Dana Art Gallery

Dana Art Gallery is a nonprofit public cultural institution and a living lab for community-based cultural innovation, located in Kibbutz Yad Mordechai in Israel's Western Negev, close to the Gaza border.

We use contemporary art as a practical methodology for community engagement, cultural heritage, education, resilience, public participation and social innovation. Alongside our exhibition programme, we develop participatory projects that bring together artists, researchers, educators, schools, local authorities, volunteers and communities.

Our flagship initiative, the ArtBus, transforms a former public bus into an open community art laboratory where creativity, education and social participation intersect. We also develop projects in public space, environmental art, cultural heritage, place-making and informal education.

Since 2023, our work has increasingly focused on culture as a tool for community recovery, wellbeing and resilience in communities affected by crisis. This experience enables us to contribute practical knowledge, implementation capacity and real-world testing environments for innovative cultural approaches.

Dana Art Gallery is particularly interested in international collaboration around:

• Community resilience through arts and culture
• Cultural heritage and memory
• Arts-based education and informal learning
• Social innovation and participatory cultural practice
• Public participation and co-creation
• AI and digital tools for small cultural institutions
• Creative approaches to wellbeing and recovery
• Sustainable cultural ecosystems in rural and peripheral regions

Alongside my role as Director of Dana Art Gallery, I lecture Strategic Thinking and Strategic Tools in the BA Programme in Culture Management at Sapir Academic College.

We are looking to join Horizon Europe, Creative Europe and other international collaborations as a cultural implementation partner, living lab and pilot site where innovative approaches can be tested, evaluated and implemented in real communities.

Dana Art Gallery can contribute as:

• A Living Lab for community-based cultural innovation
• A pilot site for participatory cultural methodologies
• A community engagement and co-creation partner
• A dissemination and public engagement partner
• A cultural heritage and resilience case study
• A bridge between researchers, artists, educators and local communities
• A test environment for digital and AI-based cultural tools in small cultural institutions

We welcome collaboration with universities, museums, research institutes, NGOs, municipalities, creative technology companies and international consortia interested in developing innovative cultural projects with measurable social impact.