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Grethe Rosbølls åbningstale
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Grethe Rostbøll, formand CKU
Åbning og velkomst konference den 11. august 2006
Views from the Middle East
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, dear guests
Welcome this morning to the conference at the Danish National Museum, we are very happy that our guests have been able to attend this opening conference.
(Tomorrow there will be an official opening)
The opening will go on in the shadow of the war between Israel and Hezbollah, and it is hard to improve the dialogue in this situation; but we have to remember that behind the bombs and rockets there are a civil society with people who fight for peace and stability in the region. We had the hope that the cease-fire would be established before the opening, we still hope.
From the early planning we knew that the peace process did not work, but the conditions still are going worse and worse. We have not been blind and we understand how difficult it can be for artists and intellectuals to participate side by side in the program of Images.
But the dialogue has to continue in the name of humanity.
DCCD’s values in relation to Images of the Middle East are based on Danish civil society traditions of dialogue and discussion. It is our wish to strengthen the cultural dialogue between groups, associations, and individuals to stimulate the participation by all groups in civil society.
Images of the Middle East will as you see in the conference program focus on contemporary culture and current changes and developments taking place in the Middle East. IDENTITY in the modern Middle East is the central theme.
· SPACE: City space, the media space, and the private space. Physical, virtual/media, open and public spaces. You already see the big billboards around in the city.
· GENERATIONS: Children, young people. Generation-specific cultures. Dreams and hopes. Conflicts and realities.
· GENDER: Men and women. Love, longing, and beauty. Equality and inequality.
- Thank you for coming, I hope you will contribute to the debate and bring new points of view to the Danish civil society, so we better can understand the conditions for the change going on in the region. The tensions caused by cultural changes find their expressions in art, culture and media and here, the possibilities and threats of the future are indicated.
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