Creative Recycle: How Art Sparks Change for Climate and Youth

From September 10 to 18, our international youth exchange Creative Recycle took place in Ureki, Georgia, within the European Erasmus+ programme. Young people from the Netherlands, Germany, Czechia, Ukraine, Türkiye, Armenia, Georgia and Lithuania came together to explore one big question: how can art help us talk about climate and sustainability, and truly set things in motion?

Throughout the week, pollution, waste and climate change were turned into creative actions. Participants built artworks from recycled materials, organised a beach clean-up, and shared their feelings about the future of our planet through music, theatre and visual arts. They experimented with silent theatre to express emotions without words and even imagined fictional nations in which they designed their ideal sustainable society.

The Dutch group brought inspiring contributions. Peter guided an interactive workshop on sustainability where young people reflected playfully on their daily choices and impact. Gianna led a creative session exploring painting, performance and other art forms, showing that every talent can find its place in the sustainability story.

Playful and innovative activities added an extra spark to the programme. In the Mug Exchange, participants swapped coffee mugs from home and used them all week as a symbol of reuse. In a Shark Tank session, they pitched bold ideas for a sustainable future and received feedback from their peers. These moments, together with energisers, group tasks and spontaneous creativity, made the exchange vibrant and alive.

Excursions to the botanical and dendrological gardens deepened the experience. The young people learned about biodiversity and conservation, and together planted trees as a lasting memory of their presence and contribution to the local community. Cultural evenings brought the group even closer, with each country sharing music, food, dance and games.

Perhaps the most unexpected lessons came outside the official programme. Many were struck by the number of stray animals in the area. What began as a confronting sight became a lesson in empathy and care. Participants shared food and water, and used creative means to raise awareness, discovering that sustainability is also about how we treat the life around us.

One of the most powerful outcomes was that three new youth groups were born in Lithuania, Germany and Armenia. During the exchange they took the first steps in founding their own organisations to continue working locally on art, sustainability and participation.

Everyone returned home with a Youthpass certificate, but more importantly with new friends, fresh inspiration and the motivation to carry their stories forward. For us at Bildung Nijmegen, this Erasmus+ project showed once again that art does not only create beauty, but also inspires real change.

Creative Recycle: 2025-1-NL02-KA152-YOU-000303632