being asked to project their vision with regard to the city development
through project competitions.
Therefore, on every layer of the Baia Mare community, actions
have been made towards creating a new image of the city, towards
transforming it, one step at a time, from the industrial center it
used to be into a cultural one. While elaborating this application,
one identified key component of success was to addresses the local
communities and their needs.
49
There are 24 school magazines that are currently used as tools to
promote values and culture among young people. As one of our local
strategic partners, the County School Inspectorate provided us with
valuable information and insights regarding the young generation’s
needs as integrant part of the local community, in order to foster
the development of cultural values and cultural competences,
contextualized, adapted, and shaped according to the functional
framework of the young generation.
Another School Inspectorate’s ongoing project, “Learn to learn”,
promotes a proper vocational orientation for a number of 15.000
students from Maramures County, with special incentives for children
from Roma communities. Among other objectives, the project
emphasizes on the creative industries sector, that is recognized to have
a long-lasting tradition in this region, and seen as a viable and healthy
solution for increasing the rate of employment.
The City Theater and ARTSCAPE, an independent local theater, are
two other important pillars when it comes to shaping audiences and
building cultural capital. Our informal consultations we had with their
management lead to identifying and drafting common ways to increase
and diversify audiences as well as theater products, in order to cover
up all the areas of public interest, given the fact that the data collected
by the sociological survey show that 30.53% of the respondents would
rather attend a theater event.
Local representatives of the creative industries sector provided us with
clear insight regarding this sector of the economy and their efforts
to make themselves visible in the local and regional market. Using
informal and formal consultations with over 50 company owners
or managers we came to understand that, on the local market, the
creative industries are developing, though they are still not properly
recognized as an alternative according to the mass conception of a
career plan. Many talented entrepreneurs who show a potential for
development and job creation, confront themselves with issues like lack
of community support and lack of local know-how. The Maramureș
Business Club, a local network of young entrepreneurs, is more than
eager to get involved and help boost the creative industries sector by
promoting it at community level.
Formal meetings with business sector representatives, local institutions,
and the civil society were initiated regarding the adoption of the longterm cultural strategy. All the three layers of participants concurred that
the city application for the title of ECoC is beneficial and necessary.
The latest consultation results, held in September 2021, concluded that
the common efforts that have been made and will be made onward,
will dramatically transform the vocation and business profile of the
city.
50
How will the title create in
your city new and sustainable
opportunities for a wide
range of citizens to attend
or participate in cultural
activities, in particular
young people, volunteers, the
marginalized and disadvantaged,
including minorities?
Please also elaborate on the
accessibility of these activities
to persons with disabilities and
the elderly. Specify the relevant
parts of the programme
planned for these various
groups.
We have built our cultural strategy and the subjacent programs
with a clear goal in mind: arts and culture should work as a social
integration vector, our efforts of reimagining the city should include
all the communities and groups instead of serving as a group or group
differentiator. The open access to culture is a mandatory premise for all
our programs and must be understood on multiple levels:
The way we projected the concept of the cultural program of Baia Mare 2021
we fully engaged the entire community in a complex learning process. The
architecture of this learning process was inspired by both the gap proved by
the analysis and the aspirations declared during consultations with all the
stakeholders involved in the educational sector. In order to increase the cultural
capital, to enrich the taste for culture of beneficiaries, a consistent focus on
education is mandatory.
• Every part of our cultural programs, even the narrow casted
or the niche programs, has a component dedicated to the
large public, free of access charge. The focus and dedication
to translate the results – using media reports, exhibitions,
publications, open demos, online broadcasting, and educational
modules – is essential for the selection and evaluation of the
projects.
• We have designed dedicated programs that aim explicitly to
surpass the marginalization of specified communities – based
on gender, age, nationality, ethnicity, sexual orientations or
religious concerns. We are especially concerned to overcome
the discrimination of specific age groups, to encourage the
access to culture and active living for the elders, as well as
the participation of infants in events and programs in order
to extend our public and empower taste formation and
development.
• Furthermore, we are preoccupied to extend the access
to culture for the low-income communities, opposing the
gentrification of the artistic and creative landscape. We believe
that culture is anything but a class privilege; on the contrary
that it should set the basis of an ecosystem, a Temporary
Autonomous Zone, suspending hierarchies and tradition power
networks, and encouraging mobility, self development and self
affirmation. In order to support these communities we started
to prototype the Cultural Multipass Card, a digital solution to
subsidize their cultural consumption.
The relation between education and culture follows the cause-effect logic.
Hence, our intervention has two major directions. First, raising attention and
motivation of traditional educators - teachers, schools, universities and parents
– to get in line with the needs of the generation they foster and the economic
challenges ahead. Second, creating contexts for quality complementary methods
to develop valuable competencies and practice opportunities. The future belongs
to communities; therefore we encourage the sharing and the networking
through communities of practice.
Explain your overall strategy
for audience development, and
in particular the link with
education and the participation
of schools.
We base our approach on the strengths of the educational environment in Baia
Mare, such as the infrastructure, the currently applied social integration strategy,
the high level of tuition and an important number of European Funds projects
of the Regional Authority of Education; and plan to connect these efforts with
the opportunities at a national and European level. So the city turns into the
major learning context that shelters the Living Academia program. This program
has the attribute to connect, develop and co-create the learning processes
throughout the city.
We adopted an extensive approach for the educational field, including in our
programs elements specific to continuing education, e-learning, adult learning,
training, mentoring, vocational learning, and, of course, education through art.
This program line will provide a constant link to each and every educational and
cultural structure in Baia Mare.
An important strategic step, agreed and accepted by the official stakeholders, is
the Educational Agenda of the municipality, adopted in 2015 and implemented
starting with 2016. This agenda plays the role of a common proactive platform
for schools, parents, students, private sector, NGOs, cultural operators to initiate
and implement new common projects with co-financing from the municipality.
We believe that the Open-Door policy is a good place to start. Our
selection of programs is affirming a more daring paradigm, setting
the frame for a Find-New-Doors policy. We encourage, through open
international call for projects, the implementation of experimental
pilot projects aiming to improve hybrid forms of collaboration for
integration and empowerment of the communities or social groups at
risk. From the Roma communities to the single parent families, from
the young unemployed to the new wave of immigrants, we encourage
new approaches that involve impact investors, entrepreneurs, thinktanks along with the traditional partners: NGOs, local administration or
international entities.
We are ready to accept the challenge of becoming the main educational and
cultural center in the region by creating the most important center of creative
industries. Because we are aware of that, as we are at a tipping point and we have
to overcome our own limits, to see the opportunities ahead. Therefore, in the
educational field we are also adopting the lean start up paradigms to prototype,
measure and scale the projects.
Outreach
Our objectives are made to empower the entire community and to share the
ownership for our project with it. The learning context will host, by 2021,
10.000 pupils and students integrated in cultural projects. The volunteering
centers will manage, by 2021, 5.000 volunteers and the number of educational
projects will rise to 520 projects per year. Each volunteering center will have
a volunteer coordinator, playing the role of counseling and coaching in order
to achieve and acknowledge the skills developed during the projects. These
centers will be multifunctional in terms of human resources development:
recognition of skills using the volunteer certificate, as well as generating projects
and communities of practices. The response to a very problematic aspect of our
youngsters’ society is the low rate in high school graduation. These centers will
also offer counseling services and peer-to-peer learning sessions, engaging socioeducational animators, youth workers, psychologists, and parenting advisors.
The result we forecast is a 15% higher graduation rate at the high school final
exams – Baccalaureate.
The number of educational NGOs in Baia Mare is higher than expected. 45%
of the local associations and foundations are mainly implementing informal and
non-formal educational projects. With the support of the Regional Educational
Authority – the School Inspectorate, Baia Mare can quickly become an
important regional educational center hosting events that are paramount for
the development of social and cultural capital of young generations. Therefore,
alternative educational initiatives such as RestartEdu, Teach for Romania,
Connector or Cross Learning House have been invited and some already
accepted the invitation to relocate or extend their main international events
here, in Baia Mare.
With regard to vocational learning, another important and integrant component
of our vision, we plan to foster form of public-private partnerships. We will
encourage and develop this type of partnerships between local highschools and
universities, on the one hand, and the creative industries, on the other hand,
by proposing new and innovative courses such as sound engineering, video
post processing or photo editing. Our target is to have minimum 20 such
partnerships per year and an employment rate of 89% after graduation. The
existing professional schools and Universities are in the process of developing
new programs and curricula in support-fields of the creative industries.
Another important initiative will focus on the creation and opening of a Center
for Excellence in Cultural Management, a joint project featuring the local
university, the City Theater and several important cultural operators.
Baia Mare hosts some of the most revenant success stories when it comes to
attracting funds and implementing EU funded projects in the educational
sector. By making use of such know-how, we will create a community of experts
in order to reach our proposed target and attract external funding of at least 1,5
million Euros/ year.
51
Management. Finance
Operating budget for
the title year:
City budget for culture:
What has been the annual budget for culture in the city over the last 5 years
(excluding expenditure for the present European Capital of Culture application)?
The municipal budget of Baia Mare, such as any other local budget in Romania is composed of the city’s own revenues, as a result of collecting land, patrimony and other types of
taxes, but also by getting income out of public investments or businesses. Moreover, part of the annual budget values come up from divided and redistributed taxes (like the VAT) that
are collected at central level. In five years’ time, Baia Mare’s expense budget rose to 170% of its 2011 value, adding up to 76 million Euros in 2015. This performance is a result of a
multitude of factors, yet mainly due to the increase of investments and to the economic growth.
Please explain the overall operating budget (i.e. funds
that are specifically set aside to cover operational
expenditure). The budget shall cover the preparation
phase, the year of the title, the evaluation and
provisions for the legacy activities. Please also fill in
the table below.
