With a successful opening event and a following exhibition the project Vielfältig schön – weibliche Lebensentwürfe im Portrait (Beautiful in many ways – female life drafts in portrait) found its climax. In Mid-November, all those involved met in the assembly hall of the Volkshochschule Leipzig and, together with their guests, celebrated the outcome of the project.
A workshop phase during the summer and an intense phase of creating the roll-ups that were to be exhibited and of preparing the exhibition itself preceded this opening event.
And there it was: the day of the exhibition opening! First, an employee of the Volkshochschule greeted everybody cordially with a speech before the project leader gave an insight into the project’s background and execution. The project’s participants themselves played of course an important role in this official part of the opening: A majority of them expressed their thoughts about the project and the topic diversity on the stage of the assembly hall.
In the further course, the exchange of thoughts constituted the main part of the event. The project’s participants, together with the depicted women, took up their position next to their roll-ups and were ready for the questions and thoughts of the attendees.
Subsequently to the opening event, the Volkshochschule Leipzig exhibited the roll-ups one more week at their premises. In that way the exhibition was open to a great number of people who could not take part in the opening event due to the then current Covid restrictions.
The project’s planned closure meeting, that was to be dedicated to reflexion on the one hand and to the celebration of the participants’ success on the other hand, took place after the exhibition. Unfortunately, at this time, it was no longer possible to meet in person, so it had to be conducted online. The participants reflected together with the project leader on their work of the last months, evaluated the project and were virtually awarded their certificate of participation.
Different institutions have already registered interest in exhibiting the roll-ups at their premises in the coming year. That applies for example to the city hall Leipzig and to educational providers outside of Saxony. The participants hope that in connection with different events that are planned together with these exhibitions, they will have the chance to present their work without Covid restrictions next year.
This project was sponsored by the Robert Bosch Stiftung as part of the programme “Werkstatt Vielfalt”.