BrailaORAȘ CANDIDATCAPITALĂEUROPEANĂA CULTURII

2021EN

The team who drafted the application owe a debt of gratitude to all supporters and contributors to the project “Braila – EcoC 2021” for their effort, documentation, suggestions, corrections and translation.

Artistic advisorsVlad Păunescu, preşedinte “Castel FILM”Pătru Păunescu, Director de ImagineRonela Popescu Sezonov, Director de ImagineDan Piţa, regizorDan Chişu, regizorDan Toader, scenografRadu Dinulescu, director artistic Teatrul ConstanţaŢino Geirun, regizor Teatrul Pygmalion, VienaMimi Chipăilă, designerRaluca Polea, designer

European programs consultancyFlorentina Grigoraş, General Manager Andralex Project CompanyIuliana Neagu, Directia S.P.P.Dezvoltare, Relaţii InternaţionaleCristina DosuleanuMarian Ghionu, General Manager Agenţia PonticEmilia Ioana VOICU, Director Executiv Organismul Intermediar Regional POS DRU Regiunea Sud-Est

Architecture and urbanismMarian Pascu, arhitectMarian Ion, arhitectCostel Drăgan, arhitect

Technical consultantsIonel Cândea, dir. Muzeul Carol I Brăila, istorieViorel Coman, scriitor, literaturăNicu Teodorescu, istoria oraşului, muzicăRais Dorian decan Facultatea de Relații publice și comunicare - Universitatea Constantin Brâncoveanu Mihaela Picu, fizică cuanticăMaria Stoica, Muzeul Brăilei Carol I, istorieLucian Ţilea, multi-culturalism, turism, gastronomieRadu Moisei, biologie-ecoturismGeorge Teodorescu, Centrul de Studii din Köln

Culture institutionsLucian Sabados, manager Teatrul “M.Filotti” BrăilaDragoş Neagu, director Biblioteca BrăilaEmanoil Ciucaşu, director Casa de CulturăPuşcaciu Maria, director Centrul de Creaţie BrăilaGeorge Romeo Bunea, Director Şcoala Populară de ArtăFlorin Chirpac, director Teatrul de Păpuşi “Cărăbuş” BrăilaIonuţ Balaban, Instituţia Publică de Spectacole “LYRA”Doina Păuleanu, Director Muzeul de Artă ConstanţaDana Dumitrescu, Director Teatrul Dramatic ConstanţaConstantin Teodorescu, Societatea Filarmonică “LYRA” BrăilaSorin Francu, Director Teatru “Gh.Pastia” FocşaniCristian Gheorghe, Director “Fani Tardini” GalaţiTeodor Niţă, Director Teatrul Muzical “Nae Leonard” Galaţi

Financial and management consultantsSorin Timuş, general manager HochlandIonuţ Iulian Radu, Rikos Marketing ConsultingAnghelescu Stoica, Director Finanțele Publice Locale, Primăria BrăilaIonel Şerbănescu, Compartiment Buget Primăria BrăilaCarmen Sîrbu, profesor Universitatea “Danubius” GalaţiMihaela Marcu, Director Finanţele Publice BrăilaMetanet Talib, SC Solo Textil SRL

International relationsSanda VişanGeorge ŞipoşCristinel Popa Stoica

Business environmentŞtefan Fusea, preşedinte. Camera de Comerţ şi Industrie BrăilaVasile Datcu, Asociaţia Producătorilor în AgriculturăIulian Zamfir, președinte UGIR BrăilaSorin Constantin, preşedinte Uniunea Patronatelor Române Filiala BrăilaMarian Filimon, Patronatul Întreprinderilor Mici şi Mijlocii Galaţi

Public AdministrationAurel-Gabriel Simionescu, Primar Municipiu BrăilaViorel Mortu, preşedinte Consiliul Judeţean BrăilaDumitru Emilian, vicepreşedinte Consiliul Judeţean BrăilaNicu Lucian Olteanu, Prefect Brăila-GalațiMarius Aurelian Tiripa, subprefect BrăilaDoina Ciocan, viceprimar Municipiul BrăilaMartin Ioan, vicepreşedinte Consiliul Judeţean IalomiţaCamelia Guşatu, Director Direcţia Cultură, Învățământ, Sport și Turism Marius Stan - Primarul Municipiului GalaţiConstantin Hogea - Primarul Municipiului TulceaDecebal Fagadau, Viceprimarul Municipiului ConstanţaDaniel Gerhard Tuchel, Primarul Municipiului TecuciDecebal Gabriel Bacinschi, Primarul Municipiului Focşani, Gabriel Necula și Marius Iorga - viceprimariNicolae Barbu, Primarul Municipiului GiurgiuDaniel Stefan Dragulin, Primarul Municipiului CălăraşiAlexandru Stoica , Primarul Municipiului SloboziaAnastase Moraru, Primarul Municipiului IsacceaTopoleanu Nicolae, Primarul orașului Măcin

Media partners, Design, Photographers, PrintMonica Paraschiv, cotidianul “Obiectiv”Armanda Filipine, jurnalist, blog Brăila ChireiGina Bahor, jurnalistCostel Pătrăşcan, caricaturistPaul Prisada, TV Accent TulceaPetru Ţincoca, jurnalist TulceaCati Lupaşcu, jurnalistNicoleta Butnaru, jurnalistCornel Crătineanu, fotografMarian Toader, designer, tipărituriMihaela Dan, jurnalistCristian Brebenel, designerCătălin Voinea, fotograf dronăAdriana Berciu, fotografTarquinius Vădeanu, fotografDoina Popescu-Brăila, scriitor, editorRaluca Ardean, realizator TV, Digi24 GalaţiIonuţ Negru, realizator TV, Digi24 GalaţiEugenia Notărescu, redactor şef, Digi24 GalaţiMarian Coman, jurnalistAlin Ciorecan, creative director, portofoliul.ro

National communities and ethnic minoritiesBabi Caravia, Veronica Macri, Athena Bondoc, comunitatea elenăDavid-Segal Iancu, comunitatea evreilorAnton Gina, centrul comunitar “Anton Pann”Gancev Maria-Ecaterina, comunitatea bulgarăSevim Rustem, comunitatea turcăAgajanian Marian, comunitatea armeanăClaudio Vals, comunitatea italianăRob Ermilio, comunitatea română în Italia

Educational environmentCanciu Cătălin, Inspector Şcolar General ISJ BrăilaKiţu Daniel, Inspector Şcolar Adjunct ISJ BrăilaMocanu Romeo, profesorNedelcuţ Florin, profesorDoroftei Elena-Simona, profesorIonel Filip, profesorIngrid Iavorschi, profesorDan Gheorghiţă - inspector școlar Martina Orlea, elevElena Damian, elevEmilia Teodorescu, elevViorel Ciocan, elevRadu Pupezeanu, elevCreţeanu Cristian, elevMarius Ion, elevLuisa Balaban, elevButoi Alexandra, elev

Political parties, Members of ParliamentMihai Tudose, preşedinte PSD Brăila, MinistruIon Rotaru, senator PSDMarian Dragomir, deputat PSDCătălin Boboc, senator PNLVasile Varga, deputat PNLMihai Dănuț, deputat PNLMărioara Nistor, președintele UNPR Brăila, deputat UNPRDorin Silviu Petrea, deputat UNPRViorel Botea, președintele PMP BrăilaGabriel Musceleanu, președintele PPPD Brăila

NGO communityDan Păun, președinte Asociaţia Ecologică “Green” BrăilaLala Gabriel, președinte Asociaţia Clubul de Turism ProilaviaFrâncu Adrian, Asociaţia Nevăzătorilor din România, filiala BrăilaCodruţa Nedelcu, președinte Asoc. “ARIN” BrăilaGabriel Ioan, preşedinte Club Rotary BrăilaCristian Pricop, preşedinte Colegiul Medicilor Brăila

Volunteer coordinationMartina OrleaNicuşor ZamfirCornelia Miler, “cercetaşii României”Didi MocanuMihaela Picu

It is our duty to record our thankfulness for the financial support and donations provided to our association by the followings:Companies: Şantierul Naval Brăila “VARD”, CEPROHART SA Brăila, Metindro Profil SRL, AltSys SRL, LUXTEN Brăila, Solar Watts SRL, DISTRISAN SA Brăila, SETCAR SA Brăila, BELVEDERE SA Brăila, ROMDRIL SA Brăila, DUNAV SA Brăila, PAPER PRINT SA Brăila, ALSTONSON DATA SRL Brăila, SC EUROCAR SRL Brăila, BIROU NOTARIAL SOCIETATEA CIVILĂ VARGA & ASOCIAŢII BrăilaIndividuals: Petru Sandu Paveliuc, Dragoș Cătălin Radu, Constantin Teodorescu, Aurel-Gabriel Simionescu, Vasile Varga, Marian Ion, Cătălin Boboc, Dan Buteică, Cristian Niculae, Marian Ghionu.

We are particularly indebted to Sorin Negura, owner of the Restaurant “Carol” where we carried out the shooting for the project’s promotional film and to all who helped on that occasion: Doina Ciocan, Andreea Copae, Cristian Niculae, Cornel Brăilescu, Petrişor Motoc, Marius Termegan, Sorin Boşneag, Dan Apostol, Lucian Pohariu, Ionuţ Negrişanu, Dan Buteică, Viorel Calenciuc, Cătălin Boboc, Liviu Dobrescu, Lucian Ţilea, Lucian Căprariu, Cristian Techiu, Gheorghe Ştefan, Ionel Filip, Maria-Elena Teodorescu, Mihai Mitache, Mihaela Teodorescu, Liviu Ilie, Albert Malaxa, Ștefan Vlaicu, Roxana Ștefan, Mugurel Duțu, Cătălin Nistor, Viorica Alexandru, Petre Bogdan Bănică, Mariana Vernescu, Elena Neculcea, Maria Elena, Ciprian Buzoianu, Marian Ghionu precum şi formaţiilor “Days of Confusion” şi “Blackout”.

Special thanks to over 2300 members of the web comunity members “Braila 2021” for their project ideas, suggestions and constructive critics.

Graphic design: Alin CiorecanPrinting: Mircea Toader, MTM Prod Brăila

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Introduction – General considerations

Why does your city wish to take part in the competition for the title of European Capital of Culture?

Braila, a miniature Europe, legendary city situated between the Danube and the Black Sea, has been a continuous presence on the banks of the Danube river that flows across Europe and connects it from West to East, being considered by the Romans the ’God of all Rivers’.

Popularly known as the ‘Danube by the Sea’, or the Lower Danube, this space between the East and the West has hosted for hundreds of generations towns and villages amassing at times more than one million inhabitants. They wrote the history of this land and they built its culture and its civilization as they envisioned it, together with the rest of Europe’s inhabitants.

Full of pride and courage, Braila joined forces with many towns in the region as well as with all those who had the availability to get involved, who know how to hope and understand the spirit of Europe, and who take life on the shores of the Danube as a blessing, and decided to submit its application to the title of European Capital of Culture. We, its citizens, thus hope to once again make Braila a cultural reference point for the entire European continent.

No matter skeptical, indifferent or optimistic, all those who wish for Braila to win the title of European Capital of Culture share different hopes for what winning the title would mean for our city. Some wish for Braila to become once more the multicultural European capital that it used to be in the old days, others hope for a cleaner, more ‘European’ place to live, while others still dream of the complete rehabilitation of the historical downtown, some wish for a more active cultural life, or to

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show the rest of Europe the beauty of their native city, and finally some even hope for a better life and better employment opportunities. Those who left the city and are currently living elsewhere hold high hope to win out of pride and love for their beloved childhood town, and some even promised that would return to Braila IF...

However, just like in ‘Quantum Thinking’ philosophy, only ‘Yes’ or only ‘No’ do not suffice as answers to a question, but they may be equally valid answers simultaneously as non-mutually exclusive truths, Braila’s citizens hundreds of answers to the question ‘Why do we want to run for this title?’ are equally valid, equally strong and justified, equally important to us, those who come bringing nowadays the message of Braila’s communities.

Attached to the European spirit more than to anything else, we would like to share a successful model of living together in a space which has way too often fallen victim to petty vanities and imperial desires, a model which emphasizes the European spirit and which we wish to develop and perfect together, animated by the state of mind to promote accessibility, competitiveness and the right to culture and education.

Our hope is for Braila to become once again the Danube’s European capital, and also a cultural one, a place impossible to ignore, and for the area between the Danube and the Black Sea to evolve into a cultural platform, a modern and visible one, which is connected to Europe’s cultural values.

We wish to participate, to learn, to have a presence within the European space, a presence sought after for its cultural diversity and richness here, on the Lower Danube. We want to rediscover our common European characteristics, to be open to knowledge and communication between Europe’s citizens, to connect with all the other cities with more experience in the ECoC project. We aim to become a Danube cultural port, a capital of culture on Europe’s river of culture and civilization.

Why do we want to candidate? Because we want to change Braila by changing ourselves first, as citizens. Just like we managed to transform opposition to this project into enthusiasm and then into active support, we will continue to convince more and more citizens to…

...abandon the group of people who said that Braila does not deserve this title...

...we will defeat the skepticism and resignation of all those who stopped dreaming that Braila could win this title...

...and we will fulfill the hopes of all those who believe with conviction that through this title we will all be able to achieve our dreams.

Regardless of the results of this elite competition, our ambitious and amenable project, started slowly, grew and became a continuous challenge for all the inhabitants of this space that has always been European. For our city’s young people, winning this title would represent an extraordinary incentive to make them be proud of living here, in their native lands. We also wish to offer a cultural alternative to the future generations who will live in a different society whose paradigms and archetypes are changing.

WE WANT and have the motivation to create and generate for the inhabitants on the shores of the ‘Danube by the Sea’ an active cultural spirit, out of the box and beyond predefined patterns, without ignoring previous positive experiences, that can enrich and spiritually prepare future generations that will benefit from social and technological developments hard to anticipate in 2015.

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Objectives pursued by region’s citizens:

1. Promoting through culture of the South-Eastern Romania, marked by the Danube, Delta and Black Sea area, higher on the list of priorities of the Romanian Government and the European Union, so that the entire region may benefit from all economical and infrastructure projects that will eventually lead to its balanced, organic and sustainable development.

2. Building self-trust for all inhabitants in the region, creating a winner’s mentality, as well as faith in regional cultural values by promoting and integrated them in the European cultural pantheon.

3. Redefining the role of culture for a society whose paradigms and archetypes are in a permanent transformation, at a time when Europe has opened its gates to new social, cultural and global experiences.

4. Multiplying the effect of the above by actively involving in the project local communities, based on the ECoC platform.

Protecting and promoting the regional cultural values, consolidating the sentiment of belonging to the European ‘quantum cultural space’, as well as increasing the contribution of the cultural phenomenon in the long-term development of the South-Eastern part of Romania.

So, the results of the activities scheduled to take place in 2021 will contribute to the overall success of the ‘Braila 2012 – Quantum Culture’ project, respectively:

On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of ECoC, we have decided to submit a daring, ambitious and optimistic project focused on a theme with numerous challenges, based on the cumulative creative energies of all of the inhabitants in the area, meant to recover the cultural spirit and re-create a cultural platform at the Lower Danube, one that will facilitate sharing common cultural experiences with former ECoC cities and with the European citizens in general.

WE BELIEVE that culture, and metaphorically speaking, ‘cultural energy quanta’ could be an effective instrument in culturally energizing people, exerting positive effects in all four dimensions. Using this cultural energy at a local or regional level can bring people together, may raise awareness of local and national administration and may also encourage social and political cohesion, consolidate social balance, and facilitate the accomplishment of major objectives of the EU and its peoples.

WE CAN generate and stimulate the intention of active participation in cultural events, we can create, together with our partners, in the spirit of the European Cultural Platform, a cultural mechanism that is self-sustainable, through its creative spirit, communication and socializing, similar to a ‘cultural illuminism’, that generates progress, long-term cordial relations among people.

Participating in the competition for the ECoC title is a unique challenge for US ALL, which we optimistic people, no matter the generation or ethnicity, assumed it. We are convinced that we have the power to transform this challenge in reality in the ‘quantum style’.

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Does your city plan to involve its surrounding area? Explain this choice.

Briefly explain the overall cultural profile of your city.

Braila intends to draw the attention of the entire world not only towards the city, but also the whole stunning corner of Romania, bathed by the ancient river nourishing the region, which connects it to Europe, carrying its secrets, sins and legends.

Geographical, historical, ethnic and religious commonalities between Braila and other localities from South-Eastern Europe determined for the latter to become in short time active supporters of Braila’s candidacy to the ECoC title. They have thus become full-fledged partners of Braila in this daring endeavour. Consequently, the common history, numerous attractions of the region, traditions and religious beliefs, determine a partnership approach of the candidature.

Braila’s best represented cultural fields are theatre, music, representational arts, dance and literature. These are promoted by a few main cultural institutions and organizations such as: ‘Maria Filotti’ Theatre, ‘Carabus’ Puppet Theatre, ‘Carol the 1st’ Museum of Braila, ‘Panait Istrati’ Braila County Library, Representational Artists` Union, culture houses (Braila City Culture House and Youth Culture House), Art Schools for Amateurs (e.g. ‘Vespasian Lungu’ School of Arts and Crafts), Children’s Palace, Armed Forces House, memorial museums and ‘Lyra’ Philharmonic Society.

All institutions and organizations above support local culture by organizing an important number of concerts, as well as national and international festivals of all kinds which have created a veritable tradition in Braila and have received the appreciation of the Braila’s citizens.

Above and beyond all of these considerations, however, it is the Danube that remains sovereign and immutable, the river that after 2,800 kilometres of ‘vagrancy’ through a diverse and proud European continent, gathers here symbolic and cultural experiences, traditions, customs, various human and cultural languages, in a unique and multivalent concept, that of CULTURAL EUROPE.

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As far as culture is concerned, it is considered a rather important element in Romania’s self-perceived value system. Culture has been identified as the 6th most important value by Romanian people after work, family, school/education, friends, and pass-time/relaxation.

Another important aspect of local culture and life is the increase in the citizens’ participation in art performances. As compared to 2012 and 2013, there has been a considerable increase in the level of attendance at both drama and puppet shows.

People at cinema

Number of performancesavailable seats

1000

352

223

320 000

2 090

17 459

20142009 Regarding the dynamics of the cinema production, an exponential raise compared to the previous years has been noticed.

While in 2009 about 1,000 people went to the cinema in Braila, 2014 recorded 320,000 attendees. Subsequently, the number of movies shown has also increased from 223 to 17,459, as has the number of seats available in movie theatres, from 352 to 2,090. All of this prove an increasing need for cinema production. A similar dynamic to that of the growing number of cinema audience can be compared to that of museum audience.

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Similarly, the number of museum visitors has been growing steadily over the past few years. There are now 8 museums operating in Braila, up from 5 in 2009. The number of museum visitors has increased by over 50% in the same interval. They are also participants in some of the educational programs organized there, programs covering various curricular needs or interests. As it is the case everywhere else around the world, Braila’s museum visitors are constantly fighting against time constraints, and have been transformed by the need for a consumption culture. Regular museum visits are informed by a diversity of motivation, life beliefs, cultural background and free time of the visitors.

In Braila County there are currently one county library with 3 neighbourhood branches and 169 school and rural libraries operating. County-wise, 56% of the population of the city of Braila uses the library services on a regular basis. Most of them are young people (under 34 years old) and have graduated at least secondary education (high school). Men tend to use libraries on a weekly basis, while most women tend to go to the library once every 4 to 6 months.

Through its established cultural institutions, Braila organizes yearly events of international and national impact, such as ‘Days and Nights of European Theatre in Braila’, The International Festival of Military Marching Bands, Love Songs over the Danube Festival, ‘George Grigoriu’ Pop Music Festival, the International Canto Competition ‘Hariclea Darclée’, the International Jazz Festival ‘Johnny Raducanu’, the National Folk Music Festival ‘Chira Chiralina’, all these events attracting audiences from the city and the county. The number of participants to these events is over 30,000, which represents approximately 17.8% of the city population.

As such, the regular Braila inhabitant’s cultural profile may be represented in numbers as follows:

• big cultural event audience: 26,000;• theatre audience: 15,000;• classical music audience: 5,000; • representational arts audience: 2,000;• pop music, cabaret, club audience: 25,000;• exhibitions, craft fairs audience: 75,000;• library and museum audience: 15,000; • Braila inhabitants with county library membership: 57,000 (30%);• books borrowed from the county library in 2014: 370,000 (source: INSSE.ro);• children formally subscribed to various forms of art education: 2,100.

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Explain the concept of the programme which would be launched if the city is designated as European Capital of Culture.

2021 represents the 100th anniversary of the recognition of scientist Albert Einstein’s achievements through the award of the Nobel Prize for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect, and in 2021 solar energy will definitely be one of humankind’s most important energy sources.

Recent discoveries in the field of quantum mechanics and of the phenomena taking place at the micro-universe level, which affect the evolution of the Universe as a whole, have forced the scientific world to deal with radically modified concepts about world and life, concepts that may well fundamentaly change the way we understand the Universe and our role within its mechanism and provide us with a new perspective on space and time, concepts that are better explored and understood through art, culture and philosophy.

The paradigm change in the scientific world, brought about by the expansion of the study of quantum phenomena, is about to create profound changes in all areas, including society, culture and even art.

The paradoxes of Quantum mechanics:

• the presence of an observer (the ‘double-slit’ experiment) may influence the results of an experiment;• the ability of micro-particles to exist in two places in the same time;• the ability of micro-particles to exist simultaneously in two different states;• the entanglement (already scientifically proven through dozens of experiments) phenomenon, through which two

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particles can instantaneously exchange states even when they are in two completely opposite sides of the universe are notions and palpable realities which are now beginning to escape science labs and universities and hold the potential to be replicated in arts and culture in original manners.

In reality, the arts have always been capable of inducing phenomena that are close to those documented by quantum mechanics experiments, literature, painting, photography or cinema being instruments that allow the human brain feel as being simultaneously in two places. Theatre and music have the ability to transpose the human soul in two different states of spirit and the artistic feeling can transfer, regardless of space and time, between the artist and the audience who then share, as in the case of the entangled particles, the same ‘wave equation’.

The ‘observer’s’ paradox is translatable in the artistic act by the special importance given to the consumer of culture and not only to the creative artist in determining the ultimate success of the cultural act, as the audience’s active participation may influence the artistic act and its message.

Regarded from a different perspective, we can argue that when the human (atom) receives a culture quanta (energy) it changes its state and is elevated to a superior cultural (energy) level and becomes able to further transfer emotions, feelings, experiences (to emit energy).

Throughout human history, arts and science have been often so close that when science became incapable of explaining certain phenomena, it was up to the artist to offer an alternative method to understand the universe.

Albert Einstein, who promoted the idea of a four-dimensional Universe, and who formulated the law of relativity, was also a passionate violin player, while Leonardo da Vinci was an artist who left us so many inventions.