Income from the
public sector:
What is the breakdown of the income to be
received from the public sector to cover operating
expenditure?
As six out of seven major public cultural institutions operating in Baia Mare are not funded by the municipality, but by the County Council, low budget percentages destined for
cultural activities are, in this case, natural and not necessarily symptomatic of the city’s cultural life. However, related expenses calculated as a percentage out of the total annual budget
prove that the current administration extends its support to culture. Moreover, the city’s candidacy to the European Capital of Culture title and the long-term cultural development
strategy have settled new funding objectives and assumptions in terms of cultural expenditure.
In case the city is planning to use funds from its annual
budget for culture to finance the European Capital of
Culture project, please indicate this amount starting
from the year of submission of the bid until the European
Capital of Culture year.
In order to have a truthful projection of what Baia Mare’s budget is able to support
in terms of cultural expenditure for the next 8 years, we have undertaken a complex
procedure of forecasting revenues for the given period, taking into account new
investments that connect to important tax collection and also the budgetary
growth rate, stable for the last five years. To this extent, we have also studied capital
investment and necessary operational expenditure that can put pressure on the
local budget. Hence, we have drafted a plan that is feasible and pragmatic, based on
existing data.
*2016 expenses will be used for the purpose of creating scalable cultural endeavors, truthful to our 2021 program and
independent of our nomination or lack thereof.
**MEUR is an acronym for million Euros
52
We aim at tripling our cultural budget by 2023, while redeeming it with 4.5% of
the total city expenses, in accordance to our pledge to deliver our mission. As the
adjacent table shows, we have pre-established amounts to be annually spent on
cultural and creative activities, with a clear projection of what ECoC related cost
allocations are to be set aside. The European Capital of Culture will be publicly
funded out of the city’s cultural budget, with different amounts schedules for each
year pursuant to specific yearly objectives. The largest amount proposed by this
financing plan, about 40% of the total city contribution to the project is to be spent
for activities in the title year. Yet, more than 5 million Euros will be appointed to
the legacy project, in order to properly evaluate and accelerate beneficial impact of
the ECoC.
Which amount of the
overall annual budget
does the city intend to
spend for culture after
the European Capital of
Culture year (in euros and
in % of the overall annual
budget)?
We believe that a proactive and
sustainable community invests a
considerable amount in culture. This
is why our goal is to reach a stable
4.5 percentage of the local budget to
be yearly spent on cultural activities,
starting 2023. As economic forecasts
show an ascendant city budget for
the next 10 years, it is safe to project
that expenses dedicated to culture will
overpass the 7 million Euro milestone
in 8 years time.
What is your fund raising strategy to seek financial
support from Union programmes/funds to cover
operating expenditure?
Our proposition to organize and develop a Center for Excellence in Cultural
Management is a warranty of a proficient approach to the attraction of financial
support from the European Union by operators that will be part of the ECoC
project. It will feature a dedicated office, aiming to inform, train and assist
public and private cultural operators in obtaining European funding for artistic,
educational, social and research programs. The Center will focus on raising
Romanian absorption ratios in creative and social funding, by promoting best
practices and supporting applications for the following programs: Creative
Europe, Europe for Citizens, Erasmus Plus, Eurimages, grants offered by the
European Cultural Foundation or the European Youth Foundation and other
available financial opportunities or instruments.
According to what timetable should the income
to cover operating expenditure be received by the
city and/or the body responsible for preparing and
implementing the ECoC project if the city receives the
title of European Capital of Culture?
Our operational budget adds up to 40 million Euros in expenses over an 8
year long time span. Among others, it covers educational, artistic and cultural
activities to be developed by operators under the cultural programming
guidelines, respectful of our lean start-up approach to be able to prototype,
assess and then scale successful endeavors. To this extent, funding allocations
are exponentially growing each year up to the 2021, while consistent amounts
are set aside to ensure strong and coherent legacy programs. The budget
proposal aims to be cost-efficient and purpose-appropriate. Hence, marketing
expenditures will be focused on booming communication efforts in the year
previous to and the year of the title, in order to provide with envisioned
outreaches. Moreover, our ECoC approach, as a whole, turns to using efficient
and innovative tools, able to prevent useless expenditure that only produces
short-term or inconsistent effects.
In approaching the public funding plan of the ECoC operational budget, we
chose to calibrate risk by assuming the largest part of expenses as covered by the
municipality, without overbearing our local treasury. This does not only prove
that we are committed in implementing and fulfilling our vision, but also that
we are strong, confident and that we believe the ECoC to be a priority plan for
the city. Other amounts envisioned to be publicly supported are much lower, as
we chose to diminish dependencies on different types of authorities. We opted
in favor of a reliable approach, limiting the impact on central and regional
budgets.
Have the public finance authorities (City, Region, State) already voted on or made financial commitments to
cover operating expenditure? If not, when will they do so?
The City Council, alongside the County Council of Maramureș have signed a mutual seven year protocol, carefully establishing obligations and roles of each party
in carrying out the European Capital of Culture action, including provisions of financial support of the project. Moreover, we are currently developing an elaborate
10 year budgetary plan, organizing and structuring capital and operational expenses of the city, with the ECoC at the heart of strategic fund planning. Its purpose is
to create a efficient and reliable framework for all of our development plans.
The National Government has not yet established the support amount for the nominated ECoC. To this extent, the Mayor of Baia Mare has launched a public
appeal for culture addressed to central administration offices, promoting the need to have a strong position to this matter, before the selection phase, in order to
allow candidate city budgets to be thoroughly built.
Management. Finance
Management. Finance
53
Income from the
PRIVATE sector:
What is the fund-raising strategy
to seek support from private
sponsors? What is the plan for
involving sponsors in the event?
Baia Mare boasts an up and coming creative
industries sector, with successful large-scale
businesses that benefit from an open and
committed relationship with local public
authorities. They are traditional sponsors of
cultural endeavors of the city and have already
stated their support of the ECoC program.
Moreover, since an important part of ECoC
related projects will require technical and
service support, barter plans for such projects
will be put in place, faithful to our efficiencyseeking approach. We deem ourselves open and
faithful to any national or international sponsor
partnership, with mutual tangible advantages.
We aim to offer a wide range of benefits to
contributors and sponsors, in direct relation
to their needs, may that support be of image
promotion, staff building and training, national
and European marketing services or association
with powerful events and brands.
In addition, the Baia Mare 2021 Foundation
has the know-how support from prestigious
organizations with success and experience in
raising budgets for social care and education,
such as Hopes and Homes for Children
Romania or Habitat for Humanity. Moreover,
as one of the most successful local entrepreneurs
is currently building the largest crowd-funding
platform in Romania, we have partnered in
order to assist not only the Baia Mare cause,
but any other nominated ECoC, in the effort of
ensuring private funding milestones.
54
BUDGET FOR CAPITAL
EXPENDITURE:
Operating expenditure:
Please provide a breakdown of the operating expenditure,
by filling in the table below
What is the breakdown of the income to be received
from the public sector to cover capital expenditure in
connection with the title year?
What is your fund raising strategy to seek financial
support from Union programmes/funds to cover
capital expenditure?
As a great part of the ECoC related capital expenditure is planned to be
supported by funding from Union programs, our approach needed to be solid,
reliable and result oriented. Hence, projects that constitute capital expenditure
for the European Capital of Culture action have already been planned and
included within our Integrated Urban Development Strategy. This planning
document has charted, identified and scheduled all measures and actions
necessary in order to maximize European funding absorption ratios.
Operating expenditure breakdown is fairly planned, proportionate to needs and
objectives, as well as tools per each of the main expense chapters, covering costs for
the entire 8 year period of the proposed ECoC project. The cultural program adds
up to 26.5 million Euros in expenses, with almost 67% of the budget covering events
and activities. 20% of costs are planned to be invested in high quality and effective
promotion and marketing campaigns, while 10% of the project expenses are destined
to cover administrative expenditure. Less than 4% of the total amount is to be used for
services, specific acquisitions and unforeseeable events.
Planned timetable for spending operating expenditure
82% of the total infrastructure related costs is to be publicly-funded, in a
balanced expenditure breakdown, with 40% of expenses covered by municipal
funding and the other 42% by means of attracting structural European funding.
The remaining 18% is set to be privately invested, as we are planning to develop
text-book examples of public-private partnerships, in order to fulfill investments
schedules and objectives, without overbearing local budgets or being exposed to
unnecessary risk, by setting European funding milestones that are unlikely to
pragmatically happen.
Management. Finance
A wide range of operational programs and investment priorities of European
structural funds, as applied by Romanian Management Authorities will be
used for the purpose of developing capital expenditure projects: the Regional
Operational Program and all its 12 financing lines, the Large Infrastructure
Program and others. Our project portfolio has been calibrated to obtain high
scorings in European funding evaluation, having met all depicted criteria in
Operational Programs. Moreover, we have called upon management authorities
to provide us with guidance and assistance in preparing projects that will be
submitted as applications for European funding available in Romania in this
current exercise, 2014-2023. Thus, by means of preparing high quality and
detailed financing plans for our capital expenditure, we believe we will be
successful in implementing our program, as such.
Have the public finance authorities (city, region, State)
already voted on or made financial commitments to
cover capital expenditure? If not, when will they do so?
Financial commitments to cover capital expenditure by means of European
funding are not possible since all budgets of Operational Programs and
investment priorities are open to competition appeals. Hence, the Management
Authority cannot commit to attribute one amount or other to the city. However,
the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Administration has published
expected city absorption ratios. Baia Mare’s projected operational budget
exceeds 100 million Euros, by cumulating all European funding managed by
the Ministry. Moreover, by means of approving investment lists projects to be
acquired and local objectives to be funded, the City Council has voted and
accepted all ECoC related capital projects.
