This article discusses the culture-making and place-making initiatives created at the intersection of ethnology and cultural anthropology, art and cultural politics. The focus is on the ways in which joint ethnological and artistic involvement can change the dynamics within the local community. As a case study the authors use the project Art in the Community: Redefining Heritage of the Association of Artists ‘Zemlja’ (Croatia, 2018 – 2020). The project was based on one of the most important episodes of socially and politically engaged artistic practices in Central Europe and Western Balkans: the legacy of the Association of Artists Zemlja (1929 – 1935), and naïve art and educational work of renowned painter Krsto Hegedušić. In the locality where they had worked and found inspiration – Hlebine – contemporary artists rethought their heritage and brought it to life through this project. The project was based on participatory approaches, artistic and community-empowering process that included local naïve artists from Hlebine and students of Visual Arts and Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology from Zagreb. The text analyses the potentials and challenges in working with different stakeholders on the region’s cultural scene who take part in the project in order to affirm, negotiate or redefine their culture-building strategies.