Niels Bohr, the Danish physicist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1922, a year after Einstein, for his studies on the atom, said, referring to the important changes those new concepts would bring on our understanding of the Universe: ‘Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory, has not understood it.’

In 1915, exactly 100 years ago, Einstein said about KNOWLEDGE: ‘The years of searching in the dark for a truth that one feels but cannot express, the intense desire and the alternations of

confidence and misgiving until one breaks through to clarity and understanding, are known only to those who have themselves experienced them. The public and the artists are, at a cultural level, those who permanently experience feelings and life events that they express and communicate to those around by participating in the artistic work, sometimes through subtle mechanisms that are still waiting to be discovered, many of them penetrating the barrier of space and time.

Sir Roger Penrose, a British scientist, winner

‘If I were not a physicist, I would probably be a musician. I often think in music. I live my daydreams in music. I see my life in terms of music. [...] I get most joy in life out of music.’

Albert Einstein

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of numerous awards and prizes, among which the Wolf Prize, which is awarded on an annual basis to remarkable artistic and scientific contributions, formulated the theory of the ‘quantum consciousness’ 20 years ago, recently confirmed by the discoveries in January 2014 of the quantum vibrations in the interior of the micro-tubules within the human brain.

In the area of technology, we are currently living a revolution of the computing technology as the first quantum computers use, instead of bits, qubits, elements of atomic dimensions that can be simultaneously found in two different states: 0 and 1. If in 2009 the researchers created the first quantum processor of only 2 qubits, in 2013 was produced one having 512 qubits and in the same year the ‘psychological’ barrier of 1000 qubits was passed.

That psychological barrier we are referring to is due to the fact that this quantum calculator could represent a number of states equal to 2 to the power of 1,000, more than the number of particles in the observable universe, which means that, theoretically it could simulate another universe.

New calculation algorithms are being developed constantly, which means that an enormous calculation power is about to be unleashed leading to quantum processors which could solve problems that today’s computer would need thousands of years to solve in a matter of minutes The rapid evolution of these computers until the year 2021 is expected to produce a drastic change in all areas, with unimaginable effects on arts and culture as well.

The cultural activities of Braila 2021 are placed under the slogan ‘Quantum Culture’ while the theme we chose, ‘The Four Dimensions of Culture at the Lower Danube’, will encourage new ways of artistic expression, through the lenses of similarities with the quantum phenomena, and using as many scientific breakthroughs that will take place over the next 6 years, as well as metaphors that will connect people and those new ideas about space and time, as interpreted by artists and their audiences.

‘To be AND not to be IN THE SAME TIME,

this IS the answer’Schrödinger’s cat answer

to Hamlet’s question

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1. Contribution to the long-term strategy

1.1 Describe the cultural strategy that is in place in your city at the time of the application, as well as the city’s plans to strengthen the capacity of the cultural and creative sectors, including through the development of long term links between these sectors and the economic and social sectors in your city. What are the plans for sustaining the cultural activities beyond the year of the title?

The success of Sibiu, a city comparable in many ways with Braila, in becoming a point of reference on the tourist map of Romania and Europe, has brought a change of attitude in the local authorities regarding the role and the place of culture in the economy of a city, reflected by the cultural strategy ‘Braila 2015-2025’.

Although Braila did not have a cultural strategy as a separate project, the local administration was always preoccupied with encouraging culture. As a consequence, in practice, a multitude of international events and a diversified program for different categories of audience were held in Braila.

Braila’s development strategy includes an important part addressing cultural activities. This strategy approved by Braila’s City Council in 2015 covers ten years. The strategy was ellaborated with a contribution of all local cultural stakeholders and submitted for public debate. The method by which it was developed was ‘bottom-up’, in order to ensure coherence with the plans and actions of the civil society, cultural venues, ethnic associations and educational institutions of art.

The general objective of this strategy is to protect and promote the multicultural diversity of Braila by teaching about the common characteristics, consolidating the feeling of belonging to the shared cultural environment among the citizens, as well as stimulating the contribution of culture towards the long term development of the local community. The strategy intends to promote culture for the people of Braila, in line with the reality on the ground, as well as creating a nucleus of cultural development on the local level, capable of generating cultural vectors towards

corresponding communities from the regional, national and European level.

The goals set are meant to help reach the overall objective and include:

Improving the range, the diversity and the European dimension of the supply of culture in Braila, including via transnational cooperation by:

• diversifying and growing the supply of culture by also promoting those artistic expressions less visible in the cultural landscape of Braila (ballet, modern choreography, permanent classical music);• interconnecting to the European system of cultural values through common manifestations, exchanges, promotion of local values.

Extending the access to and participation in culture by:

• redefining the cultural approach for enlarging, growing and diversifying the audience of culture;• recalibrating the supply of culture by adapting the message and range of the content of cultural products;• inserting the poorly represented categories of population among the active consumers of cultural events.

Consolidating the capacity of the cultural sector and its connection to other sectors (social, educational, the economic environment, tourism, sustainable development and urban regeneration) by:

• redefining the cultural sector - inclusion of the manifestations of non-conventional culture and niche culture besides mainstream culture; • encouraging and promoting artistic

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manifestations by amateurs within the traditional frame of culture, but also by promoting new ways of expression;• recalibrating the existing cultural infrastructure to the new challenges posed by the modern culture (modernization, improved acoustics, stage sound&light, open environments);• establishing structures for professional education, improving the management of art and organizing large events; • growing the involvement of the economic sector in supporting the cultural sector, as a means of encouraging economic development;• growing the share of cultural tourism as a percentage of the total number of tourists.

Enhancing on the international profile of Braila by using culture It is important to note that in this strategy the support that culture will receive from the local budget will grow and reach 8 % in 2021 and 9 % in 2025, from the threshold of 3.46% in 2015.

Not only will the number of cultural events grow significantly, but their international specificity will also keep growing. The reconstruction and restoration of conventional cultural spaces, as well as the growth of non-conventional cultural venues, will lead to the opening of cultural operators towards events for

the general public, which will generate a growth of the urban effervescence.

The necessity to ensure a cultural side to the strategic objectives of the community (infrastructure, social issues, youth, IT) has been integrated in the operational plans for the following period. This will continue as an element of integration and catalyst of urban development for the period up to 2025, for which the following eight priority fields have been identified:

1. Stimulating extended high quality cultural programmes;2. Promotion of European values and transnational cooperation within cultural programs;3. Widespread public involvement as part of the cultural program;4. New opportunities for even more categories of citizens to attend or take part in cultural events;5. Improving the cultural infrastructure;6. Developing the skills, the capacity and the local governance of the cultural sector;7. Stimulating the creation of partnerships and the cooperation with other sectors;8. Promoting Braila and its cultural program.

The European Capital of Culture action for 2021 is one of the strategic objectives of Braila for the period of 2015-2025. In view of the claims mentioned in the strategy for 2015-2025, the administration of Braila will support the organization of the event ‘Braila 2021’, after having received the title, by:• developing the cultural identity of the city by promoting the traditional festivals of Braila

(Hariclea Darclee International Voice Competition, The International Military Music Festival, The International Modern Music Festival ‘George Grigoriu’, The Folk Music Festival ‘The Love Song along the Danube’, The International Theatre Festival ‘Day and Nights of European Theatre in Braila’);

• supporting the mobility of artists and of cultural products, presenting local cultural productions in other communities from the country and abroad, encouraging participation of artists from Braila at festivals and major international events, promoting in Braila quality productions of artists from outside Braila and from other countries;

• organizing of annual art camps for different kinds of artists (painters, graphic artists, carvers, etc.);

• building relationships with national, European as well as international institutions and increasing awareness of the diversity of ethnicities;

1.2 How is the European Capital of Culture action included in this strategy?

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EUROPEAN CAP ITAL OF CULTURE

Braila 2021

CAND IDATE FOR

• developing partnerships among cultural venues, business sector, academic sector and local public administration;

• restoring historical buildings and integrating them in the cultural landscape of Braila as cultural venues;

• encouraging the organization of cultural events in non-conventional spaces (street, parks, markets, reconfigured industrial sites);

• developing cultural and educational programs for children and youth during school breaks.

The efforts to promote the application for the European Capital of Culture action and its development was a first test for the community, with its beneficial effects for the administration:

• clustering of at least a part of the civil society around a common cultural objective;• identifying the major problems and citizens’ dissatisfactions regarding the way the city is being

managed, by organizing multiple debates between the supporters of the application and the pessimists and cynics;

• increasing the dialogue between the local authorities and civil society, and creating a solid base of collaboration for supporting the application;

• achieving partnerships with cultural actors from the towns and cities from the South-East region of Romania, which has already generated more diverse artistic events.

Obtaining this title will increase the implementation of actions meant to support priority sectors of the strategy and will greatly reduce the time of achieving the strategic objectives which will be realised by:

• stimulating extended high quality cultural programs;• wide public participation within the cultural program;• new opportunities for ever growing categories of citizens to attend cultural events;• improving the cultural infrastructure;• developing the competences, capacity and local governance of the cultural sector;• stimulating partnerships and cooperation with other sectors;• promoting Braila and the entire South-Eastern region and its cultural programme, as well as

increasing the level of social cohesion for this entire region of Romania.

In case the title of European Capital of Culture 2021 will not be awarded to our city, the main objectives of the strategy will be achieved in a longer period of time and it would involve more efforts from the cultural actors, the public institutions and mostly from the current potential consumer of culture.

Winning the title would:

• gather the enthusiasm of the population and its practical and emotional involvement in this project and its promotion;

• increase trust among the national minorities and facilitate their collaboration with the majority, revitalizing their cultural, social, spiritual and economic contribution to the local communities;

• increase the feeling of belonging of the citizens to a common and diverse European cultural environment

• transfer the European cultural vision towards local authorities in order to encourge them to respect and implement the cultural strategy and to take the measures which, even unpopular, can prepare the city to face the challenges of winning such a title.

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Cultural effects:

• enhancing the quality of life of the citizens by developing creative processes and by creating an artistic infrastructure, for the entire region;

• development of new, original and large venues for cultural events;• arts education for more social categories;• increasing the public participation in the cultural events, by having more diversified artistic

acts, which means attracting more people that do not normally attend cultural events;• increasing collaboration among cultural stakeholders and offering them an important role in

creating better artistic events;• attracting and educating the youth through culture, encouraging their participation not only

as consumers, but also as artists;• increasing the pressure of the local community on the Municipality to allocate 7% of the local

budget to the cultural sector;• attracting more sponsors, who could contribute financially or in-kind to the cultural events;• creating new event categories of a larger dimension and for a larger variety of target groups,

especially those in open spaces addressing a numerous public (e.g. festivals) that will complete the cultural agenda of the city;

• restoring amphitheatres in the Macin Mountains, in Dobrogea, at the old Roman and Greek sites, to host permanent summer events;

• creating and developing, throughout a longer period of time, a festival infrastructure among the partner cities by exchanging performances and by collaborating on organizing large events in the South-Eastern region;

Social effects:

• a more thorough information of the citizens and a stronger bonding between them and the idea of belonging to the ‘European family’ of unity in diversity;

• raising the standard of living of the population through development of the the labour market as a consequence of the revitalization of cultural tourism and the integrated support of cultural industries;

• an increase of public confidence in the benefit of the EU membership and in equal rights and opportunities for all regions;

• a gradual reduction of social polarization and of discrimination regarding the access to culture for disadvantaged categories (unemployed, people with limited financial resources, pensioners, youth, people with disabilities);

• reducing differences between generations, increasing social solidarity and trust in civil society;

• empowering the citizens and increasing the sense of belonging to a common space where all need to contribute;

• increasing social cohesion among citizens of the region;• enhancing the comfort of citizens, reducing costs through collaboration among public

administrations in all partner cities throughout the South-Eastern region;• decreasing the number of young people who leave the city permanently after graduation in

search of modern European civilization (information collected from written declarations);• increasing professionalism of the tourism personnel, their accountability, training and

motivating them financially in order to achieve a modern form of tourism, according to the European standards;

• the diversification of higher education specialities, according to the specific of the area;

1.3 If your city is awarded the title of European Capital of Culture, what do you think would be the long-term cultural, social and economic impact on the city (including in terms of urban development)?

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• the Braila-Galati urban system represents, in Romania, a unique case and a chance of attaining a metropolitan structure, the second in size after Romania’s capital and, also, the second contributor to Romania’s GDP.

The ‘Quantum Culture’ project proposes an increase in the level of responsibility among public administrations in order to work together for a brighter common future. The partnership proposed by this project represents a concrete step towards achieving this goal.

Economic effects:

• increasing of economic exchanges within the South-Eastern region and between the region and Europe;

• the development of the cultural and creative industrial sectors;

• the capitalization of the city’s cultural touristic potential;

• the development of the relations between

the cultural stakeholders and the business environment, with an emphasis on raising business opportunities for local entrepreneurs;

• the development of partnerships between the chambers of commerce and the industry for the entire South-Eastern region and building new partnerships between the national business environment and foreign businesses, especially the European countries and cities located on the Danube side;

• the raise of the average local income, which will target an increasing cultural awareness of the local community;

• the improvement of the regional infrastructure, focusing on rebuilding the access roads for Braila and partner towns;

• the restoration of well-known industrial fields in the region such as the development and revamping the water transportation, service industry, light industry, garment industry, food industry, furniture production.

After the title will be awarded to the association ‘Braila ECoC 2021’ we will organize a public auction in order to externalize most of the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) activities with the purpose of benefiting from the existing international expertize. The Terms of Reference will respect the principles of public auctions and will include selection criteria that are following the application and the commission’s recommendations.

The contractor who will be selected will be responsible for undetaking ongoing evaluations of the project achievements by using primary and secondary data.

The ‘Braila ECoC 2021’ association will allocate for the M&E activities between 0.8% and 1% of the budget.

The M&E reports will be carried on during the implementation process of this project (intermediary reports) as well as after its finalization(final report) and will be available for the general public.

The purpose of the M&E is:

• assessment the association’s capacity to organize the event in 2021;• identifying the risks and potential threats and risk-reduction measures;• the establishment of risk-decreasing actions;• assessment of project implementation and corrective measures and of their effects;• providing transparency in the project implementation and increasing involvment and

ownership of the stakeholders in implementation.

1.4 Describe your plans for monitoring and evaluating the impact of the title on your city and for disseminating the results of the evaluation.

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The evaluation criteria will be the internationally used set of criteria (OECD/DAC):

• effectiveness (how much did the implementation strategy manage to achieve its objective and wanted results?)

• efficiency (how efficiently were the financial and human resources used for this project in order to achieve immediate results and impact?)

• relevance (how do the results and impact of this project correspond to the citizens’ expectations? What was the obtained impact and if it is the expected one?)

• sustainability (in what way will the changes or positive tendencies brought by winning the title of European capital of culture exist after the end of the project?)

• impact (direct or indirect changes brought by the title, planned or unexpected effects).

The evaluation of the impact of winning the tile will be conducted by an independant evaluator, selected after a public action. The decision of externalizing the M&E activities was taken by the members of the association in order to ensure the project efficiency and impartiality, transparency in the project implementation, the visibility of its activities, by benefiting from the best European expertize.

The evaluation is foreseen to begin immediately after the designation of the title is announced.

The monitoring will be made by a member of the implementation team who will receive technical support from a company specialised in field data collecting.

1.4.1 Who will carry out the evaluation?

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Planning the evaluation procedures

Ex-ante ECoC 2021

The ECoC 2021 events

Ex-post ECoC 2021+

disemination of project results

Project kick-off

• Contracting a specialized company to perform the assessment• Designing the evaluation methodologies• Drafting the reporting templates, databases and the working platforms• Defining evaluation indicators

• Performing an external assesment of the ECoC and ‘Braila 2021’ brand visibility among European tourists and ongoing adjustment of the message in the case of less satisfying results.

• Performing an internal assessment of the number of tourism agreements with destination ECoC 2021 Romania.

• Monitoring and final verification of the cultural infrastructure functionality and the access to it and proposing corrective actions

• Performing quantitative/qualitative measurements of the evolution of all the effects (economic, cultural, social, administrative capacity) generated by the title of European Capital of Culture on the region (internal and external evaluation), in the year preceding the event.

Defining the baseline indicators for measuring all effects

• Performing internal assessments related to the visibility, and transparency of the actions carried out by the association, and raising citizen’s awareness towards the project activities, on a semestrial basis.

• Performing internal assessments related to the increase in the number of volunteers attracted in training programs, on a semestrial basis.

• Carrying out an internal assessment of the performance of the association departments responsible for organizing events after the completion of ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ related programs

• Applying the necessary corrections based on the evaluation reports and the proposals submitted by the association departments, by the partners, with support from evaluators

• Assessment of the number of external partnerships concluded with cultural actors who will be selected annually to participate in the major event ‘Braila 2021’

• Performing quarterly assessments of the progress of the cultural infrastructure developments, including access to it.

• Performing quantitative/qualitative measurements of the evolution of all the effects (economic, cultural, social, administrative capacity) generated by the title of European Capital of Culture on the region (internal and external evaluation), on an annual basis.

AwardingN + 3 months

2020

2021

2022-2025

2017

2017-2019

1.4.2 Will concrete objectives and milestones between the designation and the year of the title be included in your evaluation plan?

Time frame Stage Goals

• Performing quantitative/qualitative measurements, of the evolution of all the effects (economic, cultural, social, administrative capacity) generated by the title of European Capital of Culture on the region (internal and external evaluation), in the year of the event.

• Performing monthly assessments of the outputs of the partnership activities carried during the ECoC 2021 event

• The assessment of the degree of satisfaction provided by the events among tourists and general public

• Performing quantitative/qualitative measurements of the evolution of all the effects (economic, cultural, social, administrative capacity) generated by the title of European Capital of Culture on the region (internal and external evaluation), on an annual basis.

• Performing an assessment of the number and quality of disemination activities addressing ‘Braila ECoC 2021’ experiences.

• Performing an assessment of the number of partnerships concluded by ‘Braila ECoC 2021’ association with future ECoC’s.

• Ex-post evaluation of the project’s effects.

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In order for the ‘Quantum culture’ project to be carried out optimally, it is highly important to assess all the stages, so that we can forsee any issues and minimize risks. The moment the announcement is made that Braila has won the title of cultural capital must be highlighted so as to involve as many people as possible in the project. The greater the importance given to the announcement, the easier it will be to identify risks and minimize the occurence of undesired phenomena, both during the preparation period of the project and during its progress, thus ensuring the desired impact.

Consequently, we believe that it is necessary to combine quantitative research methods with qualitative ones in order to obtain data that give a more precise overview of the phenomena. Assessments shall focus both on Braila and on the whole region, they shall cover all the 12 thematic areas and the specific objectives which were associated with relevant indicators.

The validation technique of the data obtained shall be triangulation, in order to minimize the distortions produced by each method, which includes three dimensions: time, space and people. Triangulation highlights the originality and magnitude of the collected views, due to a broader theoretical sample, causing new facets of the studied element to appear.

1.4.3 What baseline studies or surveys - if any - will you intend to use?

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The following types of studies shall be used:

• studies carried out by the municipality;• studies carried out on tourists and visitors from host cities, the opinions of international experts, statistical data published by authorities;• data taken from official documents (regional statistics).

The main indicators we will monitor shall be grouped as follows:

1. Indicators related to the impact on the community

• the citizens’ confidence in the success of the project;• the visibility of the city and its actions, in social networks and the virtual environment;• the volume and the percentage of media appearances presenting the positive image of the

cities;• the number of restaured buildings in the historical centre;• the number of volunteers actively involved in the actions to support and prepare the candidacy;• the number of Person-to-Person connections from the program ‘European Citizen Entaglement’

(shall be described in the next chapters);• the turnover of the companies from the applicant region;• the quality of the tourism services and the preparations made for 2021.

2. Indicators related to the success of the event and to the accomplishment of ECoC goals

• number of unemployed people involved in the festival related industries;• the number of partnerships and regional collaborations between partner cities;• the degree of knowledge of the European cultural diversity;• the dynamics of the city GDP and the budget for culture;• the value in euros of the cultural programs carried out by partner cities;• the value in euros of the investments in infrastructure and cultural facilities;• the sense of belonging to a mutual cultural space among citizens;• the number of events organized by ECoC related and non-related entities;• the percentage of inhabitants assisting or taking part in the events, combined with category

breakdown (young people, minorities or deprived people);• the number of tourists.

3. Indicators related to the dissemination of the results and effects after ECoC

• the number of international conferences to which team ‘Braila 2021’ is invited;• the number of visitors on the web pages describing the ECoC experience;• the number of agreements signed with European cultural operators.

We can talk about success the moment one succeeds in achieving a perfect union between the goals, the means and the final outcome of any endeavour, for all the parties involved in the dialogue.

Regarding our project, which has so many targets, premises and objectives, success is a very complex result of matching the purpose to places, people and circumstances, of choosing the most

1.4.4 What sort of information will you track and monitor?

1.4.5 How will you define ‘success’?

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Immediately after the nomination of the cities that have qualified after the pre-selection stage, the following step will be to hire the managers for the association departments and establish their duties by means of the job description sheet, including duties related to the assessment of the current specific activities.

The assessment will be performed in the period between the time of the final nomination of the city and the year 2024. The assessment will be performed by an external company contracted for this purpose. Furthermore, after the pre-selection stage, the project team will perform its own assessment, related to the impact of the candidacy and the introduction of Braila on the short list.

The assessments of the impact of the nomination of Braila to the ECoC 2121 title, will be performed by the independent evaluator in four stages: the preparation for the title 2017-2019, the assessment in the preceding year (2020), the assessment during the ECoC 2021 event and the assessment post ECoC, in 2024. Depending on their dynamics, certain indicators will be tracked on a quarterly, half-yearly or annual basis, in accordance with the description listed in the chart from section 1.4.2.

After each assessment, the project team will analyse the intermediary results obtained by the independent evaluator and will propose measures to the management of the association, meant to increase the visibility of the ECoC title.

1.5 Over what time frame and how regularly will the evaluation be carried out?

Success for the applicant region

The startling increase in visibility of the whole south eastern region for a Europe which is interested in discovering less known, new cultural and geographical territories.

Promoting the whole south eastern area, especially the large urban areas Braila-Galati, on the Government’s list of priorities, in such a way that the area can benefit from all the economic and infrastructure advantages. This will ultimately lead to a balanced development of the area as compared to other regions in the country.

Success of the ECoC concept

Europe on this occasion discovers an important area of ancient European civilization which lies at the intersection between occidental and oriental culture, bringing an area of great artistic authenticity and originality closer to it.

It discovers a pattern of peaceful coexistence between various ethnic communities of different religions, as well as an unique geographical area of great beauty and good environmental conservation, with a great tourism potential which has not been sufficiently used yet.The South-Eastern part of Romania, as an Eastern border can spread towards Eastern regions unmanned in European structures, the community design of culture and civilisation.

suitable and efficient ‘travelling companion’, of establishing priorities, of following a well thought and structured calendar, of the solidarity and the confidence of the work group and especially of the harmony between the European guide and the specificity of the place and of the proposed project.

