At EMCCINNO, we believe that innovation thrives at the crossroads — where disciplines intertwine like the branches of an old forest and ideas cross-pollinate across sectors, cultures, and communities. Rooted in the fertile ground of artistic innovation, community-driven transformation and sustainable climate transitions (SCT), EMCCINNO (Empowering Community-based Cultural and Creative Industries for Innovation) is a European project dedicated to cultivating systemic change.
Like mycelium networks beneath a forest floor, we foster self-reflectivity, mutual learning and deep connections linking cultural and artistic, scientific, and citizen ecosystems to support Creative and Cultural Industries (CCIs) in co-designing transitions for fairer and more sustainable futures.
Our approach? (Re)Generative. Rhizomatic. Non-linear. We nurture emergence over control, process over product, community over hierarchy. Through cooperation, research, artistic practices, training and sharing we engage in growing new methods of transforming local challenges into collective resilience.
EMCCINNO Partners:
Our five transformation sites — Where Seeds Become Systems
Across Europe, EMCCINNO is rooted in five transformation sites — diverse cultural ecosystems where experimentation, community, and creativity flourish. Each site is a fertile field for prototyping new ways of thinking, making, and connecting. Together, they form a constellation of local action with translocal impact.
La Friche la Belle de Mai
Marseille, France
A former tobacco factory turned into a cultural laboratory. La Friche pulses with artistic energy and civic engagement, exploring ecological redirection and collective transformation
BeTime SCA
Vejer de la Frontera, Spain
Nestled in the Andalusian countryside, BeTime is a sanctuary for slowness, reflection, and situated learning. It plants creative seeds through residencies, land-based practices, and deep community listening — cultivating futures that are slower, smaller, and more soulful.
Jazz ao Centro Clube (JACC)
Coimbra, Portugal
JACC rewrites the score of community arts through improvisation, jazz, and collective experimentation. Working from Coimbra’s cultural undercurrents, they orchestrate new alliances between music, territory, and democratic innovation.
KÖME – Association of Cultural Heritage Managers
Budapest, Hungary
KÖME operates at the crossroads of heritage and innovation, activating cultural memory as a catalyst for sustainability. From museums to public spaces, they reimagine cultural institutions as agents of ecological and social transition.
ZK/U – Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik
Berlin, Germany
A hybrid vessel between art and city-making, ZK/U grows urban imaginaries through residencies, research, and grassroots action. It is a place where artistic gestures become urban practices — composting bureaucracy into creative soil.
Our Advisory Board
The EMCCINNO Advisory Board plays a key role in ensuring the quality, relevance, and impact of the project. Comprising distinguished experts from the fields of climate transition, cultural and creative industries (CCIs), and social enterprises, the Board provides strategic guidance and critical feedback on project activities and outputs.
Our Advisory Board members bring a wealth of interdisciplinary experience and a deep understanding of the transformative role of arts and culture in fostering sustainable futures. Their involvement helps validate our results, strengthen our learning processes, and ensure that our prototypes and policy recommendations are grounded in cutting-edge thinking and practice.
The Advisory Board includes:
Denis Burke
The Netherlands
Communications Coordinator at the Transnational Institute (TNI), with over a decade of experience in climate communications and artistic production.
Dr. Þorvarður Árnason
Iceland
Professor at the University of Iceland, environmental humanist and Director of a regionally embedded sustainability research center.
Dr. Alexandra Nikoleris
Sweden
Researcher at Lund University, specialising in futuring and sustainability transitions through narrative and imagination.
Mateja Lazar
Slovenia
Director of Motovila (Slovenia), a leading voice in cross-sectoral cooperation and internationalisa-tion in the cultural sector.
Inês Câmara
Portugal
Co-founder of Mapa das Ideias and president of A Reserva, known for her work at the intersection of education, heritage, and community arts.
Niels Righolt
Denmark
Director of the Danish Center for Arts & Interculture (CKI), cultural policy expert, and board member of several European cultural networks.