Management. Finance
55
56
Baia Mare 2021 Foundation - Organizational Layers
How will this structure be organised
at management level? Please make
clear who will be the person(s) having
the final responsibility for global
leadership of the project?
How will you ensure that this
structure has the staff with the
appropriate skills and experience to
plan, manage and deliver the cultural
programme for the year of the title?
What kind of governance and
delivery structure is envisaged for
the implementation of the European
Capital of Culture year?
How will you make sure that there is
an appropriate cooperation between
the local authorities and this
structure including the artistic team?
57
We believe that collaborative work is the only approach for innovative results, but we value reaction
speed and decision making. We want to emulate the flexibility of a start-up , but also to scale our delivery
capacity fast in order to match our international partners. We fully understand that our legitimacy relies
on the accurate local representation of the local stakeholders, as our relevance relies on our international
aperture and proven performance. Taking these matters into consideration we designed a flexible and
quick responsive organizational structure, the Baia Mare 2021 Foundation – founded, endorsed and
supported by the City Council, that includes three layers:
The Core Team
- Locally based team of experts and managers (20+
people);
- Includes representatives of key local institutions,
creative industries, cultural field and informal groups;
- Covers and ensures the administrative and legal
requirements and the project vital components:
overview, strategic vision, research, planning,
monitoring, reporting, evaluation, financial,
fundraising;
- Works under a commonly agreed protocol – the
Green Charta – including values, criteria, strategic
directions;
- Is the guarantee of continuity, responsibility and
accountability;
- Has the final responsibility for global leadership
and includes the Operative Team (General Director,
the Artistic Director, the Strategy and Development
Director, the Financial Director, the Program
Coordinator Manager and the Creative Director )
– the supreme decision making instance.
58
The Local Initiative Group
- Can initiate proposals for local projects and
programs;
- Provides feedback, advice and mentorships for any
local projects in the process of being evaluated;
The Extended Board
- National and international experts, covering all the
horizontals and verticals in our cultural programs (40+
people);
- Works under a commonly agreed protocol – the
Blue Charta – including values, criteria, strategic
directions;
- Includes representatives of the Cultural
Ambassadors;
- Can initiate proposals for international projects and
programs;
- Provides feedback, advice and mentorships for
any international projects in the process of being
evaluated.
-Is a guarantee of much-needed redundancy and
second opinion checking for vital processes: selection
of projects, international partnerships, project
development and mentorships, cultural agenda,
fundraising;
In our organization layers we praise the lead-by-example paradigm,
translated into flat management schemes and expressed leadership
based on competences instead of hierarchy. We apply some of the
principles of the holacracy model pioneered by start-ups and 3.0
economy entities, in order to encourage the ownership of every
member of our team as well as their personal development. We focus
on tangible results, milestones and objectives, in order to support
and update our long term cultural strategy. We believe in modular
meetings based on naturally congregated talents around publicly
assumed projects. We don’t delegate, we aggregate task forces, on a
scalable team structure that values open learning and online project
management tools such as Trello or Basecamp.
Our approach aims to break organizational silos, and to prototype
the startup mentality as well as the lean startup techniques in the
cultural management field. We strive for our projects and programs
to have a great degree of accountability, but also an equal degree of
autonomy, in order to be flexible and scalable. We measure success
by the value of our people. We fully understand that, for a long
term strategy to be successful, we need to lay human capital as the
foundation of our construct, as the basis for securing sustainable,
results and generating a ripple effect at all levels. Hence, we
commit to rallying highly qualified professionals, engage talents,
constantly train and re-train local human resources, in private and
public institutions, in order to develop and foster cultural capital.
Thus, by 2021 and far beyond the title year, Baia Mare will have a
functional, efficient, and cascaded network of cultural production
and productivity.
It is the acknowledged responsibility of the core team, along with
the support and endorsement of the local authorities, to carry
out the strategy and work as a facilitator and binder between all
stakeholders involved, from local and regional authorities to political
representatives, cultural field and civil society.
The cultural strategy is a programmatic document accepted and
endorsed by all parties involved – public institutions, cultural
operators, business environment, civil society, and the community.
In order to ensure that such an initiative of these proportions is
carried out and constantly improved and adapted, an internal and
external team of evaluators will audit every year (internal auditing),
respectively every second year (external evaluator) the stage of
implementation. The internal teams will evaluate, and will be trained
as cultural auditors in order to do so, on the cultural operators/
department level, whereas the external teams will evaluate the whole
progress, having the 360 degrees approach. In order to do so, a team
of 10 independent experts from various fields – sociology, cultural
management, tourism, finance, urban development will proceed in
auditing effects of implemented actions, mapping good practices and
outlining areas where targeted initiatives did not succeed, in order to
rethink and boost the effectiveness of our plan.
Our organization encourages and integrates within the core team
a number of 14 local interns and mentees, representatives of local
youth associations and cultural NGOs, as well as freelancers,
grass-roots entrepreneurs and members of groups at risk such as
single parents or Roma ethnics. In 2016 we plan to become a host
organization for at least 20 incoming international volunteers part of
the European Volunteering Services network under the supervision
of the local host NGO Team For Youth. By 2021, we want to enlarge
our core volunteer base to at least 150 people. We believe that this
approach is vital in order to ensure the know-how transfer to young
professionals setting the basis for a solid, sustainable good practice
community.
59
The appointed General Director and the Artistic Director have been
chosen from a shortlist of cultural managers and project managers
whose qualifications matched very specific job requirements:
- an in-depth understanding of the local and international artistic field,
notably the contemporary scene, preferably as insiders or practitioners,
According to which
criteria and under which
arrangements have the
general director and the
artistic director been
chosen – or will be chosen?
What are – or will be – their
respective profiles? When will
they take up the appointment?
What will be their respective
fields of action?
As we consider innovation, communication and education being part
of our brand DNA, we favoured the candidates who:
- have strong applied communications and marketing skills demonstrated
by a relevant background in the creative industries, media, public relations
or organizational communication,
- a relevant experience of over fifteen years in cultural management and/or
creative industries,
- demonstrate good knowledge of educational trends or have a relevant
practice in this field,
- proven abilities to manage budgets, long term projects and large scale
teams,
- are tech-savy and early adopters of trends and technologies,
- proven ability to interact and to engage international partners and
audiences,
- demonstrate innovative and disruptive thinking abilities,
- strategic vision and strategic planning experiences.
- are fluent in at least two broad circulation languages.
As stated before, the human resources strategy is a very important component of our strategy, therefore we have chosen as top manager two
directors with real leadership skills, won can capacitate and empower the efforts of the team, and can bring together rich professional experiences
from different fields. Our human resources policy strictly and firmly rejects any discrimination based on gender, ethnicity or religious beliefs.
Building our core management team, we assumed the need to keep a proactive gender balance and to include in the management structures
representatives of categories at risk.
Our General Director, Andreea Ciortea, has been directly involved
in the implementation of the cultural program for European Capital
of Culture, Sibiu 2007. As an international cultural manager she
overviewed or coordinated over 200 projects, some of them as
project manager of the German Cultural Center in Sibiu. She’s an
accomplished serial entrepreneur in the creative industries field and a
certified trainer.
The General Director`s fields of action will include:
- strategic planning;
- supervising of the programs implementation according to the strategy;
- legal representation of the organisation in relation to the local and national
authorities, national or international organizations, other institutions and
business partners;
- mediating and facilitating the relation with the local authorities as well as
the communication between the Local Initiative Group, the Extended Board
and the core management team;
Our Artistic Director, Vlad Tăușance, is a writer, strategic planner
and innovation consultant. In the last 15 years, he worked closely
with the emerging art and music scene in Bucharest and Timișoara,
setting up events and communication platforms. He has a relevant
background as a publisher, a journalist and a public speaker. He was
listed recently as one the most important voices in creative education.
The Artistic Director’s fields of action will include:
- drafting, developing, implementing and revising the cultural strategy;
- drafting, developing, implementing and revising the cultural programming
for the timeframe 2016-2021;
- developing strategic lines of programs, key events and partnerships;
- scouting, selecting or approving the content for ECoC 2021;
- representing the organization in relation to the artistic community,
creative industries, specialist and managers;
- supervising the implementation of the programs;
- coordinating of the ECOC Project 2021 between the city authorities and
other municipalities or regional authorities involved;
- coordinating the programs with the twin ECoC 2021 city , the international
cultural networks;
- approving and amending the organizational decisions concerning business
relations, acquisitions, personnel or finances;
- supervising along the Creative Director the communication and marketing
of the projects.
- supervising the internal financial process,
- approving the cultural agenda as member of the Operative Team.
Both of our directors have been formally appointed in the
summer of 2015, with a mandate to supervise and coordinate
the preparation of the bid book, as well as to elaborate and
prepare for implementation the cultural programming and the
organizational strategy. Their contracts are not limited to these
explicit tasks and do not have an established expiry date. They
will be subject to an internal evaluation every three months
performed by an internal commission formed by at least five
experts or managers featured in the organizational diagram.
A second yearly public evaluation, based on their published
activity report, will be performed by a commission of 11
representatives of the Local Council, cultural institutions,
creative industries, local art scene and educational field. The
results of the evaluation as well as the activity reports will be
made available to the public in order to insure the mandatory
institutional transparency.
If based on the internal and public evaluation, the
performances of the Artistic Director of General
Director cease to fulfil their job description and
requirements, or their conduct undermines the
values and the image of the program, they will follow
an independent mediation process. If vacated,
their positions will be subject to an open call-forapplication supported by a screening process
performed by an at least two independent human
resources consultants or professional recruiters.