Success means:• achieving the goals and objectives of the citizens of the region and all our partners;• creating a remarkable ‘Braila 2021 ECoC’ event, which confirms the prestige of the brand

established by the European Union.

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SCOPE OF ACTIVITIES

Our project, called ‘The four dimensions of cuantum culture inside the Danube frontiers’ aims to construct the creative, concrete and artistic image of multiculturalism, specificity and originality with the help of all the programmes that embody those 4 dimensions. All of these should permanently be related to values, concepts and also artistic and communicational frameworks within European values.

In the first dimension, the ‘Geographical’ one, we have made an analysis of ‘space’ in all its accepted meanings, from the positioning of the South-East region inside Europe, to ‘space’ that separates people and civilizations; the ‘space’ that brings together multiple ethnies and hosts different communities; the ‘space’ that TODAY and more important, TOMORROW, can easily get in touch through technology, connecting communities and their shared creations.

The second one, the ‘Temporal Dimension’, highlights Braila and its partners as a genuine open-air museum, which traps in a time-capsule undebatable proofs and traces of culture – past, present and future projections. It is not by chance that Braila holds the City Center Clock to be its prestigious symbol.

The third one, the ‘Social Dimension’, the concepts of sharing a common space, Braila and the Danubian region, by different nations, nationalities, religions and ethnies. Braila – Galati region and other participating cities will seek common ways to upgrade and facilitate the administrative actions, also through common projects, splitting the costs and multiplying the benefits, common informatic projects to be done once and to be used by all parties in medium to long-term planning, this way eliminating the first obstacles and also exploring the benefits of a successful regionalization process.

The fourth one, the ‘Spiritual Dimension’ includes traditions, habits, cultural and artistic manifests, religions, highlighting once more the intercultural and confessional dialogue and a better understanding amongst European citizens.

2. European dimension2.1 Elaborate on the scope and quality of the activities:

2.1.1 Promoting the cultural diversity of Europe, intercultural dialogue and greater mutual understanding between European citizens

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2.1.2 Highlighting the common aspects of European cultures, heritage and history, as well as European integration and current European themes;

Being part of Europe, we will expose more details regarding our cultural and civilization model to be able to harmonize it with communitarian values, contributing this way to developing the concept of European cultural diversity. The region with all its geography, residents, activities, traditions and aspirations, will become more visible and transparent to all Europeans and by attracting them into our living space, we will together succeed to share our own model, trying to make a better understanding and a higher level of knowledge of each other through culture.

Promoting some European entertainment events in our region will allow the current European cultural values to be shared to the citizens. On the other hand, these events will allow artists and tourists altogether to better understand Braila and to start a cultural dialogue between domestic and foreign artists.

The European cultural diversity is presented in our project through 2 main directions:

• the proposal and presentation ‘in extenso’ of our region’s specificity, through actions, so that the interested public make direct contact with traditions, customs and cultural events of our zone’s inhabitans (traditional costumes exhibitions, tools, live performance of traditional activities, domestic cooking, fishing on the Danube, and big events with folk music); • different exchanges of events, exhibitions or independent artists from Danubian countries and cities that will be invited in our region either to present their own creations or to host workshops in their own area of knowledge and know-hows;

These substantial cultural exchanges will promote other two basic project objectives, namely intercultural dialogue and a better understanding between European citizens.

No matter their place of living, European citizens share basically the same human and spiritual values: compassion and peaceful living together, the continuous desire of improvement, the hope of a better existence, sharing the beauty and authenticity of art, understanding and helping those that are in need.

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Shakespeare, Moliere, Goethe, Goldoni or Cehov are ‘goods’ that belong to all of us and not only to the nation that they were born in and that is why we will try to have events designed around their creation and having their artistic build-ups as a starting point, proving once more:

• their universality;• the democratic access to culture;• the effort to attract new public through

diversificating the cultural offer.

In order to succed in highlighting the common aspects of cultures, we will propose events in which Shakespeare will be played by Greeks, old Greek odysees will be interpreted through German ‘creativity’, Goethe will be universal because it will be interpreted by latin artists and the well-known Verdi creations are to be played by Slavic artists.

We will challenge the European tourist to discover the invisible wires that tie us by initiation in traditional gastronomy, folk handicraft and traditional activities such

as fishing agriculture, sailing. The ‘60-’70 oldsmobile parades from far-away Germany to our city will bring once more common memories and values to share, leading to a better understanding and appreciation of the European patrimony.

The Danube, as one possible matrix of the European Union will be a reason for dialogue and a facilitator for a better understanding through promotion of a modern kind of tourism – by river.

Being European and more importantly, being aware of the affiliation to the European Family means, as a cultural operator, highlighting the common aspects of culture, patrimony and European history.

In our project, the practical ways to sustain all these aspects mentioned above belong to the history museums in the respective region and their specialised personnel, either curators or archeologists or even writers and editors, they have to use their specific instruments and, in partnership with European museums, to be

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able to invite specialists and organise events in our region.

This museum dialogue is meant to establish common lines, possible similarities in discovering, saving and maintaining the common heritage, both mobile and immobile, rediscovering common traits of history and civilization, completing in the end a new portrait, unique for the history of the central and South-East European region.

Especially in the temporal dimension section it will be proven by arguments and history science testimonies a common genealogy, that of a united Europe “avant la lettre”.

Not only history will succeed in proving the numerous common traits of European countries, but also the ethnography, linguistics or artistic languages that are invited in our project will discover using specific means, the elements of continuity and relationship.

The theme and target of European integration is another major challenge for the project. Thus, in the space and spiritual dimension sections, through the exchange of events and artists we approach the theme of European integration. The widespread presence of the Romanian people and culture within the European space is historical certainty with numerous branches in our geographical area.

The historians’ or linguists’ science,

besides the continuous circulation from one way to another of certain themes, symbols, techniques or artistic languages, within the European culture, speak for themselves about the yesterday’s or today’s concerns of artists, leading to achieve an agreement beyond the geographical and linguistic distances towards a natural and necessary European integration. All the projects regarding the cultural infrastructure will be developed and built taking into consideration the actual themes of the European Union for energetic efficiency, use of regenerable energetic resources and carbon reducing.

Consolidating the governance is taken into consideration throughout our project, especially for the partnerships that Braila has at administrative level with the other partner cities that we will search for successful solutions to raise the efficiency of administrative paperwork and trust of the population in benefit of a smart developing plan of the region.

Our project protects the common cultural European heritage in order to make it accessible to everybody by supporting and promoting the art and creation sectors, by developing and promoting the creative industry.

The success of our project will create in the South-East region the premises of a more attractive for investments and work space, promoting the knowledge, the innovation and creating employment opportunities.

The transnational partnerships can be divided into two main categories. One category includes the existing institutional cooperation or those that are under seal, as is the case with the cities of Silistra and Pleven (Bulgaria), Ismail, Cahul and Straseni (Moldova), Reni (Ukraine) and Bursa Nilufer (Turkey), Volos, Kalamata and Piraeus in Greece. The second category includes partnerships currently under negotiation, with cities such as Bratislava (Slovakia), Vienna (Austria) and cultural institutions and universities, such as the Consortium of Universities of the Danube, based in Cologne and partnership already agreed upon by both parties, Pygmalion Theatre in Vienna.

Usage of European experience and importing the appropriate tools proven to be successful in Europe which are not sufficiently known and practiced in Romania: the projects like ‘Artist in residence’, ‘Cultural shuttles’, ‘ Ideas incubator for cultural projects’, ‘ Europeans Architects save the heritage’.

2.1.3 Featuring European artists, cooperation with operators and cities in different countries, and transnational partnerships.

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Projects that are already underway, in the field of rescue and valorisation of cultural heritage, by participating in successful European projects regarding this very important domain, collaborating with architects from Norway, Italy and France will be maintained and expanded. University of Bergen is currently running a project with ‘Ion Mincu’ University of Architecture from Bucharest, aimed to collect new ideas of reorganising public spaces. Braila Town Hall is currently working on a project with France, more exactly in partnership with the French Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Development in Romania, the project is aiming to revive the historic center of Braila, as part of an older program of Romanian-French cooperation.

Our project includes the completion of large co-productions with famous ensembles from cities along the Danube from Germany, Austria, Hungary, Slovakia, Serbia, Moldova, Ukraine, Bulgaria and many other European countries, covering performances like: opera, theatre, classic ballet, classic concerts, rock, pop, jazz and visual arts.

By the section ‘spiritual dimension’, European artists are called not only to present their own productions, but to work together with Romanian artists by making co-productions or large performances of opera, ballet or theater, proving once again the free movement and mobility of ideas and artistic experiences in Europe. The role and result of these meetings statuated by co-productions is to connect artists from different spaces, not excluding the existing experience of certain final productions, such as theatre or opera in which each of the artists expresses himself in their native language.

A remarkable project will be represented by the collaboration, in 2017-2020, between Romanian musicians and AFIM (Association Française d’Informatique Musicale), IRCAM (http://www.ircam.fr/) Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique, MusInfo from Bourges and the team of IT specialists from France who wrote the IANNIX program, an open-source sequencer for writing digital music, based on works of Iannis Xenakis, modern composer born in Braila in a Greek family. The program will include training sessions for computer use and this program for modern musical compositions, followed by concerts to exemplify the results. The collaboration will be expanded by attracting some Romanian programmers to support the development of the program and to extend the concept from ‘digital music’ to ‘quantum music’, seeking new forms of expression and composition and releasing the next version of IANNIX in Braila in

2021, the year of the event.

The second course of action for the cooperation between artists is by inviting playwrights, opera librettists, choreographers, directors, set designers or professional actors in our region, to produce performances even for the year 2021. At these events we will call and integrate amateur bands and ensembles, who are aware that art is a form of participatory democracy based on passion, talent and iniative so that both professionals and amateurs will perform on the same stage.

The centennial streets of Braila, Constanta and Tulcea will be invaded by European teams of street animations (people on stilts, living statues, jugglers, conjurers, strolling players) who will bring the cities to life and attract a large number of spectators. These street artists will interact with the audience by inviting them to learn techniques and elements of artistic virtuosity and will offer workshops for children and adolescents the puppet show technique, makeup theater technique, street painting, graffiti on the walls of abandoned and degraded buildings, which will give life to the whole city.

We believe that the chance of spectacular outdoor amphitheatres, such as the one on the Black Sea formed by the Greek cities Histria and Adamclisi, of the natural amphitheater from Macin Mountains, in Dobrogea, should be ‘fructified’ by building a permanent summer season, between June 15th and September 15th, when these international coproductions will be presented at least twice a week.

In the light of traditional culture of Braila, Constanta, Tulcea, Giurgiu and Calarasi, specific to all ports in the world, the entertainment priorities were, and remain, sailing events, shows and fishing contests and cooking fish products, contests and kingdoms of boats, and also music bands, musical theater, circus, theater or party music, street animations. The aim of our project is to transform, according to current times, these requests and artistic offers, giving them that growth of NEW, SURPRISE and NOVELTY, not only by the content but also regarding the form of presentation.

Due to the valuable and rich history of almost 650 years of the city of Braila, our main attraction for Romanian and foreign tourists, is staging extensive vintage reconstructions in the perimeter of the old fortress town, with numerous extras, costumes, weapons and props from the XVI and XVII centuries,

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scheduled for the weekend.

The fact that our region gathers several standard representative cities in the tradition of navigation and Romanian and European trade, it creates the opportunity of a network of ports that will commonly share some great activities such as the International Festival of Military Bands that will add to the current format ample choreography presentations and cheerleading, all of these which will be completed by ample sailing competitions and demonstrations specific to the area. To this type

of large-scale events which are very appreciated by audiences everywhere, teams and international bands representing countries, cities and ports established in Europe are called to participate.

This way, we can prove, once again, the merging between artists and spectators, common European roots, through millenary arts such as singing, declamation, circus, dance, street fighting or theater.

Due to the regional approach of our project, besides the twin cities of Braila, we will harness the opportunities of partnerships with cities - former and future candidates and ECoC as well as with the Danube cities and from the addressability area, for which reason we will group the current and the future partnerships:

Constanta-Odessa (Ukraine), Salonic and Heraklion (Greece), Perugia (Italy), Brest (France);Tulcea–Ilion (Greece), Ulm (Germany), Novi Sad (Serbia), the last two being located on the Danube.

2.2 Name some European and international artists, operators and cities with which cooperation is envisaged and specify the type of exchanges in question.

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Giurgiu–Ruse (Bulgaria) and Dunaujvaros (Hungary), both cities on the Danube. Regarding transnational partnerships, a main direction of action of the working group will be contacting and concluding agreements and partnerships between our town halls partners from Romania and town halls of major Danube cities such Regensburg (Germany), Linz and Vienna (Austria) Bratislava (Slovakia), Budapest (Hungary), Belgrade and Novi Sad (Serbia). Achieving these networks aim to itinerate exhibitions (photo, ethnographic, historical) of shows achieved in coproduction on cruise ships that dock in each of the aforementioned Danube ports; these artistic productions will be performed even on the ship or in locations ‘in’ and ‘out’ door of these cities, exclusively created for the program of the year 2021.

Our interest is also moving at the same

time towards attracting managers recognized through similar European projects, primarily from Romania (Sibiu, European Capital of Culture - 2007) and managers of former European Capitals of Culture as Marseille, Liverpool, Kosice, Plzen and Paphos.

As cultural operators that can brighten our project through experience and professionalism, we will focus our attention and will contact a few directors/succesful theatrical managers, such as: Felicitas Braun (Burgtheater, Vienna), Armin Petras (Schauspiele, Stuttgart), Tino Geirun (Pygmalion Theatre, Vienna), Arpad Schilling (Kretakor Theatre, Budapest) and Julian Ursulescu (National Theatre in Novi Sad). We intend to collaborate with vanguardist organisations such as Daghdha Dance Company from Ireland or Institute of Social Choreography from Frankfurt, Arts and Design University from Offenbach, University

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of Arts and Design from Milano.

Through the help of Radu Dinulescu, from Braila, artistic director of the Drama Theatre in Constanta, there will be partnerships developed with: The Theatre of Biarritz, puppet theater in Belfort, theater Mezzanine in Paris, ‘La compagnie trois cles’ in Paris, the company ‘Charles Kleinberg’ in Brussels, the company Karromato in Sobeslav, Prague (Czech Republic), Argine de’ll Bologna Teatro, Teatro Garcia Lorca from Granada (Spain). I.A.T.F. Festival (international action theater festival) in Grenoble, Mediteraneo Teatro Academy in Bari (Italy), Tsolinée et Compagnie du Soir Etienne, Teatro Los Claveles in Spain, Aruspice Circus in Lyon, Koom-Koom Theatre Group with an interesting project ‘Koom- Koom street traveling project’, ‘La Meute, Collectif acrobatique’, ‘Le Boustrophédon - Toulouse,’ Les inédits ‘in Grenoble, ‘Scène et Danube ‘ which already has a project in partnership with French artists and Romanians called ‘Confluences or Fluids’, ‘La Ferme Godier’ in Villepinte, many of those already mentioned having sent in letters of support and collaboration for 2021 ECoC. Through the same partnership, we will bring interesting street performances such as those of team ‘KaRNaVIreS–Theatre rue de feu’, puppet theaters like’ KARROMATO - Czech Marionette Theater and ‘Ljubljana Puppet Theatre’ in Slovenia.

In all of these cases, collaboration will consist both in the development of co-productions of theater, opera and ballet, along with the guests-collaborators, who can be accompanied by 1-2 actors or opera singers or ballet dancers, invited to support performances with their own ensembles, during the summer in the amphitheater opened in Macin Mountains, the Dobrogea Mountains and the Black Sea in Constanta or Costineşti.

For street animations, performances which are very liked enjoyed so much by the general audience and which have a significant impact on citizens who traditionally do not attend cultural events, we intend, along with top managers or directors, such as Constantin Chiriac Mihai Malaimare (who created and lead for 25 years Mask Theatre, the only theater of bodily expression and living statues in Romania), Andrew Press (creator and director of the Magic

Theatre in Bucharest) and Vasile Şirli (composer and director musical at Disneyland Paris), to put together a precise timetable during the months of April to October 2021, regarding the segment of street animations (traditional music groups, bands cheerleading, juggling, sleight, walking on stilts, living statues, video installations and fireworks).

Lights designers, architects and university set designers in Belgrade and Bratislava, as well as those of the Higher Institute of Design and Architecture in Cologne, as members of the Consortium universities Danube, along with the ‘Castel film’ studio in Bucharest, led by Braila’s Vlad Paunescu, will perform extensive historical reenactments, and ancient theater, dance, poetry and lights on the Black Sea, together with the ensembles of the Braila Theatre ‘Maria Filotti’, the Galaţi Musical Theatre ‘N.Leonard’, the ‘Fani Tardini’ theatre, the Constanța National Opera and Ballet Theatre ‘Oleg Danovski’, the Constanța Drama Theatre and the Tulcea Theatre ‘Jean Bart’.

Thanks to their historical existence over the last 200-300 years the ethnic communities of Turkish, Armenian, Hebrew, Russian, Macedonian in cities like Braila, Tulcea and Constanta, outside the current European Union and the communities inside it, such as Greeks, Italians, Roma and Hungarians, we will close a natural and necessary ‘time arch’ by inviting assemblies of folk, military music, bands cheerleading, theater professional and amateur, big filmmakers and artists, bands, animation street, choirs and symphonic chamber ensembles¸ in restoration and restitution of the atmosphere of these cosmopolitan, multiethnic and multilingual cities, found in constant dialogue of European and Oriental civilizations, in a climate of peaceful coexistence and religious tolerance.

Regarding the past and present of these multiethnic cities, we have the clear perception of the ‘avant la lettre’ models of today’s European family. The best proof of this approach is inviting and perfecting the participation in the 10th International Festival ‘Days and Nights of European Theatre in Braila (1 to 6 December, 2015) of theatre groups in Bursa Nilufer (Turkey), Thessaloniki (Greece), Chisinau (Moldova) and Skopje (Macedonia), the constellation of these theaters reflecting mathematically the existence of these minorities.

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From a cultural perspective, the Greek community from Braila is the most active ethnic community of the city, the most loved minority of the city due to the traditions it constantly conserves and promotes (many philhellenic Romanians and members of other ethnic groups study Greek language and dances), as well as the most visible community, both nationally and internationally (through cultural exchanges with different ethnic communities and cultural associations from Greece and the Diaspora in several European countries as well as through various cultural projects as partner of the ‘Carol I’ Museum of Braila).

The Greek community from Braila has contributed to the universal pantheon with several cultural figures: the writer Panait Istrati (1884-1935; his work, written in French and Romanian, has been translated in over 30 languages; he was a friend of Romain Roland and Nikos Kazantzakis; the ‘Panait Istrati’ Memorial House is located in Brăila; his father was from Faraklata (a village on the Kefalonia island); the name of the Cultural Center in Faraklata is ‘Panait Istrati’), the literary critic Dumitru Panaitescu Perpesicius (1891-1971; Romanian historian, folklorist, essayist and poet, scholar and editor of Mihai Eminescu’ work, member of the Romanian Academy, former general manager of the Romanian Academy Library; the ‘Dumitru Panaitescu Perpessicius’ Memorial House is located in Braila), the poet Andreas Embirikos (1901-1975; the first one who has introduced the surrealism in Greece and the first one to have practiced the psychoanalysis),

the opera singer Hariclea Darclée (1860-1939; she sang on the great stages of the world; Puccini composed her role in Tosca; the ‘Hariclea Darclée’ International Singing Festival is held in Braila with the patronage of UNESCO), the composer Ianis Xenakis (1922-2001; the inventor of several compositional techniques), the musician Gherasimos Miliaresis (1918-2005: he laid the foundation for the study of classical guitar in Greece), the woman painter Artemis Melissaratou, the composer Gheorghios Sklavos (former manager of the National Lyrical Theatre in Athens), the woman writer Antigone Foka, the poetess Antigone Kefala, the doctor and virologist Radu Constantin Portocală, famous in the whole Europe (1915-1993; he lived in Athens) and many others.

The presence of the Greek community in Braila has been and continues to be a constant factor, starting from the antiquity (when the Lower Danube was ‘the way of communication’ of the Greeks in the city with the Greek colonies on the coast of the Black Sea and the Mediterranean), continuing - during the period when Braila was a Turkish kaza (1528-1829) - through the Mitropoly of Proilavia (called this way after the Greek name of the city; it played an exceptional role in the history of Braila and of all the Christian territories on the North of Danube or Dobrogea) and especially after 1829 (and after 1836, when the city acquired the Porto Franco status) when, besides other ethnical groups, many Greek ship owners, cereal merchants, navigators and traders settled in Brăila (important names of industrialists, ship

2.3 Name the transnational partnerships your city has already established or plans to establish.

The most important transnational partnership Braila has established DE FACTO is the partnership with the Greek nation, which will also propose another city for the 2021 Cultural European Capital!

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owners, traders: Valianatos, Melissaratos, the Stathatos brothers, Marcopoulos, the Troianos brothers, Violatos, Lykiardopoulos, Suliotis, Embirikos etc.); they were coming from the Ionian Islands - Kefalonia and Ithaca, or from Epir and from the Eastern Rumelia, Anhilaos and Mesembria Otoman provinces; as a consequence, the Greeks have become the second most numerous population minority in the city. Braila and its Greek community have seen the most important development, an exponential progress (a line for passengers transport was established in 1903 from Braila to Constantinopole and Piraeus, owned by Destounis and Ianoulatos; in 1903, when Evangelos Venizelos, the Greek Prime Minister, visited Braila, he was impressed by the high number of ships carrying the Greek flag and he declared that he had never seen so many, even in Piraeus; the 1930 census shows that there were 4.837 Greeks in Braila at the time; in the inter-war period, the city has chosen three mayors of Greek origin: Rubinis, Suliotis and

Portocală; in 1839 various journals were written in Romanian, Italian and Greek, some of the printing presses with modern machinery having Greek owners).

The Greek community was visited by a series of international personalities such as: Andrew Athens, the president of the World Council of the Greek Diaspora, James Rosappe, the USA ambassador in Romania, Greek ambassadors and high officials on duty in Romania, Jacques Bouchard, professor at the University of Montréal, George Stasinakis, the president of the International Society ‘Kazantzakis’s friends’, the writer Marianna Koromila, Ilias Demirtzoglou, the president of the Greek UNESCO, choirs and cultural and sport associations, religious representatives from Greece, the ERT Greek Television, etc. In 2000, the Ecumenic Patriarch Bartholomeos of Constantinopole visited the Greek Church where one of his uncles has been a priest during the inter-war period.

Today’s society is flooded by a variegated complex aggressive flow of information oriented towards commercial publicity and in many cases promoting worthless uncertain information which, in spite of the development of the means of communication, are more and more difficult to check.

