Arts & International Affairs: Volume 2, Number 2 | Page 178
artistic practice and politics. These works deal with gender and sexuality,
racism, disability, colonialism, body politics, etc. They employ poetics and
aesthetics emanating from diverse cultural repertoires, social experiences,
and ideologies. This kind of work makes me question what it means to be
and create in the world and it inspires my projects.
Global dialogues on the arts, in the context of co-produced projects, present
innumerable challenges, especially when we look at the disparities between
the Global North’ and South. These dialogues call recognizing diverse
points of view, production models, financing systems, and cultural barriers
and imbalances.
Festivals have helped me see that when art reflects upon our current time
and generates spaces of dialogue, a global uneasiness is illuminated: How to
live together?
The question operates at many levels and there is no single answer.
Nevertheless, the nexus between Culture and politics has never been so
relevant. This is a fertile moment to examine the extent to which Culture
shapes the way in which we imagine the world. As producers of artistic work,
public events and knowledge, it is time for us to take on the responsibility
to examine the structures and inequalities that organize Culture at a global
level. In this way we can collectively construct discourses and practices
able to create new spaces of cooperation and solidarity against the flow of
authoritarianism, the rising neo-conservative movements, and the sectarian
and ethnic violence that devastates the world.
I see festivals as territories where living together is made possible, palpable,
and where macro and micro-politics are collectively seen and communicated.
While they may not be able to respond to this complex question, they
contribute to reimagining the world by displaying glimpses of change. A
change that, according to Amador Fernandez-Savater, “will be (in) plural, or
it won’t be.”
Reference
Fernández-Savater, Amador. Foucault’s Lesson: Guillotining the King
Once and for All.
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