From jail to heritage preservation
Thank you for giving prisoners the opportunity to paint while they serve a sentence. My involvement in a European project opened new horizons for me. I never dreamt that anything like this could happen to me. The project was the turning point of my life
– Sava K, Bulgaria
These are the words of Sava K from Bulgaria. While in prison, Sava participated in an Erasmus+ project which supported the development of art education in prison. The project headed by Valentina Petrova (BG) brought together partners from across Europe interested in delivering arts education to adult offenders. Building on an analysis of national support for arts education in prison, partners shared knowledge on existing approaches, identified good practice, developed new pedagogical approaches and materials, explored the potential for combined arts education, and promoted the findings of the network to wider stakeholders, including at policy level.
When Sava got out of jail, he pursued his studies in icon painting at the Velico Tarnovo University in Bulgaria. There, he made a copy of an icon exhibited in the Danish National Gallery representing Nikolai F.S. Grundtvig, the father of adult education, as a gesture of thanks to the programme. Sava has now dedicated his career to heritage preservation and icon painting.