Community Cultural Development (CCD) is an arts-based community-building tool that promotes a sense of place, empowerment, and public participation. CCD encompasses a variety of activities involving individuals expressing their own stories, engaging in skill-building, and actively developing their culture by using arts and culture as a tool.
Because CCD is process-based, it has no one model, but in all cases the relationship between artists and their community is an equal one, where creative collaboration fosters social development and change. An important aspect of CCD is the concept of shared culture, which entails having a mutual respect for every culture in a community. Through this collective experience, communities gain respect for their own and others’ histories, resources, hopes, and dreams.
CCD is collaboration between artists and communities to creatively address issues affecting communities. Unlike community arts, CCD is more developmental in its aims, and focuses on empowering the community. On a CCD project the artist's role is to facilitate and empower the community, rather than to realize their own artistic vision.
The City of Calgary, Arts and Culture Division creates a variety of CCD projects, programs, and partnerships to ensure the practice of CCD is enriching the lives of as many Calgary communities as possible.
