The Republic Centre for Support of Persons with Intellectual Disability – PORAKA in accordance with this year’s theme of the International Day for Persons with Disabilities “Amplifying the leadership of persons with disabilities for an inclusive and sustainable future”, implemented activities that demonstrated and celebrated the inclusion of persons with intellectual disability in various spheres of everyday life.
An exhibition of photographs taken by Rozalinda Trajkovska was opened on the 4th of December. The exhibition was held at the “Dragutin Avramovski – Gute” gallery at the Faculty of Fine Arts, in Skopje in the Suli – an building. The gardening at Zelenata Arka - Bostanie done by the users from both Day Centres of the Republic Centre – PORAKA in Skopje was shown through the photographs. It is their second year of active and direct involvement in gardening at this urban garden. Since spring this year, the users have intensified their gardening activities. With their hardworking hands and enormous enthusiasm for work, they successfully completed the process of preparing the land for planting. It was once again freed from annoying weeds, dug up several times and fertilised. They planted the first seeds at the Day centres, and at the garden, they planted green beans, garlic, carrots. Each user, according to their abilities, tried to be included in these activities, which are undoubtedly, favourite amongst them due to the work outdoors.
Using the photographs, the author translated the idea, and the vision of this socially responsible and inclusive project entitled “From Garden to Table” into a story in an artistic and documentary style. The exhibition was open until 11th of December and was visited by many interested people.
The cooperation with Theatre Pi contributed to implementing creative and unique activities in the past period. A multimedia concept entitled “We, the People” was developed, in which, through mainly theatrical, but also photographic, scenography, musical and psychological workshops led by educators – professionals in their field, the participants with typical and atypical development went through complete process of creating a theatrical piece.
For the purpose of this multimedia concept, in both Day Centres of the Republic Centre – PORAKA in Skopje workshops have been implemented with the actors from Theatre Pi. The premiere of the theatre play was on 10.11.2024 at the Cultural Centre in Gjorche Petrov. The directors of the play were Zlatko Mitreski and Makedonka Ilievska Mitreska, and the assistant director was Gergana Todeva from Bulgaria. The actors in the play were persons with intellectual disability, users of the Day Centres of the Republic Centre – PORAKA in Skopje and pupils with typical and atypical development. The theme for the paly has been inspired by the writer Jordan Radickov and his piece “We, the Sparrows”.
The second part of these activities were part of the multimedia performance “Be Quiet, I Fly”, which is a product of the previously implemented creative workshops with the users of the Day Centres of the Republic Centre – PORAKA in Skopje. The performance aimed to show the audience how motivated and creative persons with intellectual disability can be in various artistic fields. To rediscover the talent within themselves and to have the opportunity to find themselves in art. This performance was held on 10.12.2024 in the Cultural Centre in Gjorche Petrov. During the performance, the persons with intellectual disability participated with monologues, musical etudes and dances.
Their parents participated in this event as well. They talked about personal experiences and events from their everyday life, about the ways they cope and the inclusion of their children in this loud and fast world. Along the users of the Day Centres of the Republic Centre – PORAKA in Skopje, pupils with typical and atypical development from all primary schools from the Municipality of Gjorche Petrov took part in this performance.
