Between 2020 and 2023, the University of Malta was involved in an EU-funded Horizon2020 project about the use of the arts with various individuals and groups of people in the context of societal challenges around Europe. This open access publication edited by Andrea Karpati (Corvinus University, Budapest) explores various examples that highlight the relationship between participatory arts and social, economic, and cultural exclusion. It includes chapters that assess the impact of these projects on skill development, identity reinforcement, and community-building. This book (Routledge, 2024) is particularly relevant for scholars in visual arts, art education, design education, drama and theatre education, and museum pedagogy, offering insights into the transformative power of participatory arts within these fields.

Art education does not address only the subject of ‘art’; or rather, it shows that ‘art’ is always more than ‘art’, more than the transmission of a set of skills and techniques. By addressing social, political and more-than-human issues, it seeks to encourage individuals and groups to critically engage with the world around them, fostering ecological awareness and encouraging activism.

This report published online in 2024 presents research carried out as part of Project Result 2 (PR2) of the EU-funded Critical Arts Education for Sustainable Societies (CARE/SS) project. Part 1 includes a study of the state of the art on the content of the courses/training programmes planned for CARE/SS as well as creative case studies targeting different populations, societal challenges and project goals. Part 2 brings together a set of localized curricula for the delivery of teachers’ courses by different partners in this project. Part 3 gives lists of resources used by different partners for the implementation of their courses, lists of software and/or apps that were planned for use by the different teams planning online or hybrid interventions, and several Strategy Cards prepared by the different partners for use in the courses.on text goes here

‘Suitable Citizens’ (2021) was a socially engaged project with a group of participants and artist-teachers organised at the University of Malta. Like many other participatory projects, this project generated more questions than answers. Who decides about the aims of a workshop? How does one balance some participants’ interest in ‘skills’ with an artist’s interest in political advocacy? This article published in 2022 in the International Journal of Art & Design Education reflects about some of the challenges and evaluates outcomes.