Without ignoring the classic mass-media informative channels or the modern electronic means of communication and the social networks,

specific to youngsters, we intend to promote an informative strategy based on physical, real objects which can be sent, received, placed on a desk, transmitted from person to person, worn, smelt or tasted. A simple small stone of Măcin Mountains, a wood chip of an old fishing boat, a fish scale or a reed fragment in a bottle with a label carrying the words ‘Approximately 470.000.000.000.000.000.000 atoms from Braila - 2021 European Capital of Culture’ will constitute the elements awaken the curiosity of

2.4 Can you explain your strategy to attract the interest of a broad European and international public?

Braila’s transnational partnerships are divided as follows:• Bulgaria represented by Plevna, Tolbuhin,

Silistra and Ruse;• Greece represented by Kalamata, Katerini,

Kefalonia, Pireu and Volos;• Moldavia represented by Cahul and

Strășeni;• Ukraine represented by Izmail and Reni;• Turkey represented by Bursa;• France represented by Calais, Marseilles;• Austria represented by Vienna.

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an European and international public.

A Romanian traditional shirt as item of clothing, personalized shirts of Braiconf, the internationally famous brand, a jar of marinated fish after the recipes of Lipovan Russians, limited series of wines rewarded with prizes from the internationally renown vineyards Focşani and Murfatlar delivered in personalized bottles or a piece of ‘Gulianca cheese’ which is about to become a national brand, a miniature replica of the clock in the city centre, they can all be offered in the big European cities, inside some small bargain sale shops in which these artefacts will be changed, not sold, by means of an archaic and symbolic barter with other objects of sentimental value representative of the area. The symbolic objects received in return from the European citizens and nations will be gathered in Braila and they will be the first exhibits to circulate in our partner cities to mediate the first physical contact between the European citizens. We would also like to gain people’s trust not only by means of cold and trade price technologies of the ‘broadcasting’ or S2C type (‘server to crowds’), but by means of TC2T (‘trusted citizen to people’) based upon trustworthy human micro-relations.

An important resource both in the initiation and support of the project as well as in its implementation is represented by the citizens of Braila. In the last 25 years a lot of citizens have constantly left to other cities and countries, many of them becoming high professionals and model citizens, no matter the

state country they are in.

In a more and more technological society, the relationship ensured by well-known and respected persons will have a greater impact and a much higher credibility. We believe that we can reach a large European and international public by means of the people who were born and grew up in Braila and who were still connected with those who are still citizens of the city. In addition, the city which will win the title of 2021 Cultural Capital, will represent the entire country of Romania. We can create a network of ‘remote neighbourhoods’ of the Cultural Capital by means of culture and information clubs organized by the Romanians abroad, no matter the city they are in.

The ‘Adopt a house in Braila’ programme is aimed at those who have left the country and live abroad as well as at their friends in the countries where they live and work. We will offer them an album with photos of architectural monuments in Brăila which require renovation or are for sale, sometimes at the price of an average car. Those who are interested can buy such buildings and actively participate for the reconstruction of an extraordinary historical center, including these buildings into the touristic circuit, with benneficial economic effects.

The ‘European Citizen Entanglement’ programme which aims to bring into contact the

Romanian citizens having the same age and living in different countries in order to facilitate their meeting and the anniversary of their birthdates in Braila in 2021. In order to reach a large European audience in a moment of high interest for the public, Braila

1) it will be detailed in chapter 6.d,, under the question “How will you mobilise your own citizens as communicators of the year to the outside world?“

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will organize a pre-selection contest for the best Romanian song which will participate in the 2020 Eurovision Song Contest.

For the traditional ‘George Grigoriu’ pop music contest in 2020, which will have significant awards, Romanian artists and composers will be invited to enter the contest organized before the national one, with songs having Braila, the Culture and the European Capital of Culture as a subject, as well as songs connected to the cultural concept ‘Quantum Culture’. Apart from

the prizes, the winning song will be supported for the National Television selection through the vote of the public from the 8 partner counties, assuring more chances to represent Romania for the 2020 final.

The participation of the selected song to the famous contest will arouse the curiosity of the European public, attracting their attention towards the event Braila ECoC 2021.

After the pre-selection round, Braila intends to establish, as soon as possible, connections with the cities which have been candidates for the title of European Cultural Capital in the past but which have not won the title in the second round and exchange experience with the technical teams which have prepared the candidature in order to acquire knowledge about the preparation for the second selection round and to know which problems could not be resolved and lead to failure. We want to learn from these mistakes in order to avoid making them and meet the requirements of the commission during the second round as well.

At the same time, the cultural proposals of these cities will be analyzed and, if some of them have never been applied but they are really interesting and can been adapted to the cultural conception of our program, we will make proposals to the respective cities to have the honor to collaborate with Braila for the implementation of the new ideas. This programme appears to us as an action which can take advantage of the good ideas and give the cities that could not win the title the opportunity to share the pleasure of presenting their soulbound projects to the European public.

A special collaboration will be developed with the Romanian cities which will have participated to the competition for ECoC 2021. Because in 2021 the events will represent to the European public not only Braila, not only the South-East region but the whole country. It is essential to be able to gather the most interesting

proposals of the partners in the competition and to implement them in partnerships with those cities. We intend to include the best positioned 12 cities from the current competitors in the list of 12 different entities, one for each month of the year, in order to offer the chance to present a small part of the programme they have worked for, adoptating some of the events to our general theme ‘Quantum Culture’. Our intention to collaborate with these cities will not stop only to the artistic part of the programme, but we want to draw in the best specialists from other cities in volunteering, communication, fundraising, artistic management and event organization.

Together with the collaborations with the former candidate cities which have not succeeded, Braila will start the collaboration with the cities which have been cultural capitals in 2019 and 2020 in order to prepare the collaboration between Braila and the respective cities in 2021 as a support for the continuity of their cultural events.

We will benefit from the experience of the former European cultural capitals of the countries from the former ‘Eastern’ Europe because we are convinced that these countries same as us have dealt with similar problems concerning the cultural infrastructure, financing difficulties, the way of interaction with the citizens and, sometimes, the lack of trust or implication from a part of the civil society. We will benefit from the experience of the Cultural Capitals in ‘Western’ Europe aiming to eliminate the differences that still exist and ensuring the solidity of a diverse but united Europe.

2.5 To what extent do you plan to develop links between your cultural programme and the cultural programme of other cities holding the European Capital of Culture title?

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3. Cultural and artistic content

3.1 What is the artistic vision and strategy for the cultural programme of the year?

The motto for the ‘Braila 2021’ event is ‘Quantum Culture’ and the theme is ‘The four dimensions (geographic, temporal, social and spiritual) of quantum culture în the Danubian-Pontic area’ and it is focused on emphasizing the duality between the cultural act, the world of art and the latest discoveries in science, especially quantum mechanics; phenomena which have the potential to create a new perspective, at a philosophical level, on the macro-scale and micro-scale universes with profound impact on human interactions and society as a whole. We are conscious of the fact that art and

culture, as resultants of social and economic activities, are permanently influenced by the latest novelties in science and technology, that they can not remain outside of what defines human progress. Therefore, not even quantum mechanics with its own observations, conclusions and paradoxes, many of which have a philosophical meaning, could not be excluded from this permanent dialogue and questioning of the human destiny and of our connection with the surrounding universe.

The Temporal Paradox

Teleporting Emotional States

Temporal paradoxes from quantum mechanical experiments will be associated with the effects of time on art. Art masterpieces from different epochs în time will be brought forward to challenge the public to discover the spiritual aspect that makes the artistic act invaluable, unchanged and frozen in a point in time. At the same time, we aim to bring to the spectators’ attention cultural acts with a powerful emotional impact at a certain moment in time, but which have been forgotten due to the variety of coordinates present in the social landscape.

‘Teleportation’ of individuals to specific moments in their past, in which only the pleasant events remain unaltered, have beneficial effects which can be noticed in how these individuals interact socially. It is sufficient to see how a car enthusiast’s face lights up when they see a Citroen 2CV, a Trabant or a Fiat 650 on a street in Braila, stirring up childhood memories of the car that his father used to drive. We wish to challenge the public to share their exuberance of the past with the joy brought by current generations, to try a transfer of emotions between generations, to encourage them to explain and tell stories from these past times, whilst at a terrace in the historical town centre of Braila, transforming for one night a simple observer into a direct participant, an actor, a novelist or a historic.

The Observer Paradox

The artistic vision will bring forward the role of the observer în culture, which, similar to quantum experiments, could radically change the outcome of the experiment. We will insist not only on the effect of art on the spectator but, in particular, on the influence of the public on the artistic act. We will prove with examples from the history of art as well as the cultural experiments which will take place the fact that these effects were never one-sided, that art by itself did not shape characters or social categories but that the effects can also be directed in the opposite way: the spectator validates the artistic act, polishes it and encourages it to evolve in a particular direction, creates new movements and means of expressing oneself and pushes humanity to a new level of perception through art.

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Perhaps not coincidentally, Braila is the only candidate for the title European Capital of Culture in 2021 that has a ‘quantum behavior’, even at the macroscopic level. The city is simultaneously in two places in Europe. We will provide details in the presentation.

Citizens’ superposition

We hope that the cultural events from 2021 will facilitate a strong communion of feelings, ideas, cultural exchanges which demonstrate that, through a strong link to the spiritual, social and temporal dimensions, the geographical dimension could be set aside, and that we can all be European citizens regardless of where we live, work or spend our vacations.

We hope to bring together groups of citizens that were born on the same year and day in the ‘European Citizen Entanglement’ programme. This is to help them to discover others’ solutions to questions similar to their own, we can offer a common point for them to expose their wishes, artistic tastes so we can transfer them, multiply them and communicate to others through the cultural medium.

Of course for all of these statements, which are in part theoretical and speculative, we will have corresponding action plans, programmes and artistic projects, with precise dates covering the entire year. This will be defined by the four dimensions of ‘quantum culture’ in our area that were mentioned in the project title: the geographic, temporal, social and spiritual dimensions.

Our cultural project will aim for the future, for the year 2021. This vision will be applied to both participating projects as well as to the artistic activities that would reach a wider audience. The four aforementioned paradoxes of quantum mechanics will be brought to the foreground using a unique artistic filter, all of which will be based on the four pillars of the project.

The evolution of Braila, from “de facto”, an European commercial and cultural centre at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, to Braila-European Capital of Culture 2021 by the assigned European Union title, is an extremely ambitious target that animated more and more the project team with audacious and constant aim to assign to the candidacy an innovative character, making the event of 2021 to offer to the culture consumers a new vision of the universe through art

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3.2 Describe the structure of the cultural programme, including the range and diversity of the activities/main events that will mark the year. For each one, please supply the following information: date and place / project partners / financing.

The range and diversity of the events will be tied to all four dimensions of ‘Quantum Culture’, using the number 12 as a symbol: 12 artistic languages of the 12 national communities in the 12 months, 12 musical tones, 12 hours, one for each star of the European Union flag.

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We will treat the 12 artistic languages from the perspective of the 4 dimensions of this vision and cultural strategy in the form of:

THEATRE

GEOGRAPHICALDIMENSION

TEMPORALDIMENSION

SOCIALDIMENSION

SPIRITUALDIMENSION

The Non-verbal Theatre, Towards a Globalization in Art nowadays we talk about new bridges of communication, about globalization or tolerance. The theatre arts, beyond the linguistic barriers, connect people, speak the same language with them, a new meta-language, a new spirituality.

The street, another scene The non-verbal theatre, outside the performance hall, performed in the public square, addresses all people in the same language: gestures, dance, body language, the primordial human voice, singing, all of these become instruments of such a communication, the spiritual one.

Medieval Miracles and Misteries from a Contemporary Perspective inviting a series of liturgical theatre performances from Western Europe which can be presented in liturgical places, others thant the Catholic one, thus facilitating a dialogue on the meaning of ecumenism and religious tolerance in the contemporary society.

The Fairground Theatre between tradition and the future extensive people-oriented events (fairs) in all the partner cities, with people invited from abroad (itinerant companies, jugglers, musicians and puppeteers, stilt people, fireworks), events that are scheduled for a whole weekend, in correlation with the local traditions and the schedule of events in each locality. The reason for these popular events will be retracing the atmosphere of the Romanian fairs of the 19th century valorising the tradition of the Romanian folk theatre, of the Turkish one ‘karaghioz’, ‘Mărioara and Vasilache’, puppet theatre in open air, circus and merry-go-rounds. The participation in this program will be international.

The Theatre, an opportunity for reintegration programme focusing on physically challenged people. People with autism and the Down syndrome will be involved in theatre workshops.

Theatre@Home theatre performances in apartments, free of charge, for families randomly chosen. On the same occasion audio and video materials will be recorded reflecting the impact of this format, and, in the end, the host families will be invited to a theoretical symposium.

Ancient Theatre Performancessummer theatrical season that will include one show each month with two performances, starting from the Greek and Roman ancient plays (tragedies and comedies) that will be presented in the amphitheatres of the ancient fortresses of Tomis, Adamclisi, Histria and Troemis.

Today's echoes of renaissance

Modern Theatre in Historic Sites will include theatrical performances of modern and contemporary plays in historic location, in churches or even archaeological sites. Both periods will conclude with theoretical conferences and symposiums on this topic.

Avant-garde theatre scenic method which involves the public as an actor, between the theatrical space and the civil space.

theaters from the English renaissance period in contemporary scenic transcriptions in unconventional spaces

The Theatre and the Technology of the Future a programme that will include inviting and producing performances using modern installations and technology, with 3D graphics and holograms.

Theatres along the Danube will include in the program, in each of the four seasons, a representative performance of a theatre company located in a city along the Danube. The focus is on Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest and Novi Sad. The performances will be presented in the region of the applicant, namely Constanța, Tulcea, Focșani and Giurgiu

Brăila – A Theatrical Gateway between the West and the East

Theatre in Natural Amphitheatres summer programme that will include two performances each month, the companies being invited from Europe and Romania and will be presented in open air places as the Danube Promenade in Brăila and Tulcea, the Măcin Mountains and on the shore of the Black Sea.

festival-like events pursuing closer ties between Danubian professional theatres by scheduling quarterly meetings in different cities of the region, by rotation

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MUSIC

GEOGRAPHICALDIMENSION

TEMPORALDIMENSION

SOCIALDIMENSION

SPIRITUALDIMENSION

Folk music from secular to sacred the coexistence of various ethnic and religious communities, as well as openess of the people towards communication, hospitality and tolerance, justify the organization of the music festivals, based on popular songs, very often related to the religious calendar.

Pill of Music suites of conference and ilistrations about the effects of music on the health of people

Life's musical hours from one nation to the other, folk customs, in conjunction with the great experiences and moments of human life, such as birth and christening, military, love, wedding or funeral music. This is where the traditional Festival of Military Music or Love Music along the Danube will find their place.

Liturgical music, the balm of the soulrepresents a spiritualized and profound way of approaching Divinity, through genuine art, brilliantly exemplified by Russian or Bulgarian religious choirs, bass profondo.

Music, a complement to work conferences and seminars analysing music, starting with that of the nomadic shepherds to the radio hits at the office.

Music for all weekly series of events of various sizes, from stadium concerts to club music, targeting audiences from different social and age categories:

- street music, folk and party music for the elderly, famous romances with the Romanian representatives Brăila's Cristian Tanase, Jean Moscopol;

- music of ordinary people from all over Europe (flamenco songs, canzonette, tarantella), traditional popular music along with the George Grigoriu festival on an European scale;

- music intended for the informed public and the trained public: jazz, the most representative musician from Brăila being Johnny Răducanu; classical music and opera, the "Hariclea Darclee" festival;pop, rock and disco of the youth, experiments at the confluence of the musical styles

The Music of Tomorrow presenting demonstrative concerts of experimental music composed by a series of European composers, computerized music experiments and on revolutionary technological media. Music and lights, open air performances, musical demonstrations of avant-garde music

Rock me Amadeusperformances that will adapt well-known classical pieces using modern rock instruments, Brăila being the place where the concert series 'Mozart Rocks' was born.

Music, from the Pre-classics to Iannis Xenakis a project that will develop along the whole year 2021, consisting in performing a series of concert-lessons under the direction of renowned conductors and European musical critics. Locations will be as diverse as possible, both in Brăila, as well as in partner cities.

Ancient Musical Instruments will bring to the attention of the public a series of instruments dating from ancient times (harps, Armenian duduk, sitar) and their use techniques in performances that will also use the latest electronic instruments

Rhythm: the Pulse of Time festival dedicated to percution instruments and their role in playing music, from ancient instruments, the tribal drums, darbouka, taiko, semantron from monasteries, street and symphonic percution, rock and electronic instruments.

Waltz, from Strauss to Ivanovich large symphonic ensembles performing a multitude of famous waltzes on cruise ships, mooring in the most important Danubian ports.

The European countriesanthems a suite of concert-lessons with exemplifications of the stories about the European countries' anthems.

Music Along the Danube music on floating barges brings together chamber symphonic ensembles, military ensembles, traditional folk music, invited from the Danubian invited countries and cities, performances that will take place in all the Danubian partner cities.

Blues in Deltas from the Mississippi to the Danube

Pop-rock, moto-rock, from Woodstock to the Reed...stock pop and rock music performances at Portița and Sfântu Gheorghe, in the Danube Delta.

blues festivals organised outdoors, in Brăila's lake, in the Danube delta and all of the nearby danubian cities.

Jazz – from New Orleans to Brăila and Troesmis outdoor and indoor jazz music performances, with the participation of the most diverse jazz bands in all of Europe.

A major event under every dimension: The European Geography of Classical Music in 12 Tonalities! The project will cover 12 days of concerts dedicated to a specific tonality, from pre-classical melodies to modern music! Each day will focus on a ‘central’ famous melody of a specific composer from another country, played by an artist and an orchestra from his home country and other well known melodies of othet composers in the same tonality. All the concerts will be held, alternatively in all the partner cities.

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GASTRONOMY

GEOGRAPHICALDIMENSION

TEMPORALDIMENSION

SOCIALDIMENSION

SPIRITUALDIMENSION

Religious holidays in culinary traditionsreferring to the ethnic communities of our area, supporting the community for celebrating religious events with broad participation of other citizens, inserting spiritual events in local cultural programs.

Secular Gastronomy in the Danubian Pontic areaconferencing, debates and lectures, accompanied by cooking demonstrations with representatives of religious cults specific to the area. Alternating influence of fasting and nutritional practices on food traditions.

Local culinary literaturecycles of conferences and symposiums in the localities of origin of writers, debates accompanied by gastronomic examples.

Wine along the Lower Danubethe organization of the “Holiday of Wine” from the most famous wine producers in the area, reconstituting roman festivities of Bacchus from Ovid, celebrating rituals from Zarathustra, the fastuoaselor ceremonies Greek during the production of wine Histrian

The ingredients and spices in local history" specialized studies and research, demonstrations of ingredient pairing in traditional recipes, contemporary recipes, cooking demonstrations by renowned European specialists

The picnic gastronomya series of events organised in the areas of interest of the participating localities, outdoor cooking, barbecue. Grilling and roasting methods fairs.

Ethnic cuisinecontests and cooking demonstrations of ethnic communities from all participating municipalities, competitions, organising the "weeks" of Greece, Turkey, etc. in different local restaurants, Bulgarian and Aromanian evenings etc. with traditional music, dancing in collaboration with teams from the „mother” countries.

Quantum Gastronomyconferences about "energy feeding" in partnership with Levine Rothgar, author of the "Alimentos Energeticos, Fisica Cuantica y Nutricion" book

Traditional Cookerytradition and futureConferences and lectures, speed cooking schools and culinary demonstrations with limited technical means.

Danubian-Pontic culinary refinementlocal master chef in collaboration with the greatest masters from Vienna, Budapest, Bratislava, Istanbul, in the bordering towns of the Danube and West of the Black Sea. Caviar and Champagne in "Gourmet weeks" held in luxury restaurants of Brăila and other participating cities.

The art of cooking in clay potssince the Gumelniţa culture until today. Series of events held in the participating cities in the Cultural Capital in 2021, each with the typical and local history.

Millenary tradition in outdoor cookingfrom Boian and Hamangia culture until today. Restoration of kitchens' evolution during civilization, through workshops in collaboration with the Museums of History

The Cuisine - between tradition and technologyfairs with modern food processing technology and „Third Millennium” cooking demonstrations - cryogenic, lyophilization, vacuum controlled atmosphere methids, etc. Series of conferences and workshops, setting up High-Tech cooking classes/ schools.

Byzantine cuisine on the Lower Danubeprogram of culinary events in the partner cities, from cooking demonstrations to work learning-shops, assisted by representatives of various ethnic groups, part of the Byzantine Empire

Traditional cookery during the communist periodcooking and preserving demonstrations, developed during the heavy period between '50s and '90s, with limited resources available.

The Pontic Shad, unique in European cuisinefestivals, fishing net competions and experience exchange events between experimented fishermen, Pontic Sad best cooking competitions, series of conferences regarding Pontic Shad.

The Danube Gastronomya series of fish cooking events, organized in those villages that are part of the project. They will be organised in fishing and harvesting fish-eggs seasons, as well as the sun-drying, salting and smoking processing seasons, depending on the specific site and local traditions.

Survival Cooking

The pie in the gastronomy between Istru and Pont Euxin cooking demonstrations in traditional clay ovens, hot stones and traditional pan , depending on the local culture.

fishing, hunting and preparing prey in isolation from civilization demonstrations. There will be organised hunting and fishing incursions in different areas of the Lower Danube Delta, Braila and Ialomita Ponds.

Sweets and desserts gastronomy in Levant Byzantine and Ottoman influences in the art of preparing sweets at Danube's delta. Experience exchanges between famous sweets and pastry confectioners from Austria, France, Germany, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, confectionary art workshops, presentations of new products, fairs pastries.

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DANCE

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Through dance to self knowledgedance unites people through rythm and melody, emotions and passion, either the protagonist or the spectator. The project gathers foreign tourists and locals who, coordinated by teacher and dance masters, will create workshops and even street shows.

Rain making dance

the pre-roman ritual of Paparuda in an attempt to implore the divinity to bring the rain.

The dance of destinypresenting an old bacchanal folk song dedicated to the solar cult and practiced in a geto-dacian initiation ritual of sending the earth into heaven, Ciuleandra, in a symbolic relay of generations

At the wedding!events created with the support of specialised companies in order to demonstrate and teach ethnic dances and wedding celebration traditions, artistically assisted by professionals and turned into novel shows with dances and music related to the 12 ethnic groups.

Dance:communication channel with divinitythe ritualic and religious significations of dance as a sign system represents for the tourist and for the ethnic communities a form of initiation and a form of approaching the divinity. The example of the dervish rotating dancers from the oriental culture, the Serma ceremony, is an illustrator of the concentration force and spiritual exercise in the community.

Nationalities specific dancesThe Berezka Ensemble – Russia’s Floating Dance Group, gipsy and all ethnic communities ( greek, turkish, rrom) dances.

