Carano 4 Children foundation: Leonardo 4 Children 2021 - Climate Action and Gender Equality

The Carano 4 Children foundation has launched the “Leonardo 4 Children 2021: Climate Action and Gender Equality” non-profit initiative, aiming to empower children and young people across Europe to contribute to address the issues of climate change and gender discrimination, while supporting children in need through art and science education.

The non-profit initiative “Leonardo 4 Children” includes competitions which represent a kind of “Nobel prize” for children. In fact, if Leonardo da Vinci were reborn today, 500 years after his death, he would not need to solve the problems of discovering the functioning of human body, or inventing ways to make man flying, or inventing machines: he would likely focus on using creativity to solve global problems to improve the quality of our lives. We encourage children and young people to develop their creativity and become the new Leonardo’s of 21st century:“Every child can be a genius !”.

The initiative includes competitions at European scale, open to children and young people resident in one of the 27 EU Member States. Contributions from children and young people living in the UK, Switzerland, Norway, Liechtenstein, Iceland, Serbia, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia and Kosovo are welcome and will receive a specific mention.

The initiative includes the following competitions:

“FABLES ON CLIMATE ACTION” & “FABLES ON GENDER EQUALITY” - COMPETITIONS FOR CHILDREN AGED 6-12 YEARS OLD  (open until 31 May 2021)

The children aged 6-12 and resident in the European Union can choose between two topics:

• "FABLES ON CLIMATE ACTION”: the competition allows children aged 6-12 to use th eir creativity and their artistic and scientific skills to create their own oroginal Fable to interpret the topic of climate action and environmental sustainability, addressing the problem and possibly proposing a solution.
• “FABLES ON GENDER EQUALITY”: the competition allows children aged 6-12 to use their creativity and their artistic and scientific skills to create their own original Fable to interpret the topic of gender equality , addressing the problem of gender discrimination and possibly proposing a solution.

“ART & SCIENCE ON CLIMATE ACTION” & “ART & SCIENCE ON GENDER EQUALITY” COMPETITIONS FOR TEENAGERS AGED 13-18 YEARS OLD (open until 31 May 2021)

The teenagers aged 13-18 and resident in the European Union can choose between the two topics:

• “ART & SCIENCE ON CLIMATE ACTION”: the competition requires participating teenagers to create an original work integrating art & science to interpret the issue of climate change and environmental sustainability, addressing the problem and possibly proposing a solution.
• “ART & SCIENCE ON GENDER EQUALITY” : the competition requires participating teenagers to create an original work integrating art & science to address the topic of gender equality and possibly proposing a solution.

“FABLES IN MUSIC” COMPETITION FOR YOUNG MUSICIANS AGED 18-30 YEARS OLD (open until 15 September 2021)

The young music composers are invited to compose an original music interpreting:

• one of the 12 selected Fables of Leonardo da Vinci, or
• one of the Fables on Climate Action by children who won the previous Leonardo 4 Children 2020 competitions.

The funds and material raised by the initiative will be entirely used for education of children in need, such as orphans, abandoned children, children without parents, sick children, children in refugee camps.

The majority of the funds will be used to support children located in countries outside the EU, in 3 projects located in Middle East, Eastern partner countries, Africa, which have been selected via an open call for proposals by mid 2019. The funds will be entirely used to educate children on “art” and “science” with material, such as toolkit and educational staff expenses (limited to 25% of funds), via “implementing partners”.

• competitions for children aged 6-12 and teenagers aged 13-18 open until 31st May 2021;
• competitions for young music composers aged 18-30 open until 15th September 2021.

• announcement of winners by 15th June 2021; 
• concert in Brussels on 30th September 2021 (tbc);
• workshop and award ceremony on 1st October 2021 in Brussels and remotely; 
• possible other events, depending on the evolution of the pandemic situation.