Hanoi Open Exhibition 2018  ©

Work Room Four

Cultural and Creative Hubs Vietnam is a three-year project co-funded by the European Union and the British Council, and implemented by the British Council, in partnership with the Vietnam National Institute of Culture and Arts Studies (VICAS) between 2018 and 2021.

Cultural and Creative Hubs Vietnam is implementing a series of activities focused around a network of local organisations actively engaged with practitioners and audiences in the field of arts, culture and creativity. Culture is an enabler and driver of sustainable development, a way of engaging communities in shaping our shared future and supporting open, inclusive and stable societies. Artistic and cultural approaches empower diverse groups to participate in cross-cultural dialogue, creative and collective problem-solving as well as capacity building. Culture also provides tools and spaces for creative expression and gives voice to individuals to raise awareness, build solidarity and encourage change.

In Vietnam, Cultural and Creative Hubs are important players in the cultural sector and have great potential for engaging and supporting freedom of expression and access to cultural life. A Cultural and Creative Hub (CCH) is a place, physical or virtual, which brings people together to express artistic ideas and creativity in a free and open environment, which in turn allows them to share a variety of artistic outputs with their communities. Most CCHs in Vietnam are independent arts/creative spaces, often led and managed by artists/creative practitioners. 

Having worked closely with the network of CCHs in Vietnam since 2012 and to support implementation of the ‘National Strategy for the Development of Cultural Industries to 2020, vision 2030’, the British Council and VICAS jointly proposed and implement this project.  

This National Symposium is one of the project’s key events, aiming to introduce the network of cultural and creative hubs in Vietnam to key stakeholders and invite discourse around developing creative industries in Vietnam in the context of the 4th industrial revolution.