Maria Dąbrowska-Majewska and her daughter Weronika Majewska are closely connected with Praga, the district of Warsaw. Here, they set up a local community center in an old market.

Divided by the river, the German city of Görlitz and the Polish city of Zgorzelec live as if together and at the same time apart. We talked with the youth Görlitz to feel the inner life of this place.

Maria Nikitina decided to make an artist residency in Kurba in order to breathe life into the native village of her family. Kurba has a very valuable architectural and historical heritage but is now going through very difficult times.

This year Plovdiv is the European Capital of Culture. We visited Plovdiv to meet the people who have long been developing the culture and urban spaces in this Bulgarian city. 

Since 2008, a group of cultural activists has been creating an alternative cultural space Kriterion, probably the only independent arts and community center in Sarajevo.

Experimental University at a pond in Berlin’s Templehof is searching for new approaches to urbanism and art.

The failed initiative to save postmodern buildings in Potsdam shows that participatory democracy is a struggle in Germany.

Polish artist Agatha Grzych opened a temporary art gallery in a 15 square meters room in a former chemistry school.

Ekaterina Yuhnova made a private museum in her flat in a typical tenement house in St.Petersburg. Her mission is to promote this heritage among people interested in the history of their town.

PeopleLoveSpaces took Ukranian and Russian musicians to a tour through several eastern European countries. This tour revealed how difficult it is to build communication between creative communities and to help artists mobility.

Not all grassroots projects are successful. But this does not mean that we should not try to create and take risks. Love, directed at places and people, gives us the strength to go forward. 

Over the past few years, many grassroots initiatives have emerged in Kiev aimed at interacting with local communities, improving abandoned buildings,  districts and social participation. We talked with organizers of these projects.