Invisible heritage: exchange and implementation of good practice in access to culture for persons with a visual impairment
Project acronym: TouchingThePast
Project duration: 1 year
The amount of the grant program PL-BY-UA: 60 852 EUR
Grant holder: The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin (Poland)
Project goals: to promote cultural heritage of Lublin and Ivano-Frankivsk by increasing their accessibility to persons with a visual impairment, especially those with total blindness. These persons encounter particular difficulties with access to art.
Specific project objectives are:
- Evaluation of accessibility of cultural heritage for persons with visual impairments in Lublin and in Ivano-Frankivsk and of the needs in the area of training of staff responsible for providing access to cultural heritage (museums, art galleries, city guides).
- Reducing the impact of unsatisfactory access to art as a source of social exclusion by adapting selected cultural institutions and city tours to meet the needs of persons with a visual impairment..
- Preparing a group of persons with a visual impairment participating in the project to make confident use of innovations providing access to art (tactile graphics workshops, understanding the relation between 3-D objects and their 2-D representations as drawings.
- Increasing interest in art among persons with blindness by raising its accessibility; also increasing chances of persons with a visual impairment in active participation in creating works of art.
- Increasing attractiveness of selected cultural institutions by providing them with solutions which will increase their accessibility for persons with visual impairments (innovative technical solutions may work as additional attractions for all visitors) and by staff training (introducing staff to new available solutions).
- Raising awareness of Lublin and Ivano-Frankivsk population about possibilities of making cultural heritage accessible to persons with a visual impairment by organizing events involving participants with and without a disability of sight.
- Building a foundation for transborder cooperation in the area of promoting cultural heritage of both regions by organizing exchange visits of groups of persons with a visual impairment and employees of cultural institutions.
Partnership:
The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin (Poland)
Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University (Ukraine)
Contact person and project manager in Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University:Christina Kazimirov, Lecturer in the Department of Music Education and Conducting,
e-mail: kazymyriv@gmail.com