The dance before Internetfolk dances as an archaical way of socialization and entertaiment e.g. Sunday hora, „sezatoare”, the Căpâlna girls' dance.

Let’s dance!dancing lessons programmes in pre University school, with contests between forms, schools and highschools. Outdoor dancing events for seniors with different musical ages music.

Dancing it’s my life!series of parties, clubs, organised in parking lots, in aerodromes, in market halls, suggesting different times of our life, with the appropiate music and dances.

Eat and dance!events in restaurants in order to emphasize dance as cultural manifestation, professional animators and the realisation of dance animators schools.

Invitation to ballethigh artistic class shows featuring Danube ballet theatres, from Russia, including ice ballet.

From Terpschicore to dub-stepseries of school-shows during summer taken in natural amphitheatres of ballet and dance european schools. Initiation and perfecting in the art of dance.

Byzantine dance and musicVintage shows in Byzantine castles, in unconventional places, with specialists from Istanbul, Venice, Florence.

The virtual world and danceseries of dancing shows with video and holographic projections, with Wi-Fi headphones and 3-D glasses with vertical air propulsion, with lifting devices, etc., with the participation of best european clubs.

We invite you to danceBallet (waltz) and music gala on the occasion of the two balls with the theme „Braila's yesterday and today's spark„ organized as the opening and closing programme in „Maria Filotti” Theatre's Hall.

The evolution of danceConferences with interpretative demonstrations of the evolution of specific dances for our region, the oldtime balls, events taking place in different cities with people clothed according to the specific age.

Voulez vous dancer … sur le Danube” sports dance, society dance, classic ballet and modern dance contests, featuring ensembles, groups and individual dancers from Danubian cities, Europe and Romania.

International Folk Dance Summitan original confrontation between Europe and the rest of the world, starting with folk dances of the world's countries accompanied with handicraft expos with sale.

Dance challenge party!events dedicated to groups of turists from Europe or other continents, where each people would show their specific dances along with local animators and guests.

Oriental dance in every day life of Danubian space„Belly dance” demonstrations: gipsy, bulgarian, tartarian, turkish and greek versions. Old romanian oriental dance contests. Conferences and musical demonstrations with and about the oriental influence on old and new romanian music.

Geographical kaleidoscope of danceDancing events according to ages and world's countries where the influence came from: argentinian tango, viennese waltz, american breakdance, romanian sarba, greek sirtakis, etc.

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PHOTOGRAPHY

11 artistic languages into onecoverage of all other 11 artistic languages in photography, including music (through artists' images during performances), culinary art (through pictures of finished products)

Spirituality through imagepresentations of images by local personalities, accompanied by lectures and conferences.

Life in black and whiteexhibition of exclusively monochrome images, with strong positive and negative emotional followed by discussions with the public awareness of major problems and finding solutions to engage the society and to promote positive experiences.

Brides and groomscontests for the best photo of the religious celebration, wedding, funniest.

Places of Worshipexhibitions and exceptional photo albums with images captured throughout the South-Eastern region in churches, monasteries and chapels.

Photography as Artexhibition of images on the border between painting and photography, modern techniques of arts synesthesia.

A picture worth more than 1000 wordsexhibition of photographs document the eyes of the world to bring social problems, poverty, inequality, the pollution, social unrest, the war

More than a selfiementoring workshops in photography with courses for the general public to discover the mysteries of photography, choice of subject, lighting, composition, using the simplest cameras of mobile phones.

Photography in schoolcourses of study in secondary education, learning modern techniques of shooting, exhibitions of photographs by young people across Europe.

Let me see!Making websites and local blogs where every resident can post photos or videos to refer to their city.

Coolestseason contests for the best photo which can participate in international competitions.

Best moment!competitions for the general audience featuring the funniest moments caught on camera.

From daguerreotype to DSLRa retrospective of photographic techniques over time with exhibits of photo equipment from ancient times, technical workshops with celluloid photographic film.

„Old versus new” at the blue Danubeexhibitions of artistic photos taken with digital versus film developed in the participating cities, demonstrations of techniques for developing, new and old photography equipment

Memoria Photo Paperseries of photo exhibitions document, with images taken over time about events, celebrities, important moments in the history of Europe.

From the same pointexpositions/competitions of urban photographs taken from the same angle but at different times, in European cities.

Picture of the Futureexhibition of the best selling cameras, cutting edge 3D images, holograms, technical salons photo and video, professional shooting demonstrations from fashion and film industry professionals, software and image processing techniques.

Braila in time imagesexhibition of photographs or postcards from Brăila's past and the cities in the region.

Pictures of Danube photo contest dedicated to the Danube, with a trip organized by the springs of the Danube to the Black Sea, which will include 48 of the best photographers of our time whose work will be the basis of the photo exhibition at the closing of 2021.

Balta Braila, first Danube Delta the discovery of a unique piece of nature through photo lens, camera workshops, camps shooting, Bird Photohunting, opening specialized sites for “photo hunting of animals".

Pricopan, the place of the 900 species of butterflies shooting camps in Măcin, workshops for scientists with professional and amateur photographers.

Braila 2021: closing chapterthe largest photographic exhibition to be presented in Braila in all partner cities, the cultural capital of Greece and in all cultural capitals so far that will present the best images of the events of 2021 and the best images from the above project.

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CINEMATOGRAPHY

Romania as Seen by Europe contest of TV reports or documentaries shot using unconventional means, shot exclusively by the foreign tourists or artists who have visited Romania.

Discover Romania at its very roots film presentations – from documentaries to artistic films that present the Romanian traditions and customs.

Religious Metaphysics of the Eastern Romania series of films about the monasteries, religious beliefs, superstitions, Orthodox protochronism, film projections in consecrated spaces of the Christian spirituality of the East.

Braila in cinema projections and conferences suite, evoking both inspiring personalities in Braila and filmmakers (actors, directors, operators, designers)

The film, a guide gala of international films with strong symbolic messages designed to stimulate the man to seek answers about his role in the universe, about humanity and spiritual values. The projections will be concluded by presentations and discussions by famous film critics and then a dialogue with the public.

YouFellinicompetition of ideas, sripts and short films shot by amateurs using unconventional shooting methods. The films will be shot during the contest (4-6 days), in the setting of the large partner cities according to a set of themes and topics. All the stages of the film shooting (filming, processing, editing) will be accomplished under the supervision of a series of professionals who are also in charge of the project.

The Quantum Leap from Spectator to Protagonist will promote cinematographic workshops with directors from Europe that will offer tourist the chance to become protagonists in films to be shot in 2021. The tourists are invited to join screenplay writers and directors to contribute and add narrative, theatrical and snapshot elements to films and then to act themselves in those films.

Ridendo castigat moreshistorical gala of all-time comedies with outdoor screenings during summer nights

Advertising addictedNights in partnership with the Cinémathèque Jean Marie Boursicot and Dakino, a marathon event enjoyed by the public

DaKINO International Film Festival will be achieved in 2021 with the support of Brăila director Dan Chişu, founder of the festival

"ANONYMOUS” Film Festival at St. George, Danube Delta large outdoor event, with over 8 years of experience and international participation

Technology of the Future, a Chance for the Film events presenting the latest video projection and filming technologies. The spectators will be offered the chance to experience the immersion in virtual reality, teleportation in remote or artificial worlds and past or future eras using the most performant computers in the year 2021.

Speechlessscreenings of silent films, black and white films, in unconventional spaces in every city of the region, accompanied by the traditional piano background music played live or by recently conceived soundtracks, and new compositions.

Past and Present: the Film as a Witness Documentary film festival aimed at presenting the Romanian and foreing tourists their origins and historical relations in the past, especially for the cities in the south-eastern part of Romania. The performances will be presented in the partner cities, in open air spaces, under the form of itinerant cinematographic trailers. The films will be followed by vintage fashion shows, antiques fairs, dance evenings with music from the 20's and 60’s of the 20th century.

From Lumiere Brothers to Luc Beson cinematography as a time machine, having windows towards the future – selection of international S.F. films, including the participation of directors and actors.

Landscape, Ecology and Film programme oriented to valorising the Dobrogea landscape, with the Danube delta and the Dobrogea Mountains.

Pelikam:International Film Festival

European Routesa famous series of TV documentaries filmed in the period between 1976-1983 will be celebrated in 2021 in a festival of film and documentaries, having as a topic the European cities and nations.

Cultural Geographica proposal of a cultural alternative of 'National Geographic', a series of films done in partnership with well-known European studios about the cultural legacy of the South-Eastern region and its European connections.

festival of environmental film, the 8th edition of a renowned festival in Tulcea. Besides the main topic of the festival, ecology, the festival also presents long and short films that approach a variety of matters that raise awareness about a healthier future. Environment protection, air quality, transport, energy, agriculture, human solidarity and fight against poverty. Traditionally, this festival brings together films from more than 10 countries.

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ARCHITECTURE

Grandparents’ home in the context of excessive urbanisation of life today, returning to a matrix of rural living, in a patriarchal atmosphere, can offer solutions to escape on vacation or possibly for retirement.

Between ecumenism and urbanism facing people towards spirituality once again can be supported by developing hotel complexes, restaurants and pensions in the immediate vicinity of places of worship, in a harmonious mix of architectural styles.

Stairways to heaven conferences, expositions about building techniques and renovation of cult shrines in the South-Eastern area.

Let's talk!a project regarding the integration of spaces dedicated to socialising on different age and professional categories, in libraries, school, colleges, clubs, etc.

Cemeteries, a social history in front of our eyes urbanand social recovery programmes, urban integration, for each denomination, etc.

Urban integration of cultural shrines debates and seminars for proposing provisions for city planning and good practices for recovery, rehabilitation and construction programmes.

Cottages and habbits expositions, workshops and techniques to build homes out of clay and straws, techniques to build lake homes in Brăila's Pond, through modern and environmentally friendly methods.

The garden on the roof expositions, projections, workshops to encourage the efficient use of multi-level spaces to promote a healthy life, turning the town 'green' and promoting campains for a fresher air.

Gems from the ruins expositions and solutions to restore dignity and radiance to buildings and iconic architectural ensembles for Brăila (hotels, famous homes, public restrooms, old restaurants and banks).

A new chance to urban communist architecture architectural studies and projects in order to lift up colective homes from the communist period, a sproject which was started experimentally with partners in Norway.

From the industrial hall to the concert hall identifying, promoting and searching for funding solutions for urban regeneration in the spirit of transforming an obsolete functionality into one that is viable and necessary to society.

Homes in the Gumelniţa culture an attempt to retrieve old techniques to build homes from the Gumelnita period, workshops with young architects from Danubian countries.

The home of the future

The underground city events in partnership with specialty institues for finding technological solutions for discovering, maintaining and restoring sections of the old traditional tunnels nearby in the touristic circuit.

Brăila's architecture, outdoor museum promoting urban touristic trails with a professional architect guide, in a true laboratory of architectural history of the last three hundred years on a European level.

symposiums, expostitions and competitions for architectural projects regarding inovative solutions to improve privat space, with efficient energetic solutions, and reduced costs under the conditions of an accentuated urban agglomeration.

Harmonising between old and new conferences, project competitions and solutions for combining, in the same architectural ensemble, of material styles, engineering and architectural solutions from totally different eras.

European influences in South-Eastern architecture photo expositions, detail studies, catalog printings and tourist guides regarding the complexity of architectonic influences.

The house on the lake workshops achieving some examples with Romsilva, in the floodplains outside Danube's dams, for fishing and hunting tourism, unique in Europe.

Brăila, the home of European architecture series of conferences, lectures, presentations in various European styles of buildings constructed before 1940, building rehabilitation programmes, etc.

The country house project competitions for groups of houses or small residential neighbourhoods in areas adjacent to our region's crowded cities.

The house in the swamp

Floating housedeveloping the concept of floating house by realising some of the projects of the civil society along with Dutch specialists.

touristic incursions in areas of natural reservations in Lower Danube's area, Brăila's and Ialomița's ponds, Danube's delta, in which europeans will discover ancient methods of men of the water.

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The time difference between the year 2015, when the application is made and the year 2021, the year of the event, will make difficult, if not impossible, to make a premature selection of events for the cultural programme. Such an early selection would surely lead to an incomplete set of innovating elements which could appear în the years leading up to the event. The permanent discovery of new artistic methods of expression, new challenges that artists face, changes in fashion and preferences,

require a continuous readjustment of the planned programme for 2021 so that the European and international audience will benefit from the most innovative and attractive cultural offer. As a result, we intend that from the year 2016 to 2021 we will establish a mechanism called ‘Braila’s Cultural Market’ which, starting from the equivalence to ‘Braila’s Grain and Goods Market’ which was set up in 1882 and dictated the price of grain in Europe, will select, train and refine the

3.3 How will the events and activities that will constitute the cultural programme for the year be chosen?

URBAN ART

The other 'Me' competition of minute street caricatures, digital tablet graphics.

Guerilla-Art symbolism in Eastern Romania a series of communications along with demonstrations, workshops, integration programmes for graphic mural art in urban art.

Unforgettable portraits street paintings, minute graphics, organised competitions, specially aranged work spaces for artists in the public space.

Gothic redivivusnew-Graffiti manifestations, music and Gothic representations, gothic outfit parades.

3D Graffiti paintingfestivals, competitions, demonstrations, debates about a new way of understanding urban life.

Graffiti Alphabetinitiation courses in Guerilla and Gothic writing, demos, workshops.

Yarn Bombingexperiments regarding street decoration and embelishment of the urban landscape, with middle school and high school students, in parks and between blocks of flats.

Backwall paintingidea competitions for establishing locations, series of workshops with local and European artists for executing the pieces.

Flyposting artwill be used not only for demonstrations but also for announcing other cultural events.

Street installation and Lock Oncompetitions with international participation, organization of workshops in schools and colleges, design contests for showrooms.

Brăila Stencil graffiti challengeorganization of competitions between the participating cities for the best piece of work, initiation in video projections for ambience before the performance.

Posters of yesterday and today expositions of posters, ads, billboards, high-tech commercials using 'augmented reality' techniques, walking advertisments, promotions using carriages and vintage cars.

From painted logos to LED displays

Holograms in urban life light and colour shows with 3D laser projections, demonstrations with commercial projectinos, specialty fairs, 3D films outdoors.

Statues and painted bas-reliefs workshops led by specialists dedicated to learning skills from the Greek and Roman period.

fairs dedicated to techniques for bright firms, and expositions of old postal cards of old firms.

Back in timehigh-tech programmes using virtual reality equipment like Microsoft Glasses, virtually reacreating buildings and life on the street from different time periods in Brăila.

Mosaic art in Europe demonstrations with the help of specialists, rehabilitation of old workings affected, workshops with renowned mosaic in Turkey, Spain, Iltalia

Geographic mosaic Guerrilla Graffiti styles demonstrations, wheatpaste, the areas selected following the competitions for ideas with local NGOs and administration.

Living walls crossing Europevideo projections on buildings and screens featuring the most well made murals in Europe; achieving major works in collaboration with renowned graffic illustrators.

Painting on glass

Posters and billboards exhibitions in galleries, on streets, squares, professional poster contests

Venetian influences, series of conferences, workshops with Italian experts

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most interesting European cultural projects. These projects would be brought for 2 weeks every year to Braila to act as both training for the organisers as well as a method of advertising and staying în contact with all European cultural entities. Part of the funds which are allocated yearly towards culture by the municipality will be directed to this selection mechanism, both based on a competition system as well as using direct invitations, for European cultural projects which will be invited in the South-East region, as a ‘teaser’ for the cultural events în 2021, which will be held under the name ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’. Selection criteria will be identical to the ones used for the cultural programme ‘European Capital of Culture 2021’: novelty factors, European perspective and multicultural dialogue. Moreover, the events that will be selected will be the ones that best fit the theme for Braila: ‘The four dimensions of quantum culture in the Danube area’.

The selection committee for the artistic events for ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ will be formed by the association members which will overlook the final project, art directors of cities that took part în ‘Cultural Capitals’ the year before in order to benefit from their freshly gained knowledge of organising such events as well as members of the

European Commission for culture and local cultural representatives. The selection will be made with the help of volunteers that have signed up for the programme as well as feedback from the public. These first initial contacts will facilitate the dialogue between local cultural representatives with the ones from EU member states. They will test how easy it is to collaborate as well as the public’s openness towards these events, both in terms of receptiveness as well as educating the public towards new methods of expression and growing the audience base. In terms of administering the project ‘Braila 2021’, organising the two weeks for ‘Braila’s Cultural Market’ will represent the best way to verify, instruct and perfect the administration team leading up to the event in 2021. This will offer the possibility of readjusting initial parameters and data, including the ones related to finances, to assure a complete success in the year of the major event.

The ‘Cultural Market’ institute will continue even after the year 2021 with the same mechanisms as before, only that this time it will have the goal of helping organise an event that would last for one month each year with the scope of maintaining a diverse range of cultural activities after 2021. The yearly-occurring event would be named ‘Braila 2021 Remember’.

The entire region covered in our application for this cultural programme has the unique characteristic of being the meeting point of 3 different regions of Romania: Greater Wallachia (comprised of Braila, Slobozia, Calarasi and Giurgiu), Dobrogea (comprised of Tulcea, Sulina and Constanta) as well as southern Moldavia (comprised of Galati, Focsani and Tecuci). This characteristic increases the diversity and richness of traditions, customs and elements of traditional art forms and handcrafts. Therefore, this diversified range of traditions will be enhanced on and offered to tourists, both foreign and Romanian, on the exact spot where these traditions originated from. This first objective will form the scope of visits, trails, tourist routes with the aim of meeting these craftsmen in their pottery or ceramic shops, traditional textile shops, wool mills or even in the domain of culinary art. The type of presentation for these age-old specific skills and crafts will exceed the often outdated forms of museology. Visits will consist of using modern methods of filming, ‘live’ feeds or pre-

recorded material, recomposing the natural scenes using modern digital technology, synesthesia between two-dimensional and three-dimensional. Recomposing the workspace for these shops can only be done through the magic of 3D however. The tourist can interact and can participate in a local traditional craft either through a computer or by taking part in such an activity and therefore contributing to the local art. The second method of interaction between the local heritage and the new, innovative cultural expressions, will constitute bringing the technologies and instrumentation in modern urban spaces, either open spaces (markets, bus stops, inner courtyards) or closed spaces (theatres, cinemas, concert halls, art galleries or even office spaces). Generally, these unconventional locations will cut out and underline the originality and authenticity of traditional crafts. The third dimension of this necessary interactivity is placing the traditional artefacts into a new paradigm. There are many examples: using traditional outfit or its elements in new products and modern creations (traditional outfit from the

3.4 How will the cultural programme combine local cultural heritage and traditional art forms with new, innovative and experimental cultural expressions?

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three intersecting historical regions which would be used in modern articles of clothing); the art of ceramic used in creating a new, revolutionary design - lighting fixtures, crockery, objects used for decoration and personal or urban ornaments, contributions to the art of metal working, leather working – in one word, a great variety of home and

industrial uses. We should not forget to mention the art of singing and of traditional dancing which interacts constantly in a two-way manner with modern art, in music as well as choreography, theatre or film.

Local artists and cultural organisations are involved and consulted throughout: both in the incipient stage of the programme as well as the stage which involves carrying out the manifestations that are part of the programme agenda.

For example, ‘Centre of Creation Braila’, which coordinates the vast majority of local craftsmen, both at an individual level as well as at an event or festival level, is currently în the final stages of documenting and choosing the most representative local artists and craftsmen from each art domain.

Together with the Centre of Creation in Braila, we have contacted associations and cultural foundations which would help structure and propose to the working collective how to integrate local artists in Braila as well as partner cities into complex programmes, cultural tourism and educational objectives.

Local craftsmen working in the traditional textile industry (traditional local costumes, rugs, wool products) as well as leather products, ceramics, pottery, will be involved in tourist programmes aimed at uncovering old traditions and will offer live demonstrations or even hands-on activities for the attending tourists.

Events from traditional folk bands from Braila such as ‘Pandelasul’, ‘Floricica din Gropeni’, ‘Muşeţeanca din Însurăţei’ and ‘Doina Bărăganului’ and established folk festivals ‘Love Songs along the

Danube’ (internațional format) or ‘Lină Chiralină’ (for children and youth) or from other similar bands from Bulgaria, Moldova and Ukraine, will be adapted to the specifics of the project and its theme.

Other cultural and educational institutes with a long history of expertise în this domain are ‘Vespasian Lungu School of Arts’ and ‘Hariclea Darclee Highschool of Art’ and the ‘Palace of Children in Braila’ (for children and youth), which will provide with the help of teachers the documentary material and artistic programmes for the duration of these events.

In terms of the local associations and cultural foundations which will collaborate on the project, we can mention the names of the cultural foundation ‘Darclee’ as well as the cultural associations ‘Cooltura’, ‘Artevent’ and ‘Maria Filotti’ which, benefiting from their own communication channels and information dissemination through their members as well as their own programmes, will complete the cultural offer or they will just act as the extension of the PR, marketing and volunteering.

Through their presence, the cultural programmes will have a supplementary number of protagonists, volunteers or simple beneficiaries. Their online activity, similar to the numerous influential bloggers that cover cultural topics, is beneficial for spreading information and enlarging the selection base of artists and programme conception.

3.5 How has the city involved, or how does it plan to involve, local artists and cultural organisations in the conception and implementation of the cultural programme? Please give some concrete examples and name some local artists and cultural organisations with which cooperation is envisaged and specify the type of exchanges in question.

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4. Capacity to deliver results

4.1 Please confirm and evidence that you have broad and strong political support and a sustainable commitment from the relevant local, regional and national public authorities.

With the start off of the actions to inform the citizens on the candidature of the city, a group of experts in law and the establishment of NGOs have drown up the first draft of the status of the association which has been harmonized, with the wishes of the groups of participants increasingly larger, during 3 major meetings on the status subject.

Once achieved the status, the initiative group held a series of consultations with all political parties, with the members of the Parliament from Braila, with the representatives of the City and County Council. In prior meetings, all participants have expressed their willingness to support the efforts of the civil society and of the association in order to submit a successful project.

The consultations ended with a solemn meeting of all the political and administrative actors of the city and county, held at the future headquarters of the association, where The Mayor, Mr. Aurel Gabriel Simionescu, read symbolically, on behalf of all those present, a statement of support, of ‘political truce’ between all political and cohesion forces, in the effort to support the project.

Although the messages submitted by the parties to the civil society were positive, balanced, there were comments in social media from some fervent supporters of several parties, fearing that some local political actors actually make this gesture in order to confiscate this action for electoral purposes.

Therefore, in the next period, a special attention has been paid to a proper, transparent and equidistant communication of all the actions of the association. When the association was established, the wide participation of all the citizens interested in the project was encouraged, without any discrimination, by establishing a modest registration fee.

Participatory leadership within the association was ensured by granting a single vote for the City Hall and the County Council in order to avoid any influence of the internal decisions.

