In partnership with the NGO INTEGRITY WATCH AFGHANISTAN (IWA), we are launching a participatory art project with the children of Kabul.

AFGHANISTAN. Kabul, a city bruised and undone by the various conflicts. Kabul, a young city, which asks only to explore paths to a promising future. Can we not encourage the spread of peaceful ideas and common values?

The art is not only the medium but also the objective of this project since we believe in art’s power of transformation. We strive to change the hostile atmosphere of Kabul’s enclosed streets and aim to transform the T-walls (anti explosion walls) into blank canvases children can use to express themselves through art.

Window-shaped mural paintings will be created to bring communities together, where walls divide them.

Artists from Kabul University will teach drawing to elementary school students to illustrate together positive values.

The kids mural paintings will be digitalized, printed and exposed in representative places of recent conflicts.

It means window in dari/persian...

Window of hope for the spirit. Today is the right moment to think around positive values, which are essential for a peaceful common future. Instead of expressing ourselves with violence, let us give free rein to expressing ideas and feelings through art!

Windows of color in the streets of Kabul. Art provides the means to improve our living space, and to reinforce sociability. Street art opens a space of color and solidarity on anti-explosion walls which characterize the Afghan public space. This activity will provide the opportunity for the participating communities to unite and create art. Street art to gather where walls separate.

Window of empathy beyond borders. These works created in situ (in the streets of Kabul) will be exhibited in various international places, principally France, and will aid to renovate our views of the Afghan people.

A "T-wall" in Kabul.

Artists from the University of Kabul are going to provide art workshops for primary school students to and help them design murals. : since primary schools in Afghanistan leave no room for art lessons, this will be the children an exciting opportunity to discover and express their creativity.

The children, from different schools and backgrounds, are going to meet and collectively create street art in a window-shaped frame. This work will be the result of a shared interpretation of several positive values (hope, solidarity, future, peace etc.). Being involved in something and then seeing the final product will give them a sense of pride and accomplishment. In the end, they'll keep these ideas and memories with them longer if it was just text in a book that was read. We believe that Walls can unite people and be, in contrary to their first function, a space of life and positivity.

These children’s "in situ" interventions in diverse public places will then be digitalized, printed and displayed in a symbolic site of the recent conflicts: Darul Aman Palace. Today, we can only observe the ruins of this gigantic "house of peace" or " house of Allah " (according to the translations). The palace will be the first open-air gallery in Kabul, where the works will echo the shared experiences during their creation.

Once produced, the main objective will be its distribution. Having a digital version of the windows will allow the project to be easily exported from Kabul. The designs of windows, printed on fabric, will be exhibited in several European cities, starting with Paris. They will share Afghan children’s hopes and dreams for the future with a public who might have a largely negative and distant perception of the country.

Preview of the exhibition of the murals digitalized at the Darul Aman Palace.

In Kabul: Naser Timory, Naseer Aieen and Wahidullah Azizi

Out of Kabul : Azilis Pierrel, Lara Haoudi, Libertad Sobrado, Lorenzo Deslesgues and Rolando Cruz

Kilkin, une fenêtre grande ouverte sur l'Afghanistan !