In the case of new appointments for the top
management positions of Artistic Director or General
Director, the former managers will be committed by a
legal agreement to assist them directly during a 6-10
months taking-over process.
The collaboration between the core management
team and the local administration is regulated by a
series of protocols and procedures, agreed by both
parts. Moreover, the strategic and tactical vision
presented in this bidbook was designed in close
coordination with the major development strategies
of the city, assumed by the administration as well as
by the local political forces.
The decision making process
Stage 1
Any organization having a project proposal
will have access to an online evaluation
tool – the Project Management Canvas –
that will follow 10 criteria:
1. Ecology;
2. Sustainability
3. Education
4. Technology
5. Networking
6. Integration
7. European dimension
8. Consistent strategy
9. Impact
10. Organizational capacity building
Each of the ten domains listed and
explained will be evaluated with a
maximum 10 points, and every project
that passes this phase will have to have at
least 50 points.
Stage 2
The applicant will be audited by a team of
experts from the Core Team in terms of
organizational capacity, relevance, historic,
infrastructure, and financial capacity. All
the audits will be summarize in a report.
Stage 3
Based on the scale – international or
national – the project will be put in
contact with extended board or the local
initiative group for consultation, feedback,
concept initiation, input on strategy or
mentorship.
After this stage, using the Project
Management Canvas, the project score will
have to be higher than 65 points.
Stage 4
Stage 5
The project is now entering the
implementation phase where the
competences of experts from the Core
Team are used for guiding and supporting
the organization in delivering best results.
The project reaches this stage after it
receives a report from the team of experts,
the Local Initiative Group or from the
extended board.
At this stage, the organization’s Operative
Team including: General Director,
the Artistic Director, the Strategy and
Development Director, the Program
Coordinator Manager and the Creative
Director will decide, using the simple
majority if the proposed project will be
approved.
- developing and implementing the cultural programming for the timeframe
2016-2021;
60
61
Andreea
Ciortea
Vlad
Tăușance
Teodor
Ardelean
Laura
Ghinea
POSITION
General Director
POSITION
Artistic Director
POSITION
Partneships and
ventures expert
POSITION
Activities Manager
AGe
37
Level of experience in cultural management area/ relevance on the domain
Andreea is a senior cultural manager and trainer, integrating various areas of
expertise such as cultural management, higher education, youth work, lifelong
learning, and adult education. She has 15 years of experience in event and project
management, ranging from conferences and workshops in the academic field to
digital art and festival organization. By her 37th birthday, she will have written,
implemented and/or monitored over 200 cultural and educational projects. She
also benefitted from a Robert Bosch traineeship in cultural management and is a
certified trainer, evaluator and human resources creative designer.
Biggest achievement
She is the initiator of the Universal IA Day (Romanian Blouse Day) in Sibiu,
an event that fosters the dialogue between traditional and new forms of creative
expression and conjoins different cultures and ethnic identities through the
feminine lingua franca of the embroidered signs. As of September 2014, she spun
a cultural initiative into a small enterprise for creative industries, the IA Sibiu
concept store that counts over 50 collaborations with creators and artists.
KEY COMPETENCES
Cultural & event management, organizational development, project writing,
training, coaching, leadership development, team building & team development,
strategic planning, academic advising, public relations, project evaluation.
Notable projects
In 2007, when the city of Sibiu was European Capital of Culture, Andreea had
the opportunity of implementing quite a few important projects included in the
official programme. Among them, “Klangräume”, a Goethe Institute project in
cooperation with the Tesla Institute in Berlin and the German Cultural Center
in Sibiu. Andreea was a member of the team that set up *artlabs, a center for art,
technology and design based in a former heating plant in the Sibiu suburbs.
Since 2010, Andreea is part of the team organising the Craiova International
Shakespeare Festival, coordinating the logistics, communication and volunteer
section. For the last seven years, she has trained over 500 professionals, young
people and seniors in developing their hard and soft skills and over 1000 people
attended the team building and team development programs that she created.
Link to Baia Mare
Her scouting into traditions and developing new partnerships in the field of
fashion industries took her to the city of Baia Mare as part of the Fashion and
Heritage Festival team.
STUDIES
Andreea Ciortea holds a Masters’ Degree in German and Intercultural European
Studies awarded by the “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu and is a certified
trainer, project manager & evaluator, educational adviser, as well as a human
resources specialist. Also, she is a Human Synergistics Consultant, Balanced
Scorecard practitioner and Belbin Team Roles Adviser.
AGE
36
AGe
64
Mihaela
Pușnava
AGE
38
Over 15 years of entrepreneurship and freelance in the creative industries; has
managed and implemented marked validated projects related to advertising,
media and online. Active as a journalist, writer, cultural management trainer
and consultant. Over 10 years of experience in event management as organizer,
promoter, consultant and communicator.
Over 30 years of experience in the management of cultural institutions, in
university education, journalism and event organizing. Considered as an excellent
ambassador of Romanian spirituality in the world, his prestigious professional
career is crowned with the Order of „Cultural Merit in rank of Knight” and with
two awards from the Romanian Academy.
For 8 years she has been involved in the management of UAPR (Union of Artists
from Romania), Baia Mare subsidiary. She worked for one year within the
Medieval Music Festival from Alsace, France, afterwards performed two stages,
each of 3 months to the Arts Museum from Nantes, France and to the City Hall
of Clisson, France.
Biggest achievement
During the last four years, Vlad Tausance has designed and implemented an
educational program focused on applied creativity and innovation. Over 500
professionals and managers have attended his workshops, and program is
considered to be included in the high school and academic curricula.
Biggest achievement
With the true vocation of a founder, he designed and advised the „Petre Dulfu”
City Library Baia Mare, considered to be the most modern departmental library
in southeastern Europe. In order for the Romanian Diaspora to maintain spiritual
ties with the country, he set up 10 libraries in: Moldova, Ukraine, Hungary,
Spain, Scotland, Canada, Portugal, for the Romanians.
Between 1992 and 1996, he was Senator of Maramures and Vice-president of the
Romanian Chamber of Senate.
Biggest achievement
For 15 years she has been a tenured lecturer at the Art and Design University
Cluj-Napoca, was an associate professor at Nice Sophia-Antipolis University,
France for 10 years, where she taught the History of Photography. For 4 years she
was associate professor at Ecole Com-Sup, Casablanca Maroc, where she taught
Photography and Visual Communication. At the North University from Baia
Mare she was an associated painting professor. For the last 4 years, she has been
the President of the Baia Mare subsidiary of UAPR and has been coordinating
the rehabilitation project of the Colony of Painters. She coordinated 5 editions of
Painting Symposiums at Baia Mare, financed by the Dorel Cherecheș Foundation.
She organized and participated at forums, workshops, conferences, summer
schools, personal and group exhibitions, collective exhibitions with guests from
the country and abroad.
KEY COMPETENCES
Strategic planning, innovation, media and marketing, cultural programming,
event organizing.
Notable projects
In 2015 Vlad was the coordinator of the online strategy for the presidential
campaign of Romanian president Klaus Iohannis. In the last 5 years, he managed
the implementation of large scale online platforms for official institutions such
as: the Romanian Government, the Airport Company of Bucharest and several
national management authorities for European funds.
Specialized in brand building and brand communication, Vlad has developed
publishing projects and communication programs for international brands such as
Vodafone, Orange, ING, Grolsch or Decathlon.
Link to Baia Mare
Vlad has worked closely for the last six years with local business in from the
creative industries field implementing brand and awareness campaigns and
developing online platforms. He has gained valuable insights and aggregated an
efficient network of talents.
STUDIES
He followed the Political Sciences specialization at the University of Bucharest and
currently studies the History and Theory of Art at the University of Timișoara.
KEY COMPETENCES
Management and leadership skills, broad knowledge and expertise in cultural area,
excellent communication and writing skills, innovation, cultural programming,
analytical thinking and results oriented.
Notable projects
Founder of the Center for Research and Documentation Baia Mare, affiliated to
Romanian Academy (2014). He successfully coordinated the implementation of
Biblionet project in Maramures County Libraries.
Link to Baia Mare
In 2011 is awarded with the title “Honorary Citizen” of Baia Mare for “the
ability to maintain the sacred fire in the sanctuary of our fortress”. Member of
the City Council and County Council, actively involved in the life of the city,
he successfully coordinated notable cultural events at local level, and in 2011
he received an award from the Maramures County Council’s President for the
construction and management of the „Petre Dulfu” County Library, for the
Project „Maramures in all and before all” and for „Familia Română” magazine.
STUDIES
Between 1970 and 1976 he followed the courses of the Faculty of History and
Philosophy in Cluj-Napoca. Between 2005-2006 he obtained a Postgraduate
Degree in Administrative Law at the West University “Vasile Goldis” of Arad.
In 2008, he obtained the title of Doctor in Philology (PhD) with the thesis
“Romanian and its cultivation in ASTRA’s works” from the University of Baia
Mare.
KEY COMPETENCES
Illustrator, artist, project coordinator, cultural events organiser, academic professor
in the higher arts education.
Notable projects
In partnership with the municipality of Baia Mare, in capacity of President of
the Baia Mare subsidiary of UAPR and as local councilman, she managed the
rehabilitation projects of the Colony of Painters, of the Arts Gallery and Studio
11 in Baia Mare. She coordinated the Annual Arts Festival of Baia mare, editions
of 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015.
Link to Baia Mare
Born in Baia Mare, currently living here with her family and carrying out a large
part of her activity in this city, even if a part of her professional engagements are
connected to other structures situated in different towns.
STUDIES
Laura has a University Bachelor of the Arts Degree in Graphics, issued by the Arts
and Design University from Cluj Napoca (2000) and another degree in Political
Studies at the European Studies Faculty, Babeș Bolyai University from Cluj
Napoca (2000). She obtained a PhD in Information Communication at the Nice
Sophia-Antipolis University, France (2006).
