Under the URBACT Creative Clusters project, the Municipality of Hódmezóvásárhely launched the “Creative School Contest” at the end of November 2009. The main topic of it was how young children imagine the city in 15 years. The leadership of the town regards the young generation’s opinion and imagination is really important and significant, because the town is built for them, so their ideas are crucial and are the base of local development.
The contest was announced in every primary and secondary schools in the town between the age of 11 and 18. Students could handle their work either individually or in groups. The contest deadline was 12 March, 2010, so children had 4 months to think about their future town. It was a positive shock for us that more than 44 pieces of arts have arrived from 9 town’s schools. The composition of the arts was very mixed: 36 pieces of paintings or drawings, 6 mock-ups, 1 statue and 2 PPT presentations.
The students expressed not only their creativity and fantasy, but also their wishes through their work. More children imagined fountains and baths with huge slides in the city centre, but shopping centre, cinema, zoo and skateboard ground also appeared. Lots of children’ ideas were impressed by the present panel programme (renovation of big block of flats), so they made drawings/paintings which represented colourful buildings with different patterns.
There were several children who besides the amusement, regarded energy-reformation as a really important fact, so they would like to see wind powerstations in Vásárhely in the future. Among the wide-choice, there was only one ceramic-work, a multi-functioning tower with more floors and rooms, named after the late museum director.
The arts were appraised by a 6 member jury, which consisted of ceramists, artists, the museum director, painter and teachers. The opinion of the jury was that young generation had lots of amazing, creative, new ideas and in their decision the most important aspect was what kind of new technologies and methods were used in order to prepare the arts.
The winners were the students of Gábor Klauzál Primary School. Their work was the most complex and it was the closest to the reality and the ideas were absolutely feasible. They have made a presentation about the present situation and at the same time it contained their plans for the future, which are mainly connected to sport activities, just like go-kart, canoe ground, skateboard ring and fountains.
The winners of the contest, three children at the age of 13, won a 4 days Study Visit in Kortrijk, Belgium, together with the URBACT Creative Clusters partnership. I have a positive note for the contest: seven months after the initiative, the municipality has already realized two ideas from the winner teams’ imagination. One of them is the skateboard ring, while the other is the fountains. I think that young generation dream the future.
Anikó Varga
Hódmezővásárhely, Partner in URBACT Creative Clusters Project
