Title of the project: Mitote Project: Trash for some … wealth for others !!!

Mitote Project is a social application of art that blends music, theater and ecology. We use art to claim the right of peoples to beauty as a means to re connect with Mother Earth and create a more just and happy world. Mitote approaches culture and art to the communities and enhances its appropriation by them, generating processes of reflection to investigate themselves and the reality they want.We work with communities, organizing jointly a soundtracked mise en scene, where all musical and theatrical instruments are created with reused materials. The show is presented to the public after the end of intervention. The project includes training of players, enhancing their impact and long-term sustainability.
Duration From 2000 till present. Location Mexico and world wide. Field/discipline Art, culture, ecology.Mitote project is headed and perform by Daniel Sánchez and Rosana Suárez:Eric Daniel Sánchez de la Barquera Gutiérrez

Composer and percussionist with academic, professional and educational development in Mexico and Italy. His works include chamber music and electronics, ballet, theater, installations, television and film. They have been performed in Mexico and several countries in Europe. Part of his musical work is published by Ediciones Mexicanas de Música. He has been a fellow of various institutions and creditor to national and international awards for his work. He is active as a performer, teacher and lecturer. He has made several recordings and national and European tours.

Rosana Suárez Vázquez

Master of Social Research for Environment and Bachelor of Environmental Science, Spain. Studies in Theatre and Performance, Spain, Theatre Pedagogy, Argentina, Clown and storytelling, México. Art Projects and Development. International workshops and postgraduate courses on sustainable development, social cohesion and land improvement, Cuba. Expert in Sustainable Human Development and International Development Cooperation. Awarded by different institutions in Spain and abroad. Collaborating in Community Development Project in El Salvador. Project Coordinator of Education for Development. Publications: R. Suarez, Research Study: “Opinion and Attitude of the Population on the MDGs. Conclusions for Social Mobilization “. Published by the Spanish Agency for

Development Cooperation (AECID) and the Andalusian Agency for Development Cooperation (AACID) 2009.

Over the last years we have worked in Mexico, bringing the project to the country’s most violent areas with communities who often do not have access to arts and culture programs. We have sensitized hundreds of children, youth and adults who have experienced other forms of relationship and cooperation that come to understand the world and its complexity from new perspectives and that will open up new opportunities to develop and build a better present and future, individually and collectively.

Our idea was always to give voice to the essentials of life, what it is immediate and necessary to be happy. Each new Mitote is learning and amazement that invites us to continue and project, knowing that working with people and art is full of spontaneous moments that are impossible to predict. We started without planning an accurate picture, but with the clear intention of creating, promoting and supporting critical thinking. We can ensure that art for social change is a core activity for humanity.

Mitote project proposes reflection and commitment on the global transformation that stimulates negative environmental and social changes, as though the world is tangible change, ethics is complex and controversial. Mitote is inserted into the social tissue and stimulates narratives arising from the direct experience of communities, as they often addresses this observation adjustment mechanisms and develop creative skills to overcome those same changes. Mitote opens a silent space revealing aspects, such as memory and resilience of the planet and the community. Mitote project also draws on intangible assets to enhance the capacity of the individual and collective imagination.

We started with the idea of approaching all audiences and make them live the Mitote experience, as experience that gives meaning to life. We never thought such a big awakening international interest, nor have the sincere thanks of many mitoteros, help us to believe in what we do by looking at them that art is a universal language that can talk heart to heart.

Our biggest investment is the time we dedicate establish contacts and build relevant networks to keep alive and moving our proposal.

Believing in what we do and get excited about it, be happy holding it enables us to continue our work every day. Be willing to continuously change and adapt to each situation with a smile and a desire for continuous learning and improvement. The attitude makes them appear brilliant solutions to the challenges of each Mitote, which mainly have to do with modes of financing and the resistance that we found in the space of creation. Many of the solutions depend on believe in the people, in its potential, and trust in chaos to achieve our results.

Mitote achieved changes at individual and collective level, obviously at both levels exalt the sense of belonging towards nature and planetary community. And use and understand art as heritage of humanity. On a personal level strengthens the research on our subjectivities, in the body as a medium of expression, and increases confidence, creativity, excellence, empowerment, and so on. At the group level, open dialogue, cooperation, solidarity, trust, learning, resilience, empowerment. And promotes different forms of relationship, individually and collectively. Mitote also manages to introduce art into the community organization and this helps people to reflect and be open to change.

It is a simple project, with low cost, high impact and relevant results in the short and medium term. We promote the active art and ecology to deepen what we are, what we want and need as a society to be happy. We show and rescued the sense of belonging to Mother Earth as a way to achieve it, allowing us to build a close relationship with Mitoteros, which easily identify with our speech and participate in the dialogue, contributing with what they are, with their individual and group memory and reality for transmitting the positive and move with enthusiasm and willingness to learn from each experience.