POSITION
Strategy and Development
Manager
Raluca
Medeșan
AGe
26
POSITION
Education and
Formation Manager
AGE
28
For the last five years has developed, managed and grown the first cultural
publication for young architects, an independent and self-sustained platform
that set out to reform competitiveness and education in the fields of architecture,
urban planning and industrial design. Has participated in drafting public policies
and strategic urban plans for local cultural sustainable development. Active as
urban planner, strategy consultant, journalist and entrepreneur.
Over 10 years of creating and implementing educational and cultural projects
or events in NGO`s or business sector. Her projects had both national and
international range. She also worked as a communicator, trainer, consultant,
event organizer, competence evaluator, and co-producer of cultural TV show on
the national television . As an entrepreneur, Raluca Medesan in co-owning and
concept store with native design and traditional clothing.
Biggest achievement
For the past year and a half, Mihaela has drafted and coordinated the Integrated
Urban Development Strategy of Baia Mare, overseeing and consulting
the development of more than 50 projects, worth 200 million euros in
implementation, collaborating with more than 100 organizations, public bodies
and stakeholders.
Biggest achievement
Raluca has been part of the team in charge with designing, testing and
implementing the curricula for a new job standard in Romania: “Youth Worker”.
In order to test and calibrate the curricula over 600 practitioners in this domain
obtained the certificate.
KEY COMPETENCES
Urban planning, architecture, professionalised media and marketing, public
policies
Notable projects
In 2011, Mihaela founded the Romanian Association of Young Architects
and also, for the next three years, coordinated, as Editor-In-Chief, the first
independent publication for architects and designers with national broadcast.
Since 2012, she has been actively involved in drafting policies and projects for
the Urban Development Plan of Central Bucharest and other local urban plans
in Romanian cities. In 2013, Mihaela coordinated the development of the first
Innovation Hub for Architects, in partnership with Lafarge Romania.
Link to Baia Mare
Starting 2014, Mihaela is an active consultant based in Baia Mare, developing a
number of local public strategies and policies for the city. She is one of the experts
who has coordinated and drafted the Cultural Strategy of Baia Mare.
STUDIES
Holds Bachelor and Master Degrees in both Journalism and Urban Planning,
as an alumni of the University of Bucharest and the Ion Mincu University of
Architecture and Urban Studies of Bucharest.
KEY COMPETENCES
Training and Development, Organisational Development, Project Management,
Event Concept and Coordination, Artistic Management, Community Building.
Notable projects
Raluca created educational training designs for strategic projects such as:
“The institution of Youth Worker in Romania”, “ ANTRE(pre)NOR pentru
PERFORMANTA”, Social Entrepreneurship Community, Editor in EU/RO
26 Magazine. Working in an environments full of diversity she became very
passionate about learning and human development, truly excited of the evolutions
in this domain as well as in assisting people reaching their goals.
Link to Baia Mare
In the past 5 years Raluca had valuable connections with educational and cultural
NGO`s from Baia Mare and Maramures County. Also, representing Grigore Lese,
the iconic traditional artist, her connection with the cultural environment from
Baia Mare grew very strong in the past two years.
STUDIES
In 2009 she obtained a BA in Public Relations and Communication at the
National School of Political and Administrative Sciences. She’s a certified trainer
of trainers and competences evaluator, and a member of the Training Café
Community of Practice.
Contingency planning
Have you carried out/planned a risk assessment
exercise?
What are the main strengths and weaknesses of
your project?
A risk assessment exercise facilitated by a team of management
consultants was conducted in order to evaluate the European Capital
of Culture project. The exercise was based on a previous research and
concluded with process simulation for the next five years, as well as
for 2021. The exercise allowed us to explore and integrate new options
and actions that can prevent threats to our objectives and increase
opportunities. In the meantime, all of our development strategies –
the Social Development Strategy, the Cultural Development Strategy,
the Integrated Urban Development Strategy – have been built as risk
mitigation planning instruments.
We firmly believe that we are able to turn weaknesses into growth
opportunities by using the adequate innovative approach, specific to
each need it may address. In addition to that, our strengths are solid
and if properly valued, they are able to become vectors of growth.
To this extent, we have identified all relevant risks associated to the
project and have subsequently assessed the probability of each risk
concerning impact on cost, schedule, performance or capacity. The
critical evaluation of all threats has been completed and we have settled
ways to prevent, mitigate and deal with fluctuating factors. Moreover,
every proposed action has been built upon a lean start-up architecture,
as we chose to monitor risk and beta-test by using this sustainable
development tool, ensuring the success of our endeavors.
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We believe that our outlook on the ECoC project and its holistic
integration with all strategic documents of the city is one of our
strengths, validated by the usage of six solid embedded transversal
principles: sustainability, education, technology, social integration,
networking and environmental responsibility. Moreover, the lean startup approach guarantees a coherent and firm development of all ECoC
actions we will undertake.
One of our greatest assets is the dynamic administration of the city of
Baia Mare, with a complete understanding of the European Capital
of Culture action and its capacity to deliver high quality projects,
as it has proven before. Any of Baia Mare’s cultural endeavours
will be beneficial not only to the local community, but will also
impact Euro-belonging and dialogue, as it stands at the heart of the
TransCarpathian region, polarizing five nations within 4 hours reach.
Other high points that are able to create momentum for our actions
are the rising economy, the local life quality and affordability, the smart
technical infrastructure of the city and the community’s adhesion to
the ECoC, complimented by its natural capacity to integrate and host.
How are you planning to
overcome weaknesses,
including with the use of risk
mitigation and planning tools,
contingency planning etc.
The main challenge that can pose threats to our initiative is the
difficulty in dealing with certain social integration issues that are
particularly hard to handle on medium-term. We aim at overcoming
the controversial image Baia Mare has gained by means of the
ecological accident of 2000, as well as misrepresented Roma issues
that gained international media coverage and allowed the city not to
become a top of mind when it comes to tourism and cultural vibrancy.
The lack of international exposure of the local cultural offer, the
limited audience development actions undertaken so far and the faulty
touristic promotion are matters that we will address by means of the
ECoC project, controlling damage and proficiently acting to reshape
the stated system of factors.
Urban renovations are a big part of our endeavor, as ecological and
rehabilitation issues are still left unsolved in different relevant areas
of the city. As up to 40% of our projects are to be funded by means
of European Operational Programs, handled by the Romanian
Government and its assigned Managing Authorities, we aim at
reducing any associated risks that may not be within the reach of
city administration, by opening and nurturing a strong institutional
dialogue.
As previously stated, we have mapped and prioritized major risks
connected to our ECoC project, accepting all low and medium risks
and mitigating by means of settling prevention actions, as well as
fallback plans, A and B. The main goal of this exercise was to plan
coherently in order to maintain assumed objectives achievable, no
matter what risks or unforeseen factors and events we may subjected
to. To this extent, we have defined time periods for action and
identified triggers for the provisioned fallback plans, subsequent to the
identification of minimum operational needs.
We considered the possibility of not meeting budgetary projections
as being low, due to solid financial prognosis, conjugated to the
economic stability of the country. However, our cost-efficient approach
deals with preventing unreasonable expenditure of funds. When it
comes to cultural development associated hazards, we have charted
the lack of diversity in event range and the limited quality thereof
as low risks, to be mitigated by means of lean start-up building. The
possibility of encountering problems in attracting operator interest
in engaging within the ECoC framework is irrelevant, since we have
already consulted and agreed upon collaborating. In terms of challenges
in creating and fostering a solid Euro-belonging sense, we believe
that such a risk is minor, since the local community, as well as sister
communities easily affiliate to European values even today.
However, our risk mitigation process has also mapped medium risks
that, if disturbed by external factors, can become liabilities. Hence, we
have decided to use a firm prevention approach, also putting in place a
series of fallback plans. Dormant audiences, their lack of flexibility and
the difficulty in integrating certain social deprived groups were such
issues that we addressed by integrating long-term cultural education
and aggregating vectors of social change in our program, in order to
dismiss linked undesirable effects. Choosing to use cross-fertilization
techniques is set to avoid inefficient capacity building of local
operators.
Risks concerning infrastructure scheduling, implementation and costs
have been dealt with by using a proficient approach in urban planning
and by drafting a financial additional contingency plan that has
identified different support mechanisms, shall European funding delay
or fail. Such fallback options include private funding or partnerships
with banking institutions that have already expressed their interest in
backing our plans. Another medium risk we deemed acceptable and
took on in terms of prevention is the lack of positive international
media coverage. To this extent, we are preparing an international
journalism residency program in Baia Mare, already tested in August by
a prototype action. Our marketing strategy is flexible and scalable and
has multiple reaction mechanisms in order to manage our image and
reputation.
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Marketing and communication strategy
Could your
artistic
program be
summed up by
a slogan?
Culture of Hosting
Our cultural brand, as well as our artistic program revolves around a
clear and self-explaining value proposition: “Baia Mare – Culture of
Hosting”.
Hosting is a concept that sums up the core European values:
interculturality, proactive and free connectivity of ideas, traditions and
knowledge, integration of all groups and audiences under a generous
and welcoming concept.
A good host is, per se, a proficient networker, a connector,
and a catalyst. Hosting is not only about communication, it is
communication. Hosting is not only about nurturing and sheltering
culture; it is becoming a culture in itself, forging values, language,
symbols, ethics, rituals, heroes and, subsequently, its own frame of
interpretation and action.
The hospitality proved to be, during a series of tests and polls, the topof-mind value cited by both visitors and natives when asked to describe
Baia Mare and Maramureș, the surrounding region. It is, therefore, the
intrinsic foundation of our cultural brand.
