Intras Foundation

European initiative based on the upcycling concept, that is to say, reuse and recycle waste materials to create valuable, useful or simply aesthetically pleasing objects. Thus, we wanted to provoke critical thinking on general society on issues like social and environmental challenges or the throw-away world we are living nowadays. Artcycling gave a unique opportunity to 85 European artists from underrepresented groups, especially those with disabilities, as for instance mental health issues, to develop their creativity and to enter/reenter the labour market. Art can be a useful tool to fight against stigma and discrimination and to promote a respectful mentality with our environment and with the handcraft, with well-done things, encouraging people to think of new and creative ways to use things, instead of simply buying new consumer goods.

Introspection Music Experience (IME) is a 3-year European cooperation project that brings together musicians and composers with and without psychiatric vulnerabilities from Belgium, England, Greece and Spain. During this project, 12 solo artists and bands will collaborate with composers with experience of mental health challenges in order to create music together that will make new audiences aware of real experiences of mental ill health. IME will create a space for diverse communities to get to know each other, initiating a dialogue, sharing experiences, and finally, producing bold and authentic artistic expressions to share with the wider world. The artists will use music as a vehicle to talk about the reality of living with mental ill health from a first hand perspective, and thus contribute to the elimination of the persisting stigma towards mental illness and people living with it.