Live Incubator: Kick-off
Live Incubator: European Cultural Project is in motion
Press release here.
In January, SPOT Festival and Fermaten launched a new transnational project. With support from the European Cultural Region and Tuborgfondet, Live Incubator was created to bring together enterprising young cultural and industry professionals across European borders. Now, nearly two months later, the incubator is truly underway, as the 13 selected youths from Midtjylland and the 10 chosen from various European countries have had their first meeting.
Live Incubator is a program leading up to the SPOT Festival 2024, culminating in three days of project development in the week leading up to SPOT, before the overall results are presented on the festival’s conference track SPOT+. However, before that, online sessions must be held, where participants are both taught by various industry professionals and meet in their assigned groups with whom they are going to work on upcoming projects. While screen meetings may be passé in many places, once again, they prove to be a valuable tool for bringing together individuals from different countries.
Participants from Near and Far
A total of 23 young industry actors ended up being part of the first Live Incubator class, each coming from cultural backgrounds as diverse as the nationalities they represent. Some reside in their respective countries, while others have settled in Denmark, where they work within the cultural sector in various capacities.
The selected participants include Egill Ástráðsson (IS), Iwona Bronisz (PL), Miriam Boulos (ES), Nela Peshovska (MK), Regina Fisch (AT), Tena Šarčević (HR), Sophia Zimmermann (DE), Sita Rawie (NL), Simon Alejandro Larsen (NO), Robin Smedman (SE), Adela Kučkovská (SK/DK), Alma Azimi Steenberg (DK), Bastian Borup Terp (DK), Daniel Aneto Olesen (DK), Johanne Elise Friis (DK), Mai Hiura (DK), Malte Sanggaard (DK), Gracia Rios (ES), Sebastian Byrsting (DK), Sandra Flammild (DK), Rosa Lois Balle Yahiya (DK), Pablo Lara Garcia (ES), and Oscar O’Shea (IE/DK).
The latter, Oscar O’Shea, works as a project manager at Tapetown in Aarhus and as a booking agent at Okay Management. He looks forward to developing projects with others who share the same drive within the cultural sector, especially with the opportunity for projects to cross borders:
“We started the project off strong. It was great to be in the same virtual space with everyone, even though it was via Zoom, as we were connected from across Europe – and the facilitators are fantastic and skilled at digital meetings. We first learned about each other’s passions, the reasons for working on what we do, and then we got started. The first session was about throwing everything we had in mind onto paper and seeing what would stick when we took a collective look. I can already see it all taking shape, and I can’t wait to get to know these people and their realities even better. There is much work to be done to ensure a sustainable, artistic, and cohesive music industry in the future,” says Oscar O’Shea, one of the participants in Live Incubator.
Kick-off online
The first online session in the program has been held, as mentioned. More precisely, it took place on March 19th, where all participants logged in to greet each other and to hear a presentation from SPOT’s director, Rikke Andersen. This laid the groundwork for future sessions leading up to the SPOT week, where everyone will meet in Aarhus. Next time, the 23 participants will be taught by Matthias Finlandsen from Tuborgfondet, Emma Meyer from the Central EU Office Denmark, and Grace Puluczek from LiveMX, focusing on topics such as initiating collaborations with new people and sharing current results.