The hosting values propose, in the meantime, a short, yet
comprehensive definition for the role and mission of the European
Union. The intricate political and economic construction was built
upon the principles of hospitality: the assumed respect for the alterity,
tolerance, openness to novelty and new experiences, sharing of the
symbolic and factual capital, of resources and infrastructure, free
circulation of individuals, enhanced cultural exchanges.
The culture of hosting is, in this context, a powerful link between
the specificity of the local culture and the manifested values of the
European Union. It’s a generous, yet particular, flexible, yet meaningful
concept, that summarizes the cultural tradition of our city and our
strategic projection of values on the European canvas.
Our logo visually summarizes our intention to host all the forms of the
artistic and cultural expression, to bring together the tradition and the
experiment in arts and crafts, from performing acts to digital enhanced
installations. We are open to host the most diverse expressions of
knowledge and feelings, and we took a pledge not to be biased in our
selection by popularity, proximity to norm or to mainstream. Layer by
layer, our cultural programming effort aims to add new meanings to
the definitions listed above.
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What is the city’s
intended marketing
and communication
strategy for the
European Capital of
Culture year? *
*in particular with regard to the media strategy and the
mobilisation of large audiences. At the final selection stage,
consideration must be given in particular to the partnerships
planned or established with the written press and the
audiovisual sector with a view to ensuring media coverage of the
event and of the plans relating to this strategy.
How will you mobilize
your own citizens as
communicators of the
year to the outside
world?
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And, yes, everything is about communication. Answering the
phone is marketing. Choosing a T-shirt instead of a suit or
the other way around, is marketing. Downloading an app is
marketing. Strategy is about marketing. Human resources are
about marketing. Budgeting depends on marketing and, of
course, is about marketing. And marketing is above all, about
communication.
Everything is marketing
The major whys shaping
our strategic vision are:
In dense and competitive mediums such as the cultural and the
creative industries field, communication must be an organic part
of the organizational culture. Marketing and communication
cannot be organizational silos, isolated from the other processes;
instead, they must act like transversal structures bringing together
talents and aggregating task forces from all the departments for
specific tasks. Our communication vision is flexible and goal
oriented, favouring efficient approaches. This vision serves also
as a contingency plan that can help us actively adjust the long
term communication strategies that can rarely manage the instant
feedback of the audience or remain valid in a five years timeframe.
We believe that an agile strategic vision, backed by strategic
constructs and tools, is equally important as an strict calendar of
implementation.
We must gain solid
international awareness.
MILESTONE: an international
reach of 8.000.000 people
Any healthy marketing and communication strategy starts with
some honest answers for a key question: Why? If we elaborate on
this question, more legitimate question marks will follow. What
is our motivation? What are our purposes? How can we translate
these purposes into objectives, milestones and action plans? What
insights can we highlight based on these inquiries?
We want our messages
to be accessible for all
types of public.
We want to build longlasting local and regional
awareness.
MILESTONE: becoming a
top-of-mind cultural and
touristic destination
• Including heterogeneous
international public,
• Including social categories
at risk
• Featuring dedicated
solutions for categories with
special accessibility needs
We want to create
autonomous
communication-ready
cultural programs
• Our management efforts
will focus on capacity
building
• Training, formation and
know-how transfer are core
activities in the majority of
our programs
We plan to enable
our citizens as
communicators by
involving as active
stakeholders in our
candidacy process, by:
• offering them multiple
levels of engagement
• extending our offer
with multiple personal
development opportunities
Considering the answers above as starting line, we have spent a great deal of research and creative work in order
to define and to validate a cultural brand for our city that conveys a strong visual and verbal identity. Based on a
three months period beta-testing and more than 20 focus-groups, we are confident that our brand:
is memorable, distinct and, in the long run, easily recognizable by
both national and international audiences
has the recognition and support of the local communities,
determining (stimulating) immediate adoption and ownership, and
is suitable for dissemination and translation in various mediums
and by various multipliers
has the potential to become a love brand, iconic and seminal
Our logo summarizes our value proposition and our strategic vision using a horizontal section of a six pieces
wooden knot, a traditional Maramureș symbol that can be found in most of the ancestral European cultures.
It is the only such world-known knot structure, that protects the inner void, like a womb, as a metaphor
to shelter, hosting, protecting, nurturing, all principles that are specific to our candidacy. This visual
representation also promotes the value generated by juxtaposition of tradition and innovation, of arts and
crafts, of different layers of cultures.
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Hosts
Defining the audiences for our communication and marketing strategy allowed us to develop a clear and
coherent approach in terms of messages and necessary communication tools. We decided to structure them
in two categories: Hosts and Guests, in order to map them based on their involvement potential and also to
calibrate our messages accordingly.
Message Receivers and
Message Multipliers
• Local cultural institutions
• The local existing, emerging and developing
public
• International networks of cultural
managers and cultural operators
• The national and international,
culturally active public
• Local media
• Cultural managers and operators such as:
gallery owners, curators, movie and show
producers or event organizers
• International journalists, online
influencers and bloggers
• National cultural institutions and the
central administration
• Local cultural independent cultural
managers and operators
• Performers, artists, cultural personalities
Each category is divided into two strategic categories:
Connectors and Message Co-creators. We are talking about aware
and proactive communities and categories of public we want to enable
to participate in our campaigns, in order to shape and broadcast their
own messages. Co-creation has already been tested by commercial
brands and cultural institutions as an innovative way to engage
communities, to earn their trust and build loyalty. It is also crucial to
empower them to propose, initiate, and facilitate potential projects and
partnerships, as this approach will create the much needed legitimacy,
momentum, and traction for our programs.
Message Receivers and Message Multipliers. In an era of
interconnectivity, the notion of inert public is obsolete. Every receiver
is now a potential message multiplier, narrowcasting his reviews,
opinions, memories, and thoughts to a network of peers. This peer-topeer distribution of messages is an important pillar of our strategy, and
one relevant example that illustrates it is the inclusion of the tourists as
message multipliers.
• Local, national, regional and international
NGOs, with a focus on: cultural associations
and foundations, youth organizations
and host-organizations for volunteers,
environmental organizations and grass-root
movements, social integration and social
support organizations
• Exposed social categories or categories
at risk: single mothers, unemployed youths,
seniors, members of ethnic minorities such as
the Roma minority, immigrants
• Local educators, professors and trainers
active in the educational field
• National media
• Bloggers, online influencers, and
independent online journalists
• Key Opinion Leaders
• Cultural ambassadors
• Performers and artists originating from
Baia Mare or that are frequently active in
the area.
Connectors and
Message Co-creators
Message Receivers and
Message Multipliers
Connectors and
Message Co-creators
• All the political actors active at a local and
regional level
Public, audiences
and communities
Guests
• National and international NGOs
• The niche national and international media
• Investors, including impact investors and
angel investors
• National and international educators
• International performers and artists
• Incoming Tourists
• Creative industries entrepreneurs and
investors
• Cultural funds managers
• Cultural tourists
• Adventure tourists and backpackers
• Business tourists
• City break tourists
• Local creative industries
• Local hospitality industry
• Representatives of the cities and regions
situated in the proximity of Baia Mare,
including foreign countries: Ukraine, Hungary,
Moldavia, Slovakia or Poland.
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Baia Mare 2021 - Capitală Europeană a Culturii
71
Penetration of dedicated
networks of professionals
Strategic partnerships with media
entities and institutions with an established
brand and strong communication networks
Besides the public networks and channels, we
will focus on getting our message to worldwide
networks of specialists and cultural managers
such
as the Robert Bosch Foundation and the
The collaboration with reputed cultural and media brands
MitOst Association, to give you just some
is an insurance that our programs and our cultural brand
examples, using already existing boards,
gain the correct exposure. Another significant benefit of
bulletins, newsletters, discussion
this approach is the symbolic value transfer through brand
groups or forums.
associations. Future partnerships with festivals such as
transmediale Berlin, institutions such as Ars Electronica
Linz or Literaturhaus Berlin, or media channels such as
ARTE, to give you just some examples, are relevant
steps toward our success. The same principle
applies to local partnership with cultural
Peer-to-peer PR and
centers, museums, galleries, and
peer-to-peer marketing
festivals.
Tactics and tools
In order to reach the milestones previously listed we will
focus on several tactics:
As stated before, we rely on the power of
the online communities to broaden our reach
by reviews and direct recommendations. We
intend to encourage this approach through
dedicated activation campaigns and
integrative publishing and monitoring
tools that link multiple social
networks and platforms.
Platform corsairing
We have started to test the promotion of our cultural values and
attractions on popular third party websites: travel directories,
booking websites, cultural magazines or business portals.
We plan to tune and scale this cost-efficient
approach that supports our peer-to-peer
marketing tactics.
Open calls for projects and proposals
on open platforms
In order to engage the local, regional, national, and
European communities as active stakeholders in our
programs, we want to implement the ”3 minutes & 3
clicks” online applications that would allow them to
propose projects or apply for residencies, fellowships,
or internships. Supported by a clear an transparent
selection process with properly explained evaluation
criteria and instant publishing of the results,
this type of solution can prove to be a
breakthrough in terms of massive
public involvment and
endorsement.
An important component of every line of programs proposed
for 2021 is the content output, essential for the documentation,
dissemination, and optimization of the impact. We will
Tactical media techniques
be faithful to this approach in the following five years of
preparation, assuring a constant flow of high quality content
The access to culture is often limited by a narrow
relevant for international audiences and made accessible
promotion
that uses a strict, recognizable, but limited
through translations: monographs, magazines,
in impact visual and verbal style. Imagine a poster for a
catalogues, audiobooks, podcasts, EPs and LPs
Philosophy conference that uses the visual code of a music
available online and offline, documentary
festival poster. Imagine a radio spot for a museum that
features, interactive maps
uses the last pop music hit as soundtrack. Imagine hipand websites.
hop artists promoting eco-tours and online games
that dynamically unveil you the history of the
city. Now imagine the viral potential of this
approach.
