Communitism
Communitism is an open community of creative professionals experimenting with practices of commoning at Keramikou 28 in Metaxourghio, Athens. They build a trust-based, cooperative relationship between owners and community members to transform abandoned or under-utilized cultural heritage buildings into cultural commons operated by active communities. Communitism calls for shared responsibilities between building owners (public or private) and communities to maintain and preserve cultural heritage. They consider collaborative artistic expression as a generator of common knowledge and practice. They believe space can shift behaviour and transform character. Art is the methodology to transcend individualism into common practices and inviting people to engage into active citizenship.
Communitism is based on sharing spaces, means of production, competences and time through practices of cooperation, solidarity and mutualism. Inspired by civic use principles Communitism grants accessibility, usability, fairness, inclusiveness and common decision-making process in the use and care of spaces.
What makes the organisation unique?
The uniqueness of the organisation lies in the social experiment that is being performed for the first time in the specific socio-economic circumstances of a society which has lost its collective memory in commoning, and is being called to consciously cooperate towards a common goal: The revival of an abandoned cultural heritage building in Athens.
The process has attracted people with diverse cultural backgrounds and needs. Together they reverse the damaging factors that have caused decay in the building by keeping it in use, in collaboration with numerous communities of the local creative ecosystem. This exchange is producing rich outcomes on self-regulation dynamics developed within the organisation. The sustainability of the experiment is a measuring factor, as well as the establishment of common ethics. The state of maintenance of the building is a mirror of the community residing in it.
What TEH activities is the centre a part of?
Balkan Hub
