“Every act of creation is first an act of destruction.”– Pablo Picasso
Breaktocreate was developed as a part of ARTIVISM, the first-ever human rights pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2019. The exhibition explored the fundamental role the arts play in promoting human rights, and breaktocreate illustrates how we can all be activists through our talents, imagination and, importantly, our critical thinking.
Take the challenge
60 Seconds: Break your assumptions about children and young people and their place in society
Just because something happens every day, it doesn’t mean it’s not bad and that it cannot change. We must always question the world we live in and the norms we live by. With critical thinking as the driving force, this is simply about asking questions and not feeling you have to accept things as they are. In a world rich with information, we have the resources to achieve this.
60 minutes – Create your own superhero and write their story
We think everyone can be a superhero in our own way, with powers that come from our everyday lives, actions and ideas. This exercise will help to reveal how ordinary qualities or objects can be superpowers and how you can use them. But, on the next page, don’t just select powers; think about their potential and what they can achieve. In other words, what makes them super?
60 days – Build a better world by using your talents
Protecting the human rights of children and adults alike isn’t just the work of organisations like ours; it’s a collective responsibility everyone shares, because we all have human rights. This doesn’t mean we have to be solitary activists. After all, history shows us it’s harder to ignore a big group than a single voice, and history is full of examples of people who came together because they had a shared idea that then changed the world. Instead, it’s about combining our strengths and individual talents and acting as a collective.
“Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it, the loss of all that gave one an identity, the end of safety. And at such a moment, unable to see and not daring to imagine what the future will now bring forth, one clings to what one knew, or dreamed that one possessed. Yet, it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self-pity, to surrender a dream he has long possessed that he is set free… he has set himself free… for higher dreams, for greater privileges.”– James Baldwin