Innovative tactics ask for innovative tools. We want to
go beyond the familiar and mandatory press-releaseposter-TV-spot universe, exploring new alternatives
that can engage more effectively new audiences.
Here are a few of our on-going projects:
Trans-platform campaigning with
multilevel messages
Calibration of tools and channels based on
the media habits of specific communities
Facebook, for instance, is a great landing platform for communication at a
national level, as more than 7.000.000 Romanians are active in this network,
and the advertising costs are relatively low. However, for specialized international
communities – journalists, artists, or creative industries professionals – we will focus
our campaigns on their native platforms, for instance Twitter, LinekdIn or Behance,
using English as campaign lingua franca.
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Interconnected display network
Focus on rich content, publication
and digital initiatives
The presence on the social network or the citations on primetime news are not communication objectives, only contextual
solutions to reach a specific milestone or an audience group. We
are focusing on brand and communication vehicles with a long
life span that are relevant in multiple platforms and mediums:
video productions, high-quality visual support, relevant well
documented stories – communication kits available under
Creative Common licence that journalists or artists, TV
networks or publishers can use, build upon, mix,
modify and broadcast for free.
In order to minimize our carbon print we are expanding
a city-wide network of displays covering meeting places,
cultural institutions and public spaces. Broadcasting our
calendar of events in real time on low-consumptions
LED displays is a sustainable alternative to low-impact
printed materials such as flyers or posters, but also
a great opportunity to attract and promote
sponsors, or to emphasize the role of the
European Union in our programs.
User-generated mobile map for
cultural navigation
We are currently testing an interactive map that
allows users to navigate through the city’s cultural
offer and to interact through photos, videos and
reviews, generating content and proposing dynamic
hierarchies and point of interest. The map will be
available on smartphone and mobile devices and
will integrate internet of things solutions that
deliver valuable information concerning
event attendance, weather or
traffic conditions.
MeltingPot Radio
Baia Mare will host a radio studio with a dedicated
broadcasting licence open to international DJs,
producers, news anchors and journalists in residence or
in touch online. We plan a lean start, focusing on online
broadcasting and podcasting; and scale our capacity
incrementally. In 2021 the radio studio should offer
to all visitors a 24 hours cultural alternative to
commercial radio, covering our events and
projects live in at least 3 languages.
Dedicated online platform
Our online platform integrates a sum of features: unlimited foreign
languages modules, unlimited interactive tools such as polls and forms
for public consultation, interactive maps and calendars or real time
broadcasting of events and booking solutions. The backend interface allows
instant updates with zero maintenance costs, as well as limitless scaling of
the functionalities. By 2020, the platform will evolve into a plug-and-play
interface for organizers, managers, artists, and curators allowing them
to explore locations and venues in virtual tours, to upload documents,
promotion materials and print files, reducing this way considerably the
logistic costs of events and programs.
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Baia Mare has an estimated 7,3 percentage of adult population
working in other cities. More than three quarters of this percentage
choose employment abroad, often on a seasonal basis. Work
migration is focused in Western Europe, in countries with a
significant Romanian Diaspora such as Spain, Italy, Germany,
France or UK. These figures apply, with small variations, for the
entire region, giving us some interesting facts to build upon. More
than 15.000 people from Baia Mare and the surrounding area,
most of them between 18 to 45 years old, are active members of
local communities abroad. We are talking about an age group with
an appetence for technology, active online, constant consumers,
reviewers and broadcasters of online content.
Crossing borders
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Another strategic layer of message multipliers are the residents of Baia Mare, owners
or tenants of properties. We have launched an official support program operationalized
by the City Council that helps them – by attestation, microfunding, consulting and
hospitality training programs – list their properties and vacation rentals or couchsurfing
spots. In 2016 we plan to launch our first activation campaign promoting Cultural
Couchsurfing – free to discover as an alternative way to explore and experience Baia
Mare and the surrounding region. This strategic, yet efficient, approach has three
objectives:
Their sense of belonging is still very strong; a great deal of their
revenue is reinvested in the construction or rehabilitations of homes
in their family home villages or invested in small business and real
estate properties in Baia Mare. It is an already traditional manner for
them – documented in documentaries such as Pride and Concrete
and other anthropological studies – to express their pride, to state
their success and their status. They regularly return home during the
summer season to attend or to host traditional weddings, or during
the winter holiday, in order to reunite the extended families around
elaborate celebrations marked by intact ethnographic rituals.
We see them as our ambassadors, our unfairly forgotten link between tradition and
contemporaneity, between Romania and its Western audiences. If properly activated
by online and word of mouth campaigns, and provided with calibrated promotion
kits, their reach in terms of communication can go, in a five year timeframe, to more
than 150.000 people. With a solid institutional and advertising support, the viral
potential and spread of these out-of-the box campaigns can reach online much larger
audiences, up to 1.000.000 people. We plan to start in 2016 the first step of the Bring
home a friend! campaign, aiming to determine and help the working abroad citizens of
Baia Mare to invite members of their residence communities to join them during the
summer or winter holidays. Another program dedicated to our informal ambassadors is
a holiday home-exchange program, aiming to incrementally increase our international
awareness and to develop the incoming tourist flux during peak seasons. We value this
approach to spread our message because it is true to our key values: hospitality and
openness to all cultures.
1
Why don’t you move in?
2
3
Organically increase our accommodation capacity with at least 1.000 beds
by 2020.
Raise our international awareness using free online promotion tools with
a tremendous adoption rate worldwide such as: Couchsurfing, Airbnb,
Craigslist or FlipKey, to give you just some currently trending examples.
We aim to become, by 2020, a top 5 destination for Romania on the mentioned
websites, with over 800 properties listed in a 30 minutes drive radius. The
estimated audiences reach for this program can total more than 1.000.000
tourists by 2021.
Promote our city as a hip destination embracing the sharing-economy
trends, appealing to young and dynamic audiences. We are counting on the
buzz factor of this initiative, and we’ll enable it through PR campaigns
aimed at economical publications, travel blogs and websites, as well as
lifestyle publications with a targeted reach of 250.000 professionals.
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A third activation layer for the local community is our Cultural Ambassadors Program, aimed
at engaging local personalities, cultural performers, key opinion leaders and creative industries
professionals with a proven international mobility and reach. We want to extend the meaning of this
title beyond its honorary function. The chosen cultural ambassadors – reaching a 300 threshold
by 2020 – will be trusted with an international mandate for negotiations with cultural operator,
investors, artists and other significant categories of public and collaborators. The first appointed
ambassadors will be: the musician Grigore Leșe, the photographers Cosmin Bumbuț, Hajdu Tamas and
Alexandru Paul and the creative director Șerban Alexandrescu.
This approach intends not only to identify, celebrate and empower
local talents and doers. Instead of isolating the chosen ambassadors
from the local community, we plan to promote them as rolemodels and to extend and enhance their community involvement
through public events and interventions ranging from exhibitions
to conferences, from concerts to workshops. The objectives of this
approach are:
Proud to represent
• To promote our candidacy using our star endorsers through a
series of video and audio commercials aired in partnership with a
local mainstream TV and radio network, as well as with international
infotainment channels with an overall audience of 3.000.000 people.
• To create online communicational momentum around the cultural
ambassadors using activation campaigns. We have implemented an
online application allowing the local community to propose and elect
their ambassador of choice. By 2019 we plan to have a community
of more than 30.000 people gathered around this campaign, with an
estimated online peak reach of 500.000.
• To enhance the local spirit, promoting new role-models and fresh
values as part of the city’s DNA.
The forth layer is built upon volunteer programs with a
communication component, involving local and international
participants. By 2020 we plan to host 500 international volunteers
that can internationally capacitate and promote the local efforts to
communicate the values and the programs summed up under the
title of European Capital of Culture. On local level, we have started
to build a network of volunteers with strong communication and
media skills that will reach the 5.000 members threshold by 2020.
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Welcoming the
film industry
Another key step we will take in order to profile our city as a harbor
for quality journalism and media professionalism is the hosting of
the 11th edition of Aristoteles International Documentary Film
Workshop in 2016, a one-month long unique applied training
program that enable 5-10 teams of producers and filmmaker to
document, film and produce a full documentary feature on a
local subject. This strategic decision is a letter of intent expressing
the determination of our city to become an alternative center to
Bucharest for the film production industries. The drastically lower
rental and production cost, the privileged geographical position in
the proximity of four states, as well as the diversified landscape, are
definitely strong advantages that support our agenda.
By the end of 2015, our candidacy website will host a section
dedicated to international filmmakers containing: a location
scouting section, a casting section and a list of local service
providers including: equipment rentals, logistics, makeup and hair,
set design, accommodation, and catering. Another project that
brings our long-term project to life is the creation of a state-of-theart media production studio, open for local educational projects,
but also serving as a functional headquarters for international media
productions. To sum it up, we plan to be, by 2020, the host of at
least 20 local film productions and 4 international productions, and
the subject of at least 20 documentary features.
A new home for
journalism
Content is King, or so the communication gurus restlessly preach
for the last decade. We plan to progressively abandon the invasive
PR paradigm based on costly advertorials and costly TV commercial.