We truly believe that, ANY CITY in Romania which would win the title, would gain extended and strong political support and a lasting commitment from the national public authorities. Romania has taken important steps towards democracy and governmental transparency and no matter what government would succeed in leading, it will treat equally and with the same utmost importance the city that will receive the title of ECoC in 2021.

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For the year 2021, Braila will use as artistic space the ENTIRE OLD TOWN, with a total area of 1.65 square kilometres, a true open-air museum, one of the largest and most dense historic centres of a town in the Romanian space.

Having an exceptional geo-location, Braila will use a large number of spaces for events in nature, taking full advantage of the Danube promenade, Small Wetland of Braila (an important natural park), the lakes around Braila, Măcin Mountains (the oldest mountain range in Europe), superb/magnificent places in Tulcea, in the Danube Delta, the ancient cities near Constanta and from the Dobrogea area, from Cahul to Ruse. Within the proposed artistic space we included the Danube promenade with a length of 2 kilometres, a public garden of 53.000 square metres, 40 covered theatres for shows and exhibition with a total capacity of 30.000 seats and 20 outdoor spaces suitable for the outdoor arts events, with a total capacity of 120,000 seats upright.

By the year 2020 it is estimated that 30 more rooms with total capacities between 50 and 1,000 seats will be set up, some of them by urban regeneration projects of former industrial buildings abandoned at present.

Braila plans to develop the existing infrastructure through the renovation of some historic buildings, through the creation of some outdoor spaces for cultural events. It is important to note that some of the buildings have been renovated by personal efforts of some private companies, the remainder being subject to local and European funding.

Major events or the important indoor ones will be broadcast live on big screens in public places in all partner cities in the applicant region. Part of the live broadcastings of cultural products related to minorities will be sent to countries of origin and those containing Romanian folklore will be broadcast in the countries with large Romanian communities.

The ‘Braila ECoC 2021’ project will use also the cultural infrastructure of the partner cities in the project located in the South-Eastern part of Romania, in the ‘brother’ city Galati, located only 14 km from Braila, where also a large number of events will be held, since it has a comparable cultural infrastructure.

4.2 Please confirm and evidence that your city has or will have adequate and viable infrastructure to host the title. To do that, please answer the following questions:

4.2.1 Explain briefly how the European Capital of Culture will make use of and develop the city’s cultural infrastructure.

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Braila has at this moment (October 2015) over 2,500 beds in B&Bs and hotels classified according to the B&B/hotel classification system.

About 2,800 more accommodation places will be available in the nearby city of Galati, where a similar number of cultural events will take place.

Braila will also use the opportunity offered by the Danube to accommodate simultaneously a number of over 50,000 tourists on cruise ships, in the ports of Braila and Galati. The ships will provide not only accommodation at different levels of comfort, but also the possibility to commute between the partner cities in the event (Giurgiu, Calarasi, Braila, Tulcea, Sulina, Sf. Gheorghe, and Constanta) so that the participants could attend any cultural event they chose.

Braila is a major intermodal transport junction (fluvial, maritime, railway, road and aerial) and it is accessible through the following roadways:

• Tulcea International Airport and then national road for 87 Km (1 hour and 40 minutes) up to Brăila, through the wonderful landscape of the oldest mountains in Europe, Măcin Mountains, part of the Hercinian mountain range.

• Mihail Kogalniceanu International Airport (located near Constanța City) and then national road for 150 km ( 2 hours and 30 minutes ) up to Braila, passing through the superb Dobrogea Region.

• H.Coandă Bucharest International Airport and then on two routes: 240 km (3 hours) the highway A3 + the European Road E584 or 220 km (3hours and 30 minutes) by national road DN1 European Road E577 DN2B and the highway .

• Private airport for private ULM aircraft type in Vădeni, only 8 km from the city of Braila, developed entirely with private funds in the last 4 years, with potential for expansion.

• sea and fluvial port on the Danube by vessels passenger ships from Linz, Vienna, Budapest, Bratislava, Giurgiu, Calarasi, Ruse, Silistra, Galati, Tulcea.

• international rail for passenger transport , Braila-Galati being an important railway junction (Barboşi).

In addition, the former military airport in Ianca (40 km from Braila) entered into the administration of Braila County Council, the authorities intending to start a feasibility study for the modernization and inclusion of it into the international airport circuit/network system.

Recent European documents (transportation masterplan) approved by Brussels, in the optimistic scenario includes a bridge over the Danube between the cities of Braila and Galați, obtaining the ECoC 2021 being the opportunity to push the achievement of this major infrastructure objective.

4.2.3 What is the city’s absorption capacity in terms of tourists’ accommodation?

4.2.2 What are the city’s assets in terms of accessibility (regional, national and international transport)?

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By using this outstanding opportunity to expand the accommodation capacity through partnerships with European transport companies, Braila will not be forced to invest in building new accommodation facilities; therefore private investors will focus on raising the quality of their accommodation capabilities, on renovating buildings that are part of the architectural heritage of the city in order to transform them into special accommodations for families, with small indoor gardens, that will make staying in Braila even more pleasurable for tourists.

In addition, during summer, in the entire South-East region, there are already hundreds of functional camping sites, some in areas with beautiful landscapes that will surely attract nature lovers, but also bird-watching, mountain-biking, enduro, karting, fishing, water sports, air sports.

Candidate for European Capital of Culture 2021, Braila has invested in cultural and touristic infrastructure, preparing an adequate and viable infrastructure in order to host cultural events. This determination will result in achieving the four dimensions defined in the strategic planning and financial programming document ‘Braila Municipality Cultural Strategy for the period 2015-2025’.

From the viewpoint of the municipality, it is essential to ensure access to cultural spaces. In order to do this, about 42 million Euros have been invested in upgrading 23 km of roads and 6 km of double track tram running in Braila, in the last 5 years. Moreover, a pier for large ships was built in Braila, which can provide optimum conditions for ships to dock in Braila, which is the last sea and river port on the Danube river. A wharf for small boats used for cruises on the Danube and the Small Island of Braila (which is a natural park) was also built through a dedicated project. Also, in order to encourage sports and ecological transport, bicycle paths were built in Monument Park (one of the oldest parks in Braila).

At the same time, the municipality takes upon itself to make future investments in upgrading roads and ensuring efficient, effective and environmental-friendly public transportation. These actions will ensure that both tourists and locals from the neighbourhoods farthest from the city centre will have access to the cultural events, making the latter more involved in city life. Thus, according to the Development Strategy of Braila Municipality, the following activities are foreseen in order to improve access to cultural infrastructure:

• construction of a new pier for large ships;• modernization of public transportation going to Salt Lake resort – tram rail and bicycle trail;• modernization of public transportation within the city by restoring the roads and providing

means of transportation.

The glorious past of Braila, which in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century was the richest city of Romania, is highlighted by bringing back in the cultural limelight relevant buildings as conventional cultural spaces.

Now Braila has the largest preserved historical area from the early twentieth century, and is a veritable museum of the architecture of that time. The main historic way, M. Eminescu Street, former Royal Street, was rehabilitated through EU pre-accession funds, an action which brought Braila back its fame as the city with acacias. The street also became an unconventional space to conduct cultural activities: theatre, music, exhibitions. The beauty and poetry of historic

4.2.4 In terms of cultural, urban and tourism infrastructure which are the projects (including renovation projects) that your city plans to carry out in connection with the ‘European Capital of Culture’ action between now and the year when the title is awarded?

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buildings, noted by all those who set foot for the first time in the city, is brought into the limelight by rehabilitation programs.

So far the municipality has restored and reclaimed a part of the memorial houses which belonged to celebrities in Braila and plans to continue this important effort of cultural recovery.

These projects converting old buildings into conventional and unconventional cultural spaces will continue. When referring to the conventional cultural spaces that will be reintegrated into the cultural field we have the following plans:

• modernising and furnishing the Culture Houses in the Radu Negru and Chercea neighbourhoods;

• restoring, furnishing and preparing the Maţukis House for cultural activities;• modernising the Central Cinema in order to host cultural activities since the Cinema has

ample space for exhibitions, not only for watching films;• restoring a former school built in the early twentieth century, a heritage building from the

Spiru Haret era, that will host the Children’s Palace.

Since the cultural activities organized lead to fluctuating demands of spaces, the municipality is also considering organizing unconventional cultural spaces:

• rehabilitation of the old city water tower, which will be the polarizing element of an unconventional cultural space the city badly needs when organizing large-scale cultural events and when conventional cultural spaces become cramped;

• a thematic circuit in Monument Park, where a space will set up for outdoor high-profile performances and which will be furnished with a modular mobile stage with sound and lighting installations;

•

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• promoting the industrial heritage. For now the rehabilitation of buildings that belonged to the Power Plant is envisaged, to provide the necessary space for both large scale shows and for various unconventional exhibitions. The building was even used as a set during the filming of the video presentation of our candidacy;

• arranging the space for outdoor performances in Salt Lake resort so as to enable the organization of smaller scale cultural events;

• setting the Danube Promenade as a place of leisure and performance on the Danube shore. We consider the construction of an outdoor performances space with the possibility to cover it in bad weather.

Furthermore, the municipality is also considering providing creative spaces for local artists, spaces that can become a real crucible for creativity and artistic development through which the spirit of Braila will be captured and presented. The attics of the Creation Centre and of the memorial houses Petre Stefanescu Goanga and Nicapetre, which are furnished as exhibition spaces, as well as workshops, are already such spaces.The ample attic of the Youth House will become a place of creation and exhibition for objects and art collections.

In the near future, the set up of workshops inside the water tower, the art high school Hariclea Darclee, and the Vespasian Lungu popular arts school was also taken into consideration. The objects carved in stone during the creative camp organized this year in Braila will become urban art exhibits on Avenue of the Arts.

The basement of the Water Tower and the rehabilitated Turkish Cellars can host various cultural and literary events, café – bookstores, or even coffee or wine tastings.

An essential element for the local cultural infrastructure is the projection of the holographic film called ‘Flashes’ - which shows moments of the ethnic contribution to the formation of the modern city on the left bank of the Danube.

Alongside the efforts of the municipality and County Council in restoring Braila’s heritage of emblematic buildings that can be used in the 2021 ECoC project, there are praiseworthy private initiatives, with remarkable results. The latest building restored is the former Italian-Romanian bank building in downtown, a building with gorgeous interior that has been used as well as a setting for filming the video presentation of the application.

4.2.5 What is the planned timetable for this work?

In the immediately following period we will continue the restoration work in the Old City Centre and on other patrimony buildings according to the existing charts. Expanding this renovation projects and creating unconventional cultural venues are scheduled after the preselection stage, when we will be able to give more detailed answers to this question.

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The Initiators and the Association carried out actions to raise awareness concerning the chances for the city of Braila to become cultural capital by joint efforts, through cooperation between citizens, through creativity and perseverance in convincing less optimists. Brainstorming sessions were conducted in the most diverse social environments to collect ideas for actions representative of our city with special focus on myths and legends associated with Braila.

The Association logo was chosen as a result of a public competition open to the participation of students, amateurs and professional graphic artists, all from Braila. The best competitors were selected and they remained attached to the project by supporting Association’s efforts in administering the web site, drafting advertising material and helping with the overall design and layout of the present bid book.

Because the town of Braila is known in Romania thanks to the proverb, ‘Even a blind man found Braila’, proverb whose origins still sparks heated debate, the Association Braila ECoC 2021 drew together the Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired Romania, Braila branch, which in 2012 organized the National Musical Contest for people with visual impairments, together in the summer of 2015 organized the first broadcast of films accessible to blind people. It is worth mentioning that The Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired has an amateur theatre group that won several awards in nation wide competitions.

The Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired Braila, together with the Braila ECoC 2021 Association are working together in staging for the first time a musical inspired by Braila candidacy for the European Capital of Culture theme with main purpose of raising awareness amongst the city residents and secure their engagement right after the preselection time.

Over 70% of the Association volunteers are gymnasium and high school students or teachers who responded fastest to our call, With their help we were able to spread the news about about the application and award criteria starting with their own families. In schools, awareness was also raised by organizing additional tutoring (civics) hours to explain, based on the materials provided by the Association, the purpose of ECoC title, requirements and methods of judging but above everything else why is this is important for our city and its citizens. Over 3,000 views of the pupils’ parents were collected so to measure the degree to which the ECoC candidacy has been correctly transmitted and understood. The results were used to make on the go amendments to the public message about the candidacy by printing flyers containing clarifications entitled ‘Top 10 wrong impressions on the candidacy for European Capital of Culture 2021’, with messages that aimed to provide citizens with accurate information.

Although there were several other options in translating this application file in English, this was done with the direct support of students

5. Outreach

5.1 Explain how the local population and your civil society have been involved in the preparation of the application and will participate in the implementation of the year

Braila - the easiest to find capital!

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and teachers from high schools in Braila with primary intention to attract in this initiative young people and their teachers, by revealing the first part of our program and keeping them engaged by sharing our vision and involving them in our efforts in preparation of this application.

The response to the Association efforts in attracting the youth exceeded our best expectations. Their interest materialized in a massive presence during filming of the city presentation video. The filming breaks were used to expose few parts of the city candidature Program. It should be noted that the most difficult shots took several hours of rehearsal, organization, and involved following strict guidelines from the video director, during which the citizens have participated with enthusiasm.

The Association held a meeting with members of the main Braila entrepreneurs NGOs, presenting for them with the project history and evolution the candidacy theme, as well as the steps that we have been taken. The presentation was a great success and the president of the Commerce and Industry Chamber read a ‘symbolic contract’ between Braila citizens and entrepreneurs who have pledged to support the efforts of the association, the contract was then signed by the present. As a result of participation and appreciation enjoyed by the project, there were significant donations and sponsorship to the Association accounts from different companies and individuals present.

Most of the volunteers and participants

in debates and brainstorming sessions have provided many ideas for our project, from the most mundane to the most eccentric and exotic. The fact that the association has collected them all, without filtering or modifying anything, in summer 2015 generated some virulent reactions. The national media disqualified some of the proposals. The Association explained the open and fearless approach to sensitive issues the city society is facing, exploring the potential of myths and legends associated with the city, identifying strengths which could be used to service the application on the same time evaluating efforts to correct shortcomings and fix them along the way by 2021.

Local media sustained the Association efforts throughout the preparation of the application file in support of both our actions and for the purpose of identifying any shortcomings. They provided regular information on the intermediate steps, continuously running campaigns to promote and support the candidature at Braila’s largest daily newspaper which is in fact a founding member of the Association ‘Braila ECoC 2021’. Amongst other members we can proudly name Representatives of national minorities who were also enthusiastic in joining the project.

Participation in the implementation of the ECoC 2021 action

Another way to involve citizens in preparing the candidacy will be represented by a ‘Project Market’ dedicated to projects such parks

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renovation, repair and rebuilding, planting green spaces, beautification of streets, buildings and urban nearest neighborhood. This will identify the ‘leaders’ of local initiative and their ability to form a team of volunteers to support, prepare and control work in a small part of the town, in their neighbourhood. Teams are formed by 10 to 20 people living in the same building or on the same street, or co/workers from the same company. They would propose to the Municipality various beautification projects for small parts of the city, manage the project scope, resources, budget and timelines. In few instances, they will possibly be co-financing the project by organizing fundraising activities.

Following project contests, the City will select among the most creative to sponsor also considering opportunity for savings in the long run, will provide overall guidance for architectural standards and urban design and support each Project financially by covering the full cost of all materials required for the project upon receiving final confirmation of quality and proof that the project fulfilment has been undertaken in conditions of maximum transparency.

This type of action, on an experimental basis, has already been started by the Braila City, in the direction of landscaping green spaces in neglected neighborhoods.

The benefits of citizens involvement in such projects could be multiple, starting by bringing people together and collecting a large volume of ideas from various levels of Braila society to using volunteer work in city benefit (not insignificant in proceedings in which 100 volunteers planted 500 trees) in going to ensure qualitative work and subsequent maintenance of the final outcome (playground, a recreation site) will be secured by the responsibility of those who contributed to the project. Construction services companies are engaged and encouraged to support these projects through donations of building materials or equipment lending and even providing specialized resources outside working hours.

In addition, citizens will increasingly trust in partnership with local government and management of the city local budget.

An interesting example of a project with good results related to the educational environment is ‘Gaming Architecture’ that has proposed the development and promotion of architecture and environment education to raise awareness and knowledge of the values of architecture, design and urbanism. The program was intended for classes VI-VII in the school years 2013-2015 and was designed as a concept to: observe, analyze, build and present. It involves explorations, experiments, games and work on a common project: ideas for our school. In the classroom teachers were assisted by an architect to coordinate the class project.

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5.2 How will the title create in your city new and sustainable opportunities for a wide range of citizens to attend or participate in cultural activities, in particular young people, volunteers, the marginalised and disadvantaged, including minorities? Please also elaborate on the accessibility of these activities to persons with disabilities and the elderly. Specify the relevant parts of the programme planned for these various groups.

Attention to disadvantaged categories access to cultural activities has always been a concern of the city. Noted in this regard are the Theater Team/Company from Tichileşti Penitentiary, the Theater Team/Company of the Association for the Blind and the Visually Impaired or performances of puppet Theater ‘Carabus’ which promotes special programs for sick children performing in hospitals or in special centers for disabled children.

In the next period ‘Maria Filotti’ Theatre will introduce an experimental system design which supports real time display of dialogues on a screen special for hearing impaired people. Also at the ‘Maria Filotti’ through European funded projects, facilities for people with special needs in all areas of the theatre were created and through the ECoC 2021, we intend to expand this experience to other theaters in the city.

In the long term, the association is planning to create a company specialized in organizing, managing and disseminating

professional and also independent shows throughout the applicant region applied with the aim to promote national and European level. This company, which was called the ‘Danube Culture Hub’ wil act as the starting point through which well-known European agencies will bring various cultural events to the entire south and east Romania. The company will also have an educational role of training manager, manager of events and cultural projects, sound engineers and lighting and in time aims to create a Production Department to customize sets and costumes for theater and vintage film props vintage but also facilities for outdoor scenes, amphitheatres.

This target company’s production comes from the countless opportunities offered by the exceptional and unique natural setting where numerous films, television productions, theater and opera have been produced over the years, Braila having good a cooperation with the biggest film studio in Romania, ‘Castel Film’, which it has also made the video presentation. Another function of this cultural operator

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will be that of an ‘interpretation center’ designed to integrate and promote the results of all successful cultural projects in the region, across the country and Europe.

The company will promote artistic handcrafted products with specific local folklore flavour given the rich tradition of the area and the existence of institutions that maintain and craftsmen specialized in the processing of wool, flax and hemp, leather, pottery and ceramics, wicker or rush. Braila is long recognized as a national brand shirts industry in Romania in the past 50 years. The revival of latest fashion trend interest in Romanian ‘ie’ (‘The blouse roumaine’) can also prove local industry economic sustainability in close collaboration and connections with major European fashion houses that already have cooperation in Braila such as Dolce & Gabbana, Faconnable, United Colors of Benetton, Paul & Shark, Zara.

By creating a seasonal or annual industries, a large number of young people will be involved/employed on the projects. It will create management structures trans-provincial events, management of volunteers network through training and organizing, contribute to a material decrease in unemployment rate through active recovery of people from outside market labour. Recently, with the support of our

partners in city of Focsani, a film projection has been made accessible to the visually impaired with a small number of films. In partnership with the biggest house films from Romania, ‘Castel Film’ will be able to develop a modern production of such films accessible to disabled and even audio-books.

Another direction of development we believe that our region brings a unique trait is the production of wooden pleasure boats, small traditional technologies, thanks to the involvement of former Olympic champion Ivan Patzaichin original from Tulcea, our partner city. Braila and Galati city shipyards bring enough experience and qualified resources for development of such niche industry. We could also address the construction of classic cruise ships or boats, propelled by sail or paddle for leisure, tourism on the Danube in Europe, or production for the film industry.

The association conceived the ‘Your Braila Guide’ for older people and teenagers, which aims to identify seniors of different ethnicities who have the talent, knowledge and skills to act as communicators or guides to the tourists and help them discover the picturesque places in Braila and its amazingly rich history. Together, a ‘master’ in the story of local legends in various European languages, with the young who will bequeath story site will accompany the tourists joining the ECoC event

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in 2021 as a veritable ‘time travel’ companions in the city’s past and present time. The entire tourism industry in the region will benefit and continue to develop and evolve with the help of ECoC title if winning in 2021, providing young people with sustainable career development opportunities.

All this projects aiming heritage and cultural areas will be integrated and used in the context of European natural heritage, environment and sustainable development.

5.3 Explain your overall strategy for audience development, and in particular the link with education and the participation of schools.

We are starting from the belief that through art and culture, fundamental changes both at the personal, community, and at the macro level could be produced. The power of education and culture impact is difficult to match. To strengthen the relationship with the education system, but also to produce radical changes with long lasting effect we propose a two-pronged action program.

Given the structure of the education system in Romania which makes schools subordinate to the County School Inspectorate we will work from the top down, centralized, because the system allows us to create a working partnership between the Association of Braila 2021 and educational institutions. Thus, the structure and school curriculum will be enriched with educational and artistic programs aligned to the programs of the ‘ECoC 2021’ in which the 12 languages of artistic expression will be exemplified and presented to students in a framework developed by various specialists.

Legislation recently updated offers volunteers the advantage of using the experience obtained through volunteer activities as professional development and skills refresh or upgrade particularly useful as employment advantage after school graduation as well as access to skills required to join educational institutions in Europe. We will publicize this advantage and by using the volunteering program will be able to certify skills acquired in 2021 ECoC supporting and guiding young people in finding their way towards a successful career.

The second strategy is to use the energy and bouts of ideas in schools to create ‘schools for citizens’ programs to channel updates and news related to city business, courses for foreign languages, tourism, customer service, communication skills in order to properly present and represent the city, etc. Lecturers can be identified among students thus encouraging empathy and closing the generation gap, empowerment of young people through knowledge and responsibility as well as lifelong learning opportunities for adults. The school environment will support the city’s cultural activity by creating specialized professionals able to effectively interact with the visitors, whether local, national, regional or international.

A third orientation of the program is the connection between the educational and the cultural environment. In practical terms it would mean a scholarship program for research involving collaboration between teachers in secondary education and among researchers in education sciences to identify ways of using culture in order to improve the educational process.

For example, learning a musical instrument and concepts of music theory and notation can improve the ability of abstraction and then refine the results to mathematics. Developing physical skills during rehearsals music leads to better outcomes for jobs that require concentration and coordination. Pilot classes can be set up starting on 2017 along with the city preparations for the 2021 ECoC.

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The data below includes only the amounts the town of Braila (without county or region) will allocate for financing the project European Capital of Culture in 2021.

6. Management

6.a. Finance• City budget for culture:

What has been the annual budget for culture in the city over the last 5 years (excluding expenditure for the present European Capital of Culture application)?

• In case the city is planning to use funds from its annual budget for culture to finance the European Capital of Culture project, please indicate this amount starting from the year of submission of the bid until the European Capital of Culture year.

