In “Fes! Cultura podcast”, creators from different disciplines explain how, through their art, they are imagining creative responses to ecological and social challenges.
In this episode, we explore how art can transform mindsets in the face of the ecosocial crisis. From surrealism to science fiction, passing through contemporary dance, we discover narratives that awaken awareness. These projects reimagine our relationship with nature, make the climate emergency visible, and question extractivist models of the future.
Featuring: Laida Azkona, Ladislas Chachignot, and Oskar Luko
Hosted by: Diego Salazar
Eco-surrealism: Ladislas creates artworks and illustrations about ecology and ocean protection from a surrealist perspective. His goal is to capture the viewer’s attention and invite them to rediscover the richness of nature.
Desērtum: Oskar believes in art as a tool for impact, emotional disruption, and activating listening. He presents a piece that delivers a message of climate emergency through the unconventional language of video dance.
Celestial Bodies: AzkonaToloza presents a science-fiction documentary work about future colonies and the limits of mineral resources. It explores the rise of aerospace mining as a new extractivist paradigm.
Participation in cultural life is a human right that is not guaranteed equally and, in a multicultural society such as Spain, it is urgent to ensure this right also for migrant and racialized populations.
Culture plays a key role in social transformation because of its ability to connect people; it activates spaces for dialogue and encounter, encourages the expression of diverse ideas and identities, promotes the development of critical and creative skills, enables the creation of shared imaginaries, and fosters community self-organization. Ultimately, it provides the foundations for people to intervene in the public sphere and actively participate in the social and political debates that affect them. Therefore, guaranteeing the right to cultural participation for communities living on the margins is not only a matter of visibility — although that is important too — but also an entry point for defending all other rights. If 31% of the people living in Barcelona were born outside Spain, we have the right to ask ourselves: Where are we represented in the city’s cultural ecosystem? Why are we not central in the decision-making spaces of institutions, cultural venues, and programming? Are our cultural contributions valued as an essential part of this city? Is it possible to transform these dynamics that relegate us to a peripheral role in local culture?
At Fes! Cultura, we have long been activating this conversation among migrant and racialized people working in culture, in order to imagine proposals that help more and more people in this city — especially those of us who have come from elsewhere — become part of the local cultural community. Not because we want to replace what already exists or demand more than those who identify as locals have, but because we want to participate on equal terms, contribute to public debates, and be part of decision-making spaces. Because we live here, because we have the need to create and express ourselves, to project our cultural identities, to build spaces for connection and to face collective challenges — not only our own, but those of everyone.
Migrant people are invited to participate as learners of hegemonic artistic practices, without being given access to spaces of governance.
It is evident that we start from a disadvantaged position when trying to actively participate in culture while having a foreign background, especially if we come from countries of the Global South. The lack of networks, racism, the scarcity of references, language barriers, obstacles to citizenship, uprootedness, precarity, lack of knowledge of the cultural and administrative system, and many other factors are barriers that push us to the margins of a cultural environment we perceive as distant, exclusionary, and hostile. And although countless migrant individuals and collectives are gradually carving out a place in the city, relationships with local institutions and organizations are not always easy. Many of the initiatives proposed to us risk falling into tokenistic practices, meaning that migrant and racialized people are incorporated merely to fulfill harmless quotas that create the appearance of diversity while, in reality, diversity is not central. Assistance-based methodologies are also common, in which migrant people are invited to participate as learners of hegemonic artistic practices without access to governance spaces. There are also extractivist dynamics that appropriate the knowledge and value of “diversity,” excluding the people who contribute their knowledge and treating them as mere objects of study. Many institutions proclaim intercultural approaches that celebrate differences while being incapable of taking a stand in defense of migrant rights or denouncing colonialism. But what can we do to change this situation? What concrete proposals are within our reach?
Access to Culture
Most cultural policies aim to guarantee equal access to culture. However, this dimension is approached from a cultural supply logic. In other words, cultural institutions create programmes and strive to make them accessible to the general population. But who decides these programmes? Are the interests and needs of migrant and racialized populations taken into account? Are references from these communities incorporated into programming and management teams? Is there an effort to include non-hegemonic cultural practices? Are there internal debates about Eurocentrism, cultural homogenization, and anti-racism?
Who decides these programmes? Are the interests and needs of migrant and racialized populations taken into account?