Instead, we want to transform our city in a blooming regional capital
of journalism and film production. We have already prototyped a
residency program that hosted five independent journalists from
Romania, enabling them to find their own local stories, free from
pressure regarding the angle, source of financing or intrusive editorial
policies. We plan steadily to scale this program in the following years
by including international journalist from prestigious publications
such as Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Die Welt, El Pais, Le
Monde, The Economist or Time, but also extend our open invitation
to more narrowcasted media producers, sites of publications:
Wired, Monocle, Jet Art, Vice, Habitat, Beaux Arts, as well as to
independent bloggers and journalists from Europe. These intended
residencies programs have three objectives:
1 • To propose local subjects to broad international
audiences, using the principles of transparency and
professional solidarity. In a five years’ timeframe, we aim
to support through this line of programs more than 50
articles addressing a worldwide public.
In order to complete our networking and capacity development
vision, we took the responsibility of supporting, logistically and
financially, as well as hosting the most important Romanian events
dedicated to journalism excellence: the international conferences The
Power of Storytelling and the SuperWritings Prize.
Another consistent initiative is Printed in Baia Mare! – a support
program for magazines, fanzines and publishing houses searching
for high quality subsidized printing solutions. Our aim is to support
the temporary relocation of Romanian and regional editorial teams,
allowing them not only to research local subjects, but also to locally
print a special edition of their titles. By the end of 2020, we want
Printed in Baia Mare! to become a quality stamp, promoting the
professionalism of the local dozens of printing houses, but also
proving our long-lasting support for the media field.
In the same spirit, this year we launched the first edition of the
Cultural Journalism Competition, and it is our declared goal to
support the regional professionals in researching and completing
complex and valuable projects, with an appeal for international
audiences. The competition also intends to create a local
support network that can assist our international guests in their
documentation process, as well as to create a community of practice
with an independent agenda and strong, manifested ethics.
2 • To set the foundation for future institutional
partnerships with media and journalism networks such
as ARTE, ZDF/ARD, BBC, euronews, InterNations or Word
Alliance.
3 • To enhance the quality of local and regional
journalism and media production, through workshops,
conferences and professional trainings developed in
partnerships with our guests. Baia Mare 2021 - European Capital of Culture
77
We live in a media democracy, where everyone can become a reporter
or a media producer with entitled rights to his or her 30 seconds
of fame. YouTube and Vimeo, Instagram, Vine, and Periscope are
defining a new media landscape instantly reaching audiences from
around the globe. Using competitions, photo and video workshops,
photo tours and activation campaigns, we plan to encourage
alternative broadcasting of photos and videos projecting their
invitation and vision for 2021. A properly used hashtag on Twitter or
Facebook is a great solution to complete, in terms of lifespan, reach
and conversion rates, the awareness performances of a classic form
of communication such as primetime TV story. Using common tags
such as #baiamare2021 or #youarewelcome, a high profile landing
page on Facebook and an integrative app, every resident with a
smartphone can virtually and de facto become a promoter of his or
her city. By 2021, our milestones in terms of social networks and
alternative publishing reach are:
500.000+ fans and followers on Facebook, Twitter
of other emerging trending social media platforms
Peer-to-peer.
Step by step.
10.000.000+ combined peak reach for all the
communication and publishing platforms
20% benchmark engagement rate for our published
posts and materials
500 news and stories originated in the online
medium broadcasted by TV stations or published
by newspapers
True to our innovation values, we decided to walk the talk when it
comes to promote our city as a cultural destination, using peerto-peer recommendation networks dedicated to tourism, such
as TripAdvisor, as well as booking sites such as Booking.com or
Venere.com. Our goal is to become, in a five year timeframe, a top
5 destination in Romania, empowering user cross-reviews from
residents and visitors through awareness and activation campaigns in
partnership with the local hospitality industry. This out-of-the box
approach, supported by advertising campaigns, training programs,
dedicated apps, and online support, can be translated into an
outstanding online reach of 2.500.000 people by 2021.
78
Our sociological research indicate that a vast majority of 92% of the people aware of our candidacy,
representing at their turn 68% of the adult population, correlates the European Union as author
of the European Capital of Culture. We can conclude that we have a solid base to build our
communication upon, at least at local level. However, in order to ensure the adequate perception,
we will make sure to highlight this link using:
How does the city plan
to highlight that the
European Capital of
Culture is an action of
the European Union?
• A dedicated 360 degrees awareness campaign, focused on the online medium and our own media productions,
as well as the inclusion of traditional media partnerships and media planning;
• A special section on the website dedicated to the institutional relations and partnerships involved by the
European Capital of Culture, promoting and putting to action the principles of transparency;
• A dedicated clip promoting the European Union’s authorship of the project with a one year lifespan, broadcasted
on heavy rotation on our interconnected display network.
The European Union’s role as a creator and a catalyst of this program
cannot and should not be resumed at the positioning of a logo on the
promotional materials or specific websites. Adverts and press releases
that follow strict guidelines and regulations are a must, and a good
starting point as well. The brand manual for Baia Mare’s candidacy
for the title of ECoC is already including a dedicated section
covering the correct communication of tutelages, partnerships and
collaborations, elaborating on written and visual standards, on an
extended list of media, and offering several guiding templates.
As stated before, our core team has strong communication skills,
and all of the managers have a relevant marketing or public relations
backgrounds. We plan to scale the extended board, our team of
experts, as well as our local support group based on this criteria, as
responsible impact communication must be assimilated as a must,
not delegated as an ordinary task. This way we can make sure that
every spokesman, frontman, decision maker and influencer involved
in our project can deliver, fast-check and also improve the correct
public message emphasizing the role of the European Union.
Our institutional partners from all fields, as well as our volunteers
will be part of induction programs supported by online followup, allowing them to familiarize with the rigors of public
communication, the recommended guidelines and the mandatory
quotations and institutional brand exposure. Based on constant
monitoring of the local media, if needed, we can expand the
induction program. A dedicated audit and monitoring team using
instant listening tools such UberVu will supervise the quality of our
presence in the international media, and intervene, if needed, to
ensure the correct representation of the European Union role.
79
“
The 2021 European Capital of Culture competition has beautifully challenged Romania.
An entire process of awareness, self-seeking and reshaping city priorities and strategies, having
culture at its core, has been set in motion. The city of Baia Mare and our entire community
decided to accept the challenge, but first and foremost, we raised the bid in a competition with
ourselves and our future.
We have drafted a master plan with multiple partitions linked together in an effort that goes far
beyond 2021, a project that aims at boosting the city’s economy, developing social and cultural
capital, setting the benchmark in Romania in terms of talent aggregation and creative economies.
We firmly believe that our nomination will be the gearing up for growth we have prepared for in
the last years. To us, it is a driver for true and thorough change, as we see culture to be the high
impact step for a sustainable city development. Loyal to this purpose, the Municipality lends its
full and utmost support to all actions related to what has become the strategic project of
Baia Mare – European Capital of Culture 2021.
Cătălin Cherecheș,
Mayor of Baia Mare
80
What makes our application so special
compared to others? Why choose Baia Mare?
The real competition that you face when applying for the title of ECoC is
yourself. It is the perfect occasion to ask yourself what are the things that we
can improve starting tomorrow, or even today. This application was a great
opportunity for us to evaluate ourselves, to convert our heritage into a strong
motivation, to transform our dreams into implementation-ready strategies.
We truly believe that this endeavour can change the vocation and the destiny
of our city. We value this competition as an important chance to develop,
rather than a race for a title.
What makes us special is our will to struggle for our values and to succeed.
We have put together all of our efforts in order to build a project that is
ingenious, sustainable and has the capacity to evolve into a textbook
definition of city renewal. We have said it from the start: we are at a tipping
point. Aiming for the European Capital of Culture nomination is an effort to
correct and accelerate the sustainable development of our city, overcoming
our limitations in order to become a healthy, prosperous and cultural city, a
community united in its diversity.
Editorial Team
Andreea Ciortea, Izabella Kiskasza, Raluca Medeșan, Mihaela Pușnava, Vlad Tăușance
Consultants, advisers and experts
Radu Macrinici, Laura Ghinea, Teodor Ardelean, Tiberiu Alexa, Ioan Marchiș, Mircea
Bochiș, Mihai Grigorescu, Ștefan Dărăbuș, Florian Sălăjeanu, Grigore Leșe, Iulia
Gorneanu, Costel Bucur, Steli Grigore, Alexandra Cantor, Danina Arsene, Paul
Manolescu, Roxana Bucată, Timea Hont, Valentina Nicolae, Rodica Brad, Adriana Suciu,
Annamaria Somay, Bianca Herlo, Rareș Crăiuț, Hannes Nehls, Ana-Maria Moldovan,
Amelia Bănică, Cristian Kit Paul, Mario Kuibuș, Stefan Paskucz, Ildiko Mitru
Visual concept and identity
Photography
Dan Mezok, Mihai Grigorescu, Viorela Tarta, Ciprian Strugariu, Florin Rusu, Cătălin Pop
Add any further comments which you deem
necessary in relation with your application.
Whether we will obtain the nomination as European Capital of Culture or
not, we are ready to act as we have planned, truthful to the mission we set
ourselves to carry. This program’s purpose was and is to make us compete
with ourselves, challenging and pushing our status quo, as a city and as a
community. Last, but not least, please always care to remember and spread
the word: whenever in need of a great host or a new experience,
Baia Mare is here to welcome you!
Special thanks to
Adriana Moldovan, Anca Feher, Georgiana Popovici, Radu Țolaș, Dan Coardă,
Laszlo-Tibor Olah, Hajdu Tamas, Vasile Dorolți, Dan Bucă, Horațiu Săsaran,
Ionuț Caraba, Romeo Crișan
Supported and advised by the Municipality of Baia Mare
and the Mayor of Baia Mare, Cătălin Cherecheș
81
Piata Libertății nr. 15, 430321
Baia Mare, România

Baia Mare - Capitală Europeană a Culturii 2021

Transcription

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