YearAnnual budget for culture in the city

(în euros)Annual budget for culture in the city

(in % of the total annual budget for the city)

2011 3,241,934 4.99%

2012 3,230,178 3.76% *)

2013 2,714,022 4.11%

2014 3,065,035 4.50%

2015 3,759,543 4.46%

*) In 2012, the City Hall of Braila received an external funding for upgrading water utility infrastructure and as a result, the city budget was substantially affected in its structure.

Year Budget reserved by the city of Braila for financing ECoC 2021

2015 20,000 €

2016 300,000 €

2017 600,000 €

2018 800,000 €

2019 1,400,000 €

2020 1,600,000 €

2021 3,900,000 €

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• Which amount of the overall annual budget does the city intend to spend for culture after the European Capital of Culture year (in euros and in % of the overall annual budget)?

• Operating budget for the title year

YearAnnual budget of the city (în euro)

Annual budget for culture in the city

(in euros)

Annual budget for culture in the city

(% of the total annual budget for the city)

2022 86,000,000 6,020,000 7.00%

2023 87,000,000 6,438,000 7.40%

2024 88,000,000 6,864,000 7.80%

Income to cover operating expenditure:Please explain the overall operating budget (i.e. funds that are specifically set aside to cover operational expenditure). The budget shall cover the preparation phase, the year of the title, the evaluation and provisions for the legacy activities.

YearTotal income to cover

operating expendi-ture (in euros)

From the public sector (in euros)

From the public sec-

tor(în %)

From the pri-vate sector(in euros)

From the private sector(în %)

2016-2020 5,745,000

City 2,100,000

92.60% 425,000 7.40%Region 2,270,000

Govern 950,000

TOTAL 5,320,000

2021 25,770,000

City 3,900,000

97.40% 670,000 2.60%Region 3,400,000

Govern 8,900,000

UE 8,900,000

TOTAL 25,100,000

2022-2024 4,615,000

City 1,950,000

92.31% 355,000 7.69%Region 2,250,000

EU 60,000

TOTAL 4,260,000

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What is the breakdown of the income to be received from the public sector to cover operating expenditure?

Income from the public sector to cover operating expenditure in 2021 in euros %

National Governement 8,900,000 54.27%

City 3,900,000 23.78%

Region 3,400,000 20.73%

EU (with exception of the Melina Mercouri prize) 200,000 1.22%

Other 0 0

Total 16,400,000

Income from the public sector to cover operating expenditure in 2016-2021

in euros %

National Governement 9,850,000 44.81%

City 6,000,000 27.30%

Region 5,670,000 25.80%

EU (with exception of the Melina Mercouri prize) 460,000 2.09%

Other 0 0

Total 21,980,000

We considered the 2016-2020 to be the ‘preparation phase’, for the year of the event 2021 and as ‘legacy activities’ all the organizational processes for the cultural events taking place in 2022-2024.

The authorities responsible for public finances have not yet voted on the proposed budget will do so after the pre-selection phase.

The strategy of securing funding to receive financial support programs / EU funds relies on mechanisms activated in the drafting of the proposal for European Capital of Culture. Thus,

Have the public finance authorities (City, Region, State) already voted on or made financial commitments to cover operating expenditure? If not, when will they do so?

What is your fund raising strategy to seek financial support from Union programmes/funds to cover operating expenditure?

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The fundraising strategy must be based on a very strong image of the Association, of the region, of partners and of the ‘Quantum Culture’ program.

As a result, in the first year, 2016, we will apply a communication strategy to create a strong image and for the significant increase in the number of volunteers, whether they live in

Braila, in the region or elsewhere in the world. The strategy will target both the virtual and the physical, for the message to reach all target groups. The Association will send its story to all target groups: teenagers, young people, parents and grandparents. In all the twin cities of Braila we will promote a common message, which has stressed the importance of Braila as a cultural capital for the region.

Income from the private sectorWhat is the fund-raising strategy to seek support from private sponsors? What is the plan for involving sponsors in the event?

According to what timetable should the income to cover operating expenditure be received by the city and/or the body responsible for preparing and implementing the ECoC project if the city receives the title of European Capital of Culture? Please fill in the table below (this question is optional at pre-selection stage)

Source of income for operating expenditure

2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021

EU 10,000 30,000 50,000 70,000 100,000 200,000

National Governement - 50,000 100,000 200,000 600,000 8,900,000

City 50,000 150,000 300,000 600,000 1,000,000 3,900,000

Region 70,000 150,000 350,000 700,000 1,000,000 3,400,000

Sponsors 15,000 40,000 75,000 120,000 175,000 670,000

Other

in terms of supporting operational costs, public authorities will ensure financial component of their inclusion in the multiannual budgetary provisions of amounts necessary to support implementation processes and by focusing on the priorities of the established financial efforts.At the same time, some of the costs can be supported by providing co-funding ‘in kind’ by the private sector. This concerns in particular those elements whose presence is required in the implementation process, but which can be provided through the provision of facilities available in their local environment - we consider primarily unconventional areas for the conduct of activities, elements of logistics and even human resources. Regarding this category of operational costs - the cost of Human Resources- having in mind the maintenance of the support offered by the local community through volunteering and valuing this resource in accordance with existing resource, dynamism and capabilities.

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The title of this communication project will also be the slogan of the project application, ‘Quantum Culture’. It will consider two types of communication, external and internal, to mobilize all persons who are members in the Association. Internal communication will be made in real environment - posted posters in key locations in neighborhoods, flyers, advertisements in the media, etc., and the virtual - social networks, e-mail, phone messages. The purpose will be announcing various events that aim external communication for ensuring the presence of the target group. Also, the dedicated website will be more active, will promote events, will be able to send news automatically to all those concerned, and in the menu there will be a button for news about the internal life of the Association: what it is working for, what are the problems, when meetings are scheduled. Everything will be done with maximum transparency. For effective communication we will draw up a map of audience groups, and we will communicate. Also during this communication strategy we will implement a project to significantly increase the number of volunteers. Event promotion campaign for ‘Quantum Culture - Here and Now!’ will cover:

• generating scale movements throughout the region, not only in Braila, meant to be realized by entering a larger number of volunteers;

• mobilization of a greater number of public figures/VIPs who volunteer and financial support campaign;

• set up a database for each category of person included: people, partners, media, political, local government, business, the diplomatic, professional associations, international partners, members of the Association.

• acceptance of Braila as regional leader.

In the following period, 2017 - 2019, with the increasing number of volunteers from all ages, social and ethnic groups, we will expand the range of promotion projects and we will be able to implement an effective strategy for fundraising from sponsors concerning in particular those economic activities related to the implementation of European Capital

of Culture 2021, tourism companies, hotels, restaurants, transportation, entertainment, events. During this period the project ‘Ambassadors of Braila’ will be undertaken and the city will be assuming the leadership role again. Association leaders will organize nonconformist seminars in partner cities in the region, where there will be invited representatives of the major brands in the financial and commercial field, from different industries from which financial, material and moral support are expected. The event will present various projects of ‘Braila European Capital of Culture 2021’ and each sponsor will be able to assume the support of a project: financing - co financing, with know-how. The project of involving private sponsors will be called ‘Adopt!’ and will have several sub-projects that could be developed. In the line of ‘Adopt a project’, the private sponsor will be able to adopt and support a project co-financing. ‘Adopt a house in Braila!’ will enable those interested in taking a house. This will mean restoring and remodeling old houses facades from Braila or from the partner cities and turn them into adaptable spaces for various cultural - artistic performances. ‘Adopt an event!’ shall mean supporting an event from European Capital of Culture Braila 2021 in the period 2017-2020, to which the sponsor will contribute with whatever it has available: money, materials, business connections, volunteering, people etc.

Also during this period the program ‘European Citizen Entanglement’ will start. VIPs will be sought in the economical, cultural, entertainment areas that will support morally and financially European Capital of Culture 2021 event and they will coagulate the actions of other people born in the same year and the same day.

In the year 2020, the forerunner of the great event, we will make a program of all activities and every volunteer or financial supporter may SUPPORT an activity which that one likes. The project will be called ‘I like it’ and will be a natural continuation of the project ‘Adopt an event!’ A timetable of show samples will be done, so that people can choose knowingly. When it comes to foreign artists or

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performances that cannot be achieved before then, we will be able to promote the artist, his creation on a big screen in public places, so that everyone knows what it is prepared, and participate in the event from organizing until completion. To this is added a very good planning on fundraising activities. There were established the following steps:

1. The necessary amount;2. A fundraising plan;3. Continuous improvement of methods;4. FRIENDRAISING.

The amount required to be collected through fundraising is 1.7 millions of Euros, including 200,000 Euros from individuals. Donations will have one goal, which is to cover a range of current expenditures of the Association respectively for regular business donations, donations on co-participation in national and/or international donations wage.

The targets of the fundraising campaign will be citizens, companies, investment funds and grants. The main channels through which donor targets will be addressed will be: direct mail, media campaigns, SMS, social media, personal contact.

Individuals and therefore the citizens of Braila prefer the following ways to donate: unique donation, monthly donations (direct debit, recurring), unique/recurrent SMS and wills and linked.

To this, the annual campaigns to redirect 2% of their income tax to an NGO are added. A study conducted throughout 2013 reveals this national trend. 25% of the total population of Braila, over 42,000 citizens are willing to redirect 2% of their income tax to a nongovernmental entity.

Companies and investment funds will be approached from an entirely different perspective; they have to see our request as a business proposal, as an extension of the business.

Another way of fundraising will be the sale of promotional materials at the Association

and through collaborators, travel companies, advertising and by organizing fundraising events addressing both citizens and companies/entrepreneurs. We will continue the positive experience with raising funds for the video presentation of Braila application which showed us good corporate involvement.

Fundraising events will include: sports events (marathon, swimaton, cycling etc.), charitable dinners, music and art exhibitions. The fundraising event will be held in stages: before the event (sponsorship packages), at the event (raffles, draws, direct purchase of promotional material of the Association, auction), after the event (within 2 weeks donations from participants, the auction outcome of the event will be online, the trophy auction).

To maximize fundraising capacity we will draw upon Crowd funding platforms namely Bursa binelui – bursabinelui.ro, Creștem idei – crestemidei.ro , Pot și Eu – potsieu.ro, We are here - we-are-here.ro (note that these platforms should retain between 5 and 10% of the amount donated) and international crowd funding platform, Kickstarter (subsidiary of amazon.com) - kickstarter.com.

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Operating expenditurePlease provide a breakdown of the operating expenditure, by filling in the table below

Planned timetable for spending operating expenditure

This question is optional at pre-selection stage

Budget for capital expenditureWhat is the breakdown of the income to be received from the public sector to cover capital expenditure in connection with the title year?

Chapter in euros %

Programme expenditure 10,975,000 47.56%

Promotion and marketing 5,000,000 21.67%

Wages, overheads and administration 4,500,000 19.50%

Other (please specify in euros)

External advice, assessment and audit 1,200,000 5.20%

Collaborations with other former European capitals for the replication of the most important events appreciated by the public

900,000 3.90%

Training 500,000 2.17%

Total of the operating expenditure 23,075,000

Operating expenses above totals:

• operational expenses of 2021;• operational expenses of 2016-2020.

Braila has chosen to postpone filling of this table after the pre-selection stage!

Income from the public sector to cover capital expenditure in 2021 in euros %

National Governement 100,000 5%

City 0 0%

Region 100,000 5%

EU (with exception of the Melina Mercouri prize) 1,800,000 90%

Other 0 0

Total 2,000,000

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Have the public finance authorities (city, region, State) already voted on or made financial commitments to cover capital expenditure? If not, when will they do so?

What is your fund raising strategy to seek financial support from Union programmes/funds to cover capital expenditure?

The public authorities from city and region have not voted the budget for capital expenditures and plan to do so after the city will pass the pre-selection phase.

Capital expenditures are foreseen for the 2016-2020 time frame and have as objective developing the cultural infrustructure using mostly European funds, through programmes that promote the restauration of buildings for the Puppet Theatre,the Cultural Centre, the Astronomical Observer, the Danube Esplanada, the old tunnels, the old cinematographer and many others.

In order to cofinance the EU programmes conducted by the local administration, having as an objective the improvement of the cultural infrastructure, the public authorities will ensure the financial component by including it in the multianual budgets. The Association made an inventory of business opportunities that can be financed from European Union funds and programs, those that could be related to cultural and tourist infrastructure in the area. A good example is the regeneration of industrial and commercial unused spaces located on the Danube, which could become, with reasonable investment, berths and dock designed for pleasure craft of various sizes that could bring tourists interested in fishing, hunting and cultural tourism in our area. These projects could be financed through projects such as Operational Programme for Fishing or European Union Strategy for the Danube

Region (SUERD).

The Association has identified several entrepreneurs willing to invest in this type of project co-financing, including foreign partners.

Another type of project that will support the development of transport infrastructure is the airport from Vădeni which is equidistant from Braila and Galaţi (5 km), private airport that has developed explosively over the last three years and can provide the transport for light and ultra-light planes across Europe. On this airport, in the past five years, there have been organized aviation rallies with international participation and last year even with the participation of Romanian military aviation, events enjoyed a lot by the general public. The administrator of the airport has already received applications for private aircraft of entrepreneurs and companies in the area,

Income from the public sector to cover capital expenditure 2016-2021 in euros %

National Government 2,150,000 7.10%

City 2,600,000 8.59%

Region 3,180,000 10.51%

EU (with exception of the Melina Mercouri prize) 22,340,000 73.80%

Other 0 0

Total 30,270,000

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According to what timetable should the income to cover capital expenditure be received by the city and/or the body responsible for preparing and implementing the ECoC project if the city receives the title of European Capital of Culture?

What kind of governance and delivery structure is envisaged for the implementation of the European Capital of Culture year?

Following the theme of our candidacy and our wish for innovation, we will try to use an organizational scheme similar to that of a diamond, the most stable structure known. The diamond is formed out of 12 Carbon atoms, the essential element of life on Earth and which has an atomic mass of 12, following the symbolism of the 12 artistic languages, 12 ethnicities, 12 months, 12 musical notes from suggested concept in our application.

Within a diamond structure, a Carbon atom (the general manager) is bound to other atoms (department directories) based on a relationship of participative management. Even though the selection process in nomination/choosing a practicing manager of participative style is enhanced, assuming the responsibility is to be clear, total, and well-defined by the proposed management contract.

The artistic manager will be the main partner of the general manager based on a two-way type of relationship that will impose rhythm and direction.

For that reason, the choice of artistic manager is the next step, and will be taken considering team candidacies. A head-hunting company with experience at European level will be contracted and will select professionals for the two positions, consequently or by ‘block’.

Surrounding each Carbon atom (general and artistic manager), the six electrons (departments) orbit with the associate distinctive, well-defined responsibilities. The department managers will be selected, preferably, from within those already involved in elaborating the file, but the final decision will be taken directly by the general manager for the departments under his/his coordination (financial, volunteer-department, fundraising, purchasing, evaluation and internal audit) and together with the artistic manager for the regionaly coordinated departments (media, public relations, European consultants).

interested in expanding the airfield and they will be co-opted as co-financiers of the project.

Source of income for capital expenditure

2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021

EU 590,000 1,170,000 7,950,000 7,930,000 2,900,000 1,800,000

National Government - 250,000 600,000 800,000 400,000 100,000

City 250,000 450,000 500,000 800,000 600,000 0

Region 80,000 350,000 750,000 1,000,000 900,000 100,000

Sponsors 5,000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000

Other

6.b. Organisational structure

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How will this structure be organised at management level? Please make clear who will be the person(s) having the final responsibility for global leadership of the project?

Immediately after the shortlisting of our application we will contact the personalities who have already shown their availability of getting involved in the project and whose CVs can be found in the file, or other personalities respecting the contingent recommendations of the commission, regarding the nomination of a General Executive of the candidature.

It was preffered to nominate the general manager within the second stage of selection after being nominated on the short list. We chose this option because people who apply for this position should become aware regarding the contents of the file and the time allocation for the stages.

The involvement of a person with proven management potential on international level, as required at this stage is difficult because both parties in this stage of the project could not generatean income at a level to cover the normal claims of such a self-imposed standard position; neither the person of such integrity could take a sincere engagement with this project nor the project could guarantee the continuation of the position for at least one or two years.

The nominees for the management

position are bound to present their management plan along with their team members CVs. The association reserves the right to propose to the winning candidates for the general and artistic manager positions, to nominee other candidates for the remaining positions in the team. Their nominations will be consensual in case that one, or more of the proposed candidates do not fit the association standards.

The estimated time to nominee for these positions is of maximum three months from the communication of candidacy.

The association will establish an evaluation committee consisting of, at least, association chairman, general manager, artistic manager, mayor of the town, a representative of regional partners in the project and an European expert. The nomination must be consensual. The selection period cannot take more than 30 to 60 days from the nomination of the general manager.

After selecting the department managers, the final responsibility for the general management of the project belongs to the general manager and the established team.

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How will you ensure that this structure has the staff with the appropriate skills and experience to plan, manage and deliver the cultural programme for the year of the title?These two questions above could be answered by enclosing in particular diagrams, the statutes of the organisation, its staff numbers and the curricula vitae of those primarily responsible.

The general manager, by consulting the artistic manager as well as the rest of the administrative managers must recruit and hire the rest of the association’s departments coordinators having the obligation that, within maximum 2 months from the nomination to propose a final organizational chart, in case that the actual organizational chart should be amended following the recommendation received and self analysis.

The general manager coordinates directly four department managers:

1. Artistic manager,2. Financial manager,3. Administrative manager (acquisition, logistics, back-office),4. Public relation manager.

Each of the four managers has an initial team of six people that share different tasks to be fulfilled within the management department. We intend for all the 24 assignees to participate successively to perform the different tasks of the four departments so that their involvement in ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ events will provide the necessary experience that will allow them to replace any time, in case of unavailability, any other person from other departments. This procedure will provide the personnel, with the necessary skills for every department.

At the same time the general manager collaborates with six teams run by a department manager/coordinator:

1. European experts and consultants2. Regional coordination for collaborating with partner cities3. Human resource coordinator4. Volunteer coordination5. Fund raising & business club 6. Monitoring, evaluating and control team

Thus, the main leading structure is formed of 35 people. In addition there will be more staff contracted for those departments that will have

larger work volume.

The size of the teams will be determined based on the experience gained during the ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ events.

During the first year, the management team will benefit from the technical support and experience of many people within the department of culture in the city hall, cultural stakeholders in Braila and also of the of the association’s founding members.

In 2016 the association proposes to nominate and hire the general manager, the artistic manager, the managers/department coordinators. Until the title is awarded the association will rely on volunteers which will test the capacity of the association to manage and promote the activities as well as to motivate the interested parties.

Beginning with 2017, each department coordinator will estimate the number of staff that have to be hired. Each year after the events of ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ and following the results of the analysis of the evaluation activities the size of the team will be adjusted based on the needs. Throughout 2017-2020 the project team capacity to gather volunteers as well as their efficiency will be evaluated and monitored.

The association recruted few candidates who expressed their availability to coordinate the project as general manager or as administrative compartment managers. As follows we are presenting the credentials of these candidates. Taking into consideration the time horizon of 2021 it is expected that the file will include the list of the human resources who will be involved in the project which might be ammanded. It is estimated an increase of the number of staff with management skills that could join the team by the time of the nomination.

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Academy for Economic Studies, Bucharest, RomâniaFaculty of Trade, Bucharest

Tias Business School TILBURG UNIVERSITY – HollandInternațional Masters of Marketing Program

UNIQA InsuranceVicepresident of Management Board – CSO and Deputy CEO

BCR Insurance , GUILD Insurance Broker Chairman and CEO

Born in Braila

University ‘Dunărea de Jos’ GalaţiDipl. Eng. (M.Sc.) in engineering

University of Minnesota - Carlson School of ManagementEconomics and Business

Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien / WU WienExecutive MBA

Hochland Romania and South-East EuropeGeneral Manager

Sorin TIMUȘ

Romeo JANTEA

George ŞIPOŞ

Born in Braila

Osaka University, Global Admissions Office, Osaka (Japan)The University of Chicago, Graham School of Continuing Professional and Liberal Studies, Chicago (USA)Program Manager

Toyota Motor Corporation, Corporate Value Creation Department, Toyota-shi (Japan), Senior Project ManagerCreativities Group, Inc., Chicago (USA), General Manager

The University of Chicago, Chicago, USAPh.D. (Japanese Studies)

Inter-University Center, Yokohama, JapanAdvanced Japanese Language, June 2005

University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, USAAdvanced Certificate in East Asian Studies, April 2002

University of Bucharest, Bucharest, RomaniaB.A. (Japanese/Romanian Studies), July 1997

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Born in Braila

Galati Polytechnic InstituteTechnology of Machine Building Faculty Bucharest

Rikos Marketing ConsultingGeneral Manager

Kreis Construct - Representative of Schwing Stetter GroupCountry manager

Iveco RomâniaCountry manager

Volvo RomâniaSales Manager

Ionuţ Iulian RADU

Florentina GRIGORAŞ

Mihai BOTEZ

Born in Braila

Politehnical University, Bucharest, Romania Dipl. Eng. (M.Sc.) in Aerospace EngineeringMajor in Jet Propulsion Engines

Cisco Systems, Dubai, United Arab EmiratesStrategic Product Specialist Internet of Things

GE Energy, Dubai, United Arab Emirates Segment Leader, Middle East & Africa

Intergraph Computer Services, Bucharest, RomaniaGeneral Manager

Born in Braila

Politehnical University, Bucharest, Romania Technology of Machine Building, major in industrial robots

Andralex Project CompanyGeneral Manager

master of Public Services, Environment and Sustainable Development

Faculty of Psychology ‘Maiorescu’student

Antena 1 and Naţional TvTV show host, profile European funds

implemented more than 300 projects financed from structural funds, of which 32 cultural projects

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How will you make sure that there is an appropriate cooperation between the local authorities and this structure including the artistic team?

According to which criteria and under which arrangements have the general director and the artistic director been chosen – or will be chosen? What are – or will be – their respective profiles? When will they take up the appointment? What will be their respective fields of action?

In the city’s cultural strategy 2015-2025 it is foreseen the recommendation that the Braila City Hall will consider employing a City Manager with skills in the domains of culture and cultural infrastructure development.

‘Synchronization with local authorities’ directive of the association will be lead by Braila’s ‘City Manager’ who will be designated by the authorities with the support and consultation of ‘Braila – ECoC 2021’ association.

