About the Cultural Olympiad
Our Cultural Olympiad puts Culture at the heart of the Games - encouraging participation and celebrating the cultures that make up the UK
You don’t have to wait until 2012 to be part of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Our Cultural Olympiad is going on right now and will continue up to 2012 and beyond.
The Cultural Olympiad will help ensure the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games are ‘Everyone’s 2012’ by giving communities throughout the UK the opportunity to join in.
The aims of the Cultural Olympiad are to:
- encourage and welcome involvement from communities across the UK, including London;
- leave a lasting legacy that improves cultural life;
- showcase excellence in the performing arts and creative industries as well as sport;
- introduce young people to the UK’s many artistic communities and those from around the world;
- promote London as a major cultural capital;
- heighten economic regeneration and encourage tourism in the UK through the work of the creative industries;
- incorporate the Olympic values of ‘excellence, respect and friendship’ and the Paralympic vision to ‘empower, achieve, inspire’.
A series of major projects and hundreds of smaller ones are already under way. Each encourages participation and celebrates the many cultures that make up the UK. The aim is to inspire audiences and bring about lasting change. However, its legacy, in our schools and communities, will remain for years to come.
We’re delighted to have Tony Hall, Chief Executive at the Royal Opera House, as the Chair of the Cultural Olympiad Board. He will oversee the project as we progress.
Our values
The Cultural Olympiad is for everyone. We are:- celebrating London and the UK and inviting the world to share the event with us;
- inspiring and involving young people to unlock their creativity and;
- using cultural and sports participation, audience development, urban regeneration, tourism, international links and other key strands of the Cultural Olympiad to build a meaningful legacy.
Our themes
Bring culture and sport together. Or, as Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympic Movement, said: ‘The Olympics is the wedding of sport and art’;- encourage audience participation;
- make public spaces exciting through street theatre, public art, circus skills and live big screen sites;
- raise environmental sustainability, health and well-being issues through culture and sport;
- honour and share the values of the Olympic and Paralympic Games;
- create unique collaborations and innovations between communities and cultural sectors; and
- support the learning, skills and personal development of young people through links to our education programme.
After the Games
The benefits of the Cultural Olympiad will carry on long after the Games close. These include:- a new awareness of the cultural activity that goes on in the UK;
- new opportunities and projects to be involved in; and
- new cultural partnerships in the UK and around the world.
The London 2012 Inspire programme
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Stories of the World
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What the Cultural Olympiad means
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The Best of Us
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Unlimited - celebrating disability arts
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Inspire Programme
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Upcoming events
- Workshop on tender opportunities for London 2012, Melton Mowbray
16 March 2010 - London 2012 Business event for Bedford, Bedfordshire
17 March 2010 - Podium Skills London
17 March 2010 - 18 March 2010 - Countdown to the 2012 Games
17 March 2010
