Culture as deconstruction and participation? Reflections from a field…in Transition

This chapter aims at exploring how the different artistic activities realized during the project “Atlas of Transitions” in Bologna (Italy), promoted cultural and social change both in terms of narratives built around migration and diversity, and in terms of practices of resistance and social inclusion facilitating intercultural dialogue among migrants and host communities. Our reflection will focus on a double level of analysis. From the methodological point of view, it will investigate how in the project “Atlas of Transitions” the approach of action research sustains the conditions under which groups of people can organize and learn from their own experience, showing a major shift in both the reflection on knowledge production within and outside the academy and in the relations between research, action and social change. Secondly, our analysis will focus on the processes of audience development that engage the audience of artistic practices to intervene directly in the performances. By doing this, both action research and audience development intervene in supporting a critical reflection by the participants, nurturing change and awareness about migration, linking the artistic, civic, and political sphere.