In the Association, every director/department coordinator will have the obligation of managing the hired personnel and coordinating the volunteers involved in the ongoing of the department’s complex/external activities and of keeping in contact with a ‘club’/’council of elders’ formed by the representatives of the profile institutions and the co-interested third parties. Particularly, the Artistic Department of the Association will organise this ‘club’, consisting of the manager of the Directorate of Culture within the Braila City Hall, the managers of the cultural institutions financed by the local budget, their counterparts from the partner cities’ institutions and the representatives of other cultural entities (be them public or private) with public visibility/recognition. Considering the cultural strategy of Braila

County, the mayor and the city hall administration agrees to transfer jurisdiction and responsibility to ‘Building and Remodelling the Cultural Domain’ Association. Therefore ‘The Club’, even if it will not be an institutionalised structure, it will have the role of generating guidelines for the local actors, especially the public ones, to follow in order to transform the cultural strategy, generally, but more precisely the nomination of the city into a real success and also into a phenomenon which is due not only to change the public perception, but also to remodel the local cultural institutions which must act as development and epitome changing ‘locomotives’.

The collaboration between the Association and the administrative and public entities from the cultural area is already seen as long-term, the year of 2021 needing only be the certified success of the intended plan. After the Event Year, the administrative structures the Association has proposed and the third parties have accepted will subsequently continue their activity, depending on the capacity to maintain and develop some of the local cultural reference products.

The duty of the association is not to organise a completely extraordinary cultural event for the year of 2021, but the even harder one to transform an entire town, both in terms of infrastructure and of involving every citizen in a structure which will function perfectly, and to adapt rapidly to the challenges set by obtaining this title. The general manager also has the job to realise and maintain a successful partnership with the local administration, as well as with the business environment. Therefore, the profile of the general manager would be outlined by the following necessary abilities:

• experience in the administration of a big company, of national or European far-reaching projects• independence of political parties, political movements or trade union;• an approach to the artistic and cultural environment;• communication abilities with the business environment and administration;• the courage to approach modern, innovator, bold solutions in order of finding alternative solutions• exclusive commitment for at least five years to coordinate this important project;

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Even though it is not mandatory, the association expresses the hope that the person who will be feeling this important position to reside in Braila so that could be permanently connected to the city pulse and the community desires. The general manager will take charge of the tasks immediately after the nomination by forming the operative team of the association. The range of action will be administrating the entire project, creating and coordinating a flexible and efficient managing structure and also building and instructing the team work to be able to be self-efficient, very quickly and to adapt to all demands having as final purpose the accomplishment of a memorable event in 2021.

Also, he will always take into consideration the sizing of the efforts and expenses in order to fit the budget, collaborating with the local and regional authorities to find the supplementary financial resources when is estimated to be needed for cultural infrastructure and following the deadlines of these tasks.

The artistic manager should have the following profile:• outstanding personality in culture, at international level;• has collaboration relationships with multiple cultural operators in Europe and is able to develop new partnerships;• is innovative, open-minded and flexible in approaching all 12 artistic languages proposed in our concept;• has skills of communication with the rest of the team.

In order to be fully connected to our artistic vision and to share the same concept of candidacy the association will require that the person occupying this position to attend (symbolically) a course about quantic mechanics at one of the Physics Institutes in Europe.

The artistic manager’s range of action will include the establishing and planning of an accurate calendar of all cultural events in 2021, distributing them along the year taking into consideration climatic and geographic conditions along the whole South-Eastern region, including the partner cities. He will ensure the diversity of the artistic programme, the accomplishment of partnership with European cultural operators.

The artistic manager will share a tight collaboration with the other managers to permanently correlate the calendar of cultural events with the financial and logistic resources in order to have a very good connection to the media.

Have you carried out/planned a risk assessment exercise?

What are the main strengths and weaknesses of your project?

We have conducted a session of analysis and assessment of the risks of missing some intermediary objectives from the nomination as ECoC 2021 until the year of the event.

To begin with, the decision of the regional approach of the project represents one of the methods of precaution and elimination of the main risks that could jeopardize the ECoC 2021 organization. After presenting the strengths and the weaknesses of our project we will elaborate every threat and its prevention measures in the answer to the following question.

6.c. Contingency planning

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• the project truly BELONGS to the civil society, supported by more and more citizens and totally sustained by the administration and the political parties, gathering really fast the efforts of hundreds of Braila citizens, most of them left from the city for a common purpose;• the theme of the project ‘Quantum Culture within the Four Dimensions’ will attract the curiosity of the European public, exploring by artistic methods an almost science-fiction concept, which will become reality and current technology in 5 years’ time ;• the 7th corridor of the Danube offers an access route both to the centre of the city and the whole South-East region included into the project, towards the magnificent places from the Danube Delta, the Dobrogea area and the Black Sea ;• the exclusiveness character resulting from the geostrategic layout of Braila city, situated at the junction of three important historical regions Walachia, Dobruja and Moldavia which offers a unique diversity of cultural and spiritual themes, traditions, experiences;• the regional character of the candidature situated into a delicate cross-border area within the world current political and military context could give a more generous meaning to our attempt, that to contribute to tempering the current conflicts by the noble mission of arts and culture;• the possibility to easily cover the tourist accommodation demand by using the cruise hotel-ships by Danube not only for transport, directing the funds attracted for other necessities from the cultural infrastructure instead of building accommodation spaces (hotels, guesthouses) only for the year 2021;• the existence of a native ethnic and social tolerance with secular roots allowing a particular cultural diversification, unique within the regional context, which made the Braila of the 20th century beginning and the low Danube region a predecessor of the European Union even before its creation, where, next to other states of the Western Europe, there was signed the first agreement of economic cooperation and cooperation along the Danube, ‘THE DANUBE COMMISSION’;• the performance of a top secondary and high-school education at Romania’s level, proved mainly by the exceptional results, supported by the large number of personalities that Braila and the region have given to Europe

• the existence of a scepticism in relation to all future promises, supplied by the false promises, came up with major problems in bringing over in this phase most of the Braila citizens that we have a chance, that ‘the reality is the one we create’;• the existence of an inferiority complex of the Braila citizen when referring to the achievements and development perspectives of the larger cities such as Timisoara, Cluj, Iasi, Bucharest, all of this in comparison with the manner of the community support offered by the government in contrast with the support given to the cities and regions already mentioned;• there can be noticed a real ‘development divide’ between the South-East Region as compared to the central, western and northern regions of the country, the development cleavage between them being a major one;• a university environment that is deficiently developed and adapted to the needs of the area and the potential of the young leaving for studies in other cities, resulting in a fragile support of the young students;• the association’s ‘stubbornness’ in using in this phase low funds and the desire to prepare the first file exclusively by its own forces and volunteering, leading to drawing up a candidature file less ‘made-up’, less formal but hopefully, full of originality;• the extinction of several major local industries led to the emergence of an economic insecurity reflected into a shy participation of the private sector in our project and generally in the cultural projects but which could change constructively into a significant necessity of the city to reinvent itself, to rediscover itself even through the benefits brought by the success of this project.

WeaknessesStrengths

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How are you planning to overcome weaknesses, including with the use of risk mitigation and planning tools, contingency planning etc.

Like any other socio-cultural and economic domain, our project presents some risks, too. Amploarea analizei riscurilor descreşte odată cu înaintarea în proiect, deoarece sunt din ce în ce mai puţini factori de apreciat. Evaluating probabilities of occurrence of risks and the identification of alternative solutions with the advantages and disadvantages, of mechanisms for managing these risks, implies the involvement of the entire team - internal and external specialists. The main risks inside the projects that have to be taken into consideration are:

• risks relating to the deadlines for contracted services payment (R1);• technical and specialized risks related to the investments management in the cultural

infrastructure required for the project (R2);• financial risks:

• the risk of loss caused by insufficient preparation, availability and responsibility of the management team (R3);

• the deterioration of the financial situation of the economic and business environment (R4); • contractual risks: in the case of various motives the project sponsors and partners that have

signed long-term contracts, can no longer support the event (R5);• environmental-related risks:

• carrying out works of emergencies and unplanned interventions by public authorities to the cultural infrastructure (R6);

• changes in legal provisions that establish the financial-economic and the commercial activity (R7);

• delays regarding the performance of services or delivery on the part of contractors, namely reducing the quality of the services provided by them (R8);

• natural phenomena (R9).

Mechanisms for risk management

For a proper identification of appropriate mechanisms for risk management there is necessary the realization of the risk chart, a tool that confers a certain level of risk depending on the probability of occurrence of the event, and the main consequences and effects of the production of the event.

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ClassThe estimated

value of probabilities (%)

The interpretation of probability

CharacterizationCharacterization of the

levelIndicative

of risk

P1 0-10 Very unlikely that the risk occurs

Very low Preventive enough R3, R6, R9

P2 11-40 Unlikely as that the risk occurs

Low Prevented R1

P3 41-60 Probability that the risk occurs

MediumIt can be prevented with

additional actionsR2, R5, R7

P4 61-90 Probabil ca riscul să se producă

HighIt cannot be prevent-

ed, it requires different approach

R4, R8

P5 91-100 Very likely that the risk occurs

Very highIt cannot be prevented,

there are no alternatives-

Class Effect Definition Technical level Strategic levelRisk

indicative

C1neglige-

able

If the risk occurs, then there will be no effects, all require-ments are accomplished.

- minimum- no impact

- minimum- no impact

R7

C2 minorIf the risk occurs there will be minimal effects.

- minor- additional activities - can be solved

R2, R3, R5, R6, R8

C3moder-

ate

If the risk occurs, then the project will register modest effects.

- modest- additional activities - can be solved

R1

C4 majorIf the risk occurs, then the project will register major effects

- major - critical impact R4, R9

C5 criticalIf the risk occurs, then the project will fail.

- unacceptable- there are no alter-natives

- cannot be realized -

Probability of occurrence of the class of events

Classes of consequences

Risk diagram

Pro

bab

ility

cl

ass

Consequences class

High impactMedium impactLow impact

P5

R1

R8

R7

R4

R9

R2, R5

R3, R6

P4

P3

P2

P1

C5C4C3C2C1

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Recommended measures for combating/lowering the risk analysed in the report with the category of impact are the following:

• for low impact - continuous monitoring is recommended • for medium impact – combating actions are recommmended, including the consideration of

alternatives• for high impact – new processes are implemented or the management plan/strategy of

development is changed

The main actions of the risk management: A. early identification of risks; B. risk prevention; C. risk management.

One of the manager’s responsabilities is to reduce to minimum the comercial and physical risks, pe cât posibil se va acorda prioritate prevenirii riscurilor, risk management will be a permanent process. Because one of these risks are inevitable, along the risks’ assumption or treatment there will be included the fourth action – insurance.

In case of a new risk occurence, this one will managed with the help of an emergency plan.

Examples of identified and analysed risks and their reduction measures.

The investments in the new cultural infrastructure or in modernizing the older one for the 2021 events might be late due to insufficient funds in the Municipality’s budget during 2017-2020.

The experience of the responsible team for managing the events might be insufficient in order to plan and efficiently follow the execution of all the steps for such a complex calendar.

The regional character of Braila’s application for European Capital of Culture in 2021 focuses on capitalizing the existing regional infrastructure and is not based only on private investments in new cultural infrastructure. Thus, the Municipality partner with neighbouring municipalities and agreed a regional cultural pole which will address feasible solutions for this scenario.

In order to be prepared for the events happening in 2021, we plan to host each year between 2017-2020 an event called ‘Braila 2021 preview’ in order to train the technical team and the volunteers for the 2021 events.

‘Braila 2021 preview’ represents a transparent training and calibration instrument used to ensure that the organizing team is qualified for the events and to aid the continuing

correction of the management structure, taking into consideration the problems that were encountered.

Funds and a training plan have also been provided in the budget for the entire period until 2021, including ‘know-how’ transfer and good practices from other cities, former European cultural capitals.

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The ‘Braila 2021’ Association team will be responsible during 2016-2020, in collaboration with the cultural institutions, organizing all the cultural and traditional events in Braila, in order to test and assess the managerial team for the year of 2021.

The foreign investors’ and multinational companies’ low interest to invest in touristic or cultural sights in the South-East area.

Although we do not neglect such a possibility we estimate that the probability of this situation occurring is being reduced for the following reasons:

• Braila’s application is based on the community’s involvement and desire and not on the impulsion of the local authorities, which will have a significant impact on the residents’ involvement degree;

• the companies will be interested in supporting a major politically-independent cultural act to create a direct link with the real supporters of the project ‘Braila European Capital of Culture’;

• this project, as it was developed, is an exceptional opportunity for the implementation of CSR activities specific to companies present in the South-East region or those that target the region for business opportunities.

Although, as a caution measure, Braila’s City Hall will analyse the feasibility of issuing some municipal bonds in order to fund investments in the cultural infrastructure. Another action would be the increasing of the reserve fund every year ahead by a certain percentage.

The ‘Braila 2021’ Association began in August a campaign for testing the support of the population including financial support by redirecting 2% from their income, according to the law. We achieved a number of 78% affirmative answers (8150). In early September 2015 there was signed a contract of support between the Association, the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture of Braila, Braila Employers Subsidiary and The Association of Private Agricultural Workers in Braila.

Could your artistic programme be summed up by a slogan?

What is the city’s marketing and communication strategy when holding the European Capital of Culture title? (Especially regarding the media strategy and the mobilisation of large audiences. During the final selection stage, attention must be given especially to established partnerships with the written media and the audiovisual sector in order to ensure the media coverage of the event and of the plans related to this strategy).

The slogan for Braila ECoC 2021 is ‘Quantum Culture’, with the motto ‘Together, from ancient to Quantum Culture’.

6.d. Marketing and communication

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The first stage of establishing the marketing and communication campaign is a MARKET TEST, which will be done by evaluating the events that are organised in the cultural capitals elected from 2016 until 2020. The techniques involved in this process include collecting and analysing data comprising of: 1. the number of visitors, divided into age, social and professional categories 2. The types of cultural events that attract a great public and the costs of organising those 3. The geographical origin of the public who participates at ECoC events. The information thus obtained will help to adjust the programmes proposed for 2021, according to preferred artistic genres, transport infrastructure for foreign tourists and accommodation preferences.

The second action for the communication strategy is sharing information about the event, its content, locations and organizer, putting emphasis on the originality, diversity and the innovation of our program by capitalizing local natural resources and human resources.

The communication strategy consists of:

• official partnerships with the classic mass-media (TV, radio, written and online press at local, national and European level;

• partnerships with the modern mass-media (bloggers, social networks, volunteer networks);

• partnerships with businesses, transport companies, tour operators, professional associations at a national level, NGOs, cultural and tourism associations and foundations from the region and from the South-East Romania, Moldavia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey and other civil society actors;

• partnerships with local administrations of all former European capital cities, with the partner cities in the project and with the cities that ran for the ECoC 2021 title.

The third stage of the strategy is represented by evaluating and monitoring the communication strategy at a local, national and European level for intervening in advance with corrective measures. This stage is already taken into account within the section of evaluating the impact of acquiring the title.

The events called ‘Braila 2021 PREVIEW’ find their place in the marketing strategy. The events will be organized between the years 2017-2020, so they not only have the role of training and test our project team for organizing the 2021 events,

but also the role of informing the public about the project.

All this marketing and communication strategy will be elaborated, coordinated and put to action, in partnership with professional groups, which will be selected during the public auction. The requirement is to train the volunteer team in the field of cultural and touristic marketing during the 3 years prior to the event. These teams will continue their activity after 2021 in order to ensure the sustainability of the project.

Participating tourism fairs and in cultural European events for promoting the project and creating an international relation of partners for presenting touristic packages for 2021 will also be a constant interest for association.

An original way to communicate with the public and to promote the project and the South East region could be represented by the production of a feature film. This project would be done in collaboration with European film studios and established actors, and its subject would be legends and myths from our town and its surrounding area. The association will share an important percent of earnings with the financial body which will organise and facilitate both the production and the broadcast of the film. We are counting on the recent success of Romanian motion pictures at the Golden Bear and Mostra Internazionale d’Arte Cinematografica Venezia, such as ‘Aferim’, which was mostly filmed among the natural landscape of our geographical location, specifically in the Măcin Mountains.

The stage of selling tourist packages will begin once an online centralised system is created, because only such an efficient tool could provide an interface through which cultural and touristic operators could communicate (both locally and internationally), obtain details about the programme and also book and buy packets for the ECoC events. The same system will be used for ensuring the coordination of managerial and administrative teams and the optimisation of the schedule regarding the organisation of events as well as transport and logistic resources in order to maximise the number of activities the public can take part in.

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How will you mobilise your own citizens as communicators of the year to the outside world?

How does the city plan to highlight that the European Capital of Culture is an action of the European Union?

The citizens of Braila and of all the partner cities will take part in the communication program called ‘’EUROPEAN CITIZEN ENTANGLEMENT’. With the aim of this program, students, young adults and adults will be helped to communicate directly with other citizens of the United Europe born on the same day. The nearness in age, sharing the same passions and searching for the answers to the same questions will make the European public get closer to the citizens from Braila and from the region of the Cultural Capital Event. People from Braila will invite their ‘twins’ to celebrate together their birthday in Braila, at events organised by the European Capital 2021.

The traditional ways of communication, the written one, will be supported by using postal cards with landscapes from Braila and obviously from the cities of European citizens with whom the will keep in touch. Consequently , the Europeans will stand the chance of seeing the stunning landscapes from this part of the country, sharing them with their families or work environment in a much more plausible, traditional and human way, than in a simple, electronic, cold and uninvolved ‘Like & Share’.

The postal cards received by citizens will be displayed in 2021 in a large public exhibition held in all the cities involved, by the title ‘The Europe Of The United Citizens’.

‘The young ambassadors’ project

The contest of ideas created for pupils and students, gifted with 100 prizes, each of them consisting of covering the costs of a 2-person holiday in a big European city in 2020 in which the two ‘ambassadors’ will present Braila 2021 in the most revolutionary ways. Materials as ‘witnesses’ filmed on the occasion of these revolutionary presentations will make it the subject of a film gala to ‘young ambassadors’, regardless of the support on which they were recorded, resulting in the alternative and a special subjective overview , a vision of a Europe of young people.

The contest of messages, essays, blogs and comments on social networks. The most innovative, substantial and unpublished ones will be included in a collection which will be translated in all European Union’s languages with the help of the cultural services of the embassies of European countries in Romania.

The month of August 2020, the festive day of Braila city and all of the Danube ports, the Navy Day, will be declared as ‘Family Reunion Day’ on which the members of families who work in the European Union, will get together with their relatives and friends from Romania, on which occasion they will share together Europe’s civilizational assets. When returning from the well-known August holidays, they will popularize the ‘European Cultural Capital 2021’ event in their working and life environments, preparing and animating the curiosity of European citizens towards the programme and our application file.

Firstly, as it can be seen from the programmes comprised in the four dimensions for each of the twelve artistic languages, the emphasis was put on introducing the European dimension in the (geographical) participating region, by sharing new forms of expression which are already used in the EU. In 2021, artists, companies, cultural operators and managers will all display an updated view on the role and significance of European art in the social life of our citizens. The fact that ship-hotels from our harbours have been chosen as a means of

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accommodation in addition to the traditional hotels and motels and that the Danube, the second longest European river, is being used as a main gateway for European tourists, is not only a symbolic gesture, but also actual involvement of the European infrastructure.

Throughout the year 2021, the citizens of Braila will participate in a competition which consists in changing the modern name of local districts into designations which reminds us of their former names, such as the Armenian district or the French and Hungarian ones. Thus, after thorough documentation, local students in partnership with the Museum of Braila, will identify buildings which had been occupied by local personalities, will rediscover stories and links to EU countries. The citizens will choose names such as the French district, the Italian district or the German one.

The inhabitants of these neighbourhoods will be encouraged to exhibit the flag of the chosen nation as well as the EU flag. Street signs will display both the names of the streets and the countries they represent. On the same note, traffic lights will be updated and made accessible for people who are visually impaired by using audio signals in the form of musical passages from the anthems of EU countries and other famous songs. Thus, people will know both when it is safe to cross the street and in which part of the town they are in.

In order to commemorate the great personalities of the EU countries (artists, scientists, diplomats, athletes) together with the special services of Braila’s City Hall, the streets within the Old Town, only during the year 2021, will receive new names to punctuate this common spiritual heritage, an European one, in the same manner the street signs will contain the EU logo.

Through a convention in complicity with the Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture and with the other employers ‘ unions from the region, the administrative units, educational establishments, health, police and military police, the fire department, hotels, pensions, restaurants, pubs, bars and clubs will integrate the EU logo in their companies

and prints. The means of public and private (taxis) transport will display both the logo of the ‘Braila 2021’ event and the European Union logo.

Educational units will launch initiation courses about the objectives of the European Union, its endeavours and principles from European documents. These courses will be completed with competitions concerning students’ knowledge on the European Union.

The symbolic clock in the city centre will mark the exact times by playing the national anthem of every country in the European Union and, at 20:21, it will play the anthem of the European Union.

The National Days of the EU countries, during the 2021, will be celebrated in Braila and the associated cities through a cultural manifestation whose main theme will be an important personality of that specific country. These projects will receive the participation and support of that country’s embassy and this is going to be an opportunity for European officials to have well-documented meetings, targeted at issues previously chosen by all participants to the events of the European capital at that time.

Around the 9th of May, Europe Day, we suggest organising a festive, common meeting of the European Parliament in the European Capital of Culture, with the participation of the EU countries’ embassies, the president, the parliament and the government. Its aim will be that of highlighting and analysing the current potential of the meaning and symbolism of the concept that is the European Capital of Culture of the role and place of culture in the modern European society.

8020 partnerships signed until now

This document does not represent the official position of the European Union or of the Romanian Government ... but it represents

the citizens’ of Brăila hopes and wishes.

Innovation, appreciation, multiplication, partnership, originality and INOVATION again are the magic words that define the concept for the candidacy file.

The confrontation between the team’s creativity, enthusiasm and bold exuberance and the specialists’ in project management rigorous thinking (considered sometimes too rigid and colourless) resulted in an unusual file, which contains unconventional ideas that we believe manage to follow the guidelines imposed by the candidacy guide.

The team that wrote the file is aware of the current social media instruments, but which have already proven for too many times their weaknesses and might be no longer used in 2021. For most of the time they separate, not gather, they cause isolation, not real communication and socialization.

In the same manner, the team is aware of the standard radio commercials and TV adds, of fliers, prospects and websites and the fact that they do not represent express solutions to some of our problems is not because the team’s lack of knowledge or lack of inspiration, is because we had constantly searched for new way to solve problems, even experimental ways, that could be used along with the standard approach.

We tried to surpass today’s “Digital Culture” universe through our project and create a new one, where we break the boundaries of conventional communication through social media and form a real world that blends the four “quantic dimensions” of our project with humanity, beauty, art and culture.

Brăila Quantum Culture 2021 will prove that the daydreams of those that go out in the park with their grandpartents, those that study in kindergartens, schools or university amphiteatres, can become reality!

We, the Europeans that work and live in an area where the Occident and Orient have not been in conflict, but have complemented each other for hundreds of years by creating a social mosaic, believe that we can propose solutions to the well known problems of this century, by transmiting to our peers the cultural quanta.

Quantum Culture Team – Brăila 2021

Braila

A CULTURII

2021