Cultural diversity demands a shift in the approach to cultural access policies in order to respond to the needs of a constantly transforming population. It is no longer enough to analyse the interests of those who attend cultural venues occasionally or regularly; institutions must also interact with people who do not participate despite having the right to do so. One of the main challenges that programming and audience development teams should face is ensuring that the people who use cultural services reflect the demographic profile of the territory. Because it is not enough to simply open the doors — strategies must also be developed to invite people in, or for cultural venues to extend themselves into the places where people already create culture.
Actively Participating in Culture
For everyone to actively participate in culture, the right to freely develop one’s own talent must be protected through spaces for artistic and cultural practice, creation, and expression, as well as access to educational resources.
In Barcelona, it is still necessary to guarantee access to continuous cultural training for diverse communities and to promote non-hegemonic artistic practices. More spaces for training, support, and promotion are needed so that migrant creators can develop their artistic and cultural projects and integrate them into the local cultural system. Furthermore, creation and production programmes must take into account the social conditions faced by these collectives. The creation of living mapping systems and work networks can facilitate connection and resource exchange.
By opening spaces to diverse cultural products, social benefits are generated, new audiences are incorporated, and value is added to the sector.
At this point, incorporating migrant and racialized cultural references into academia, the media, and the cultural circuit in general should be a priority. This would make visible the artistic and cultural expressions of the diverse communities living together in the city, breaking with established hegemonic patterns and promoting new trends. The inclusion of new references in the cultural scene should not be considered an act of charity, but rather an opportunity to enrich cultural offerings, attract new audiences, and foster innovation. By opening spaces to diverse cultural products, social benefits are generated, new audiences are incorporated, and value is added to the sector.
Community Cultural Practices
Community cultural practices are fundamental for social and cultural development, especially in diverse societies with cultural systems that tend toward homogenization, because they create spaces for the participation of communities whose cultural practices do not fit within the established canon. In general, these activities emerge outside institutional radar, but relegating them to the margins means depriving people of the resources that guarantee their right to form cultural communities and develop their creative potential.
Incorporating care as a culture in itself, recognizing the diversity of knowledge and sensitivities in this field.
It is time for us to adopt an expanded vision of culture that encompasses everyday practices such as cooking, craftwork, dance and popular music, festivities, oral storytelling, spiritual and religious practices, traditional games and sports, circles of dialogue, ancestral medicine, among many others. In addition, we must incorporate care as a culture in itself, recognizing the diversity of knowledge and sensitivities within this field. For this reason, it is essential to review and expand the category of “local popular culture” in order to reflect the diversity of cultural expressions present in the city.
It is also necessary to implement memory initiatives to recognize cultural figures valued by migrant communities, honouring their contributions and building a cultural identity that acknowledges other experiences and social contributions. This includes connection and collaboration among migrant communities at local, national, and European levels, recognizing that the challenges we face are shared and that collective work is essential for finding effective solutions.
Governance
Governance in culture means ensuring that everyone has the opportunity to actively participate in decision-making and in the management of resources that affect the cultural life of their community. We have the right to participate in the processes of designing, implementing, and evaluating cultural policies, both those developed by public institutions and those created by communities themselves. Because all of us, to a greater or lesser extent, are active creators of cultural policies.
We possess an unbeatable strength: the richness of our cultures, the power of our diversity.
In Barcelona, it is essential to create spaces and mechanisms that allow migrant communities to have a voice and vote in cultural decision-making. It may be necessary to implement quota policies that guarantee effective participation and representation. This would prevent participation from being merely symbolic and would promote the effective inclusion of diversity in cultural decision-making. We believe it is necessary to provide sustained resources over time to migrant cultural organizations so they can develop activities autonomously. A good institutional cultural policy should open up the field, encouraging organized communities outside institutions to push forward the proposals they consider necessary for their communities.
As we said at the beginning, it is evident that we start from a disadvantaged position when participating actively in culture while having a foreign background, especially if we come from countries of the Global South. But we possess an unbeatable strength: the richness of our cultures, the power of our diversity. A cultural force that is unstoppable, but above all one that is already here — alive, active, and eager to grow and become visible.
We are presenting the 3rd edition of the Fes! Festival of Cultures in Resistance #AccióMigrant, which will take place on Friday, June 21 at Fabra i Coats: Fàbrica de Creació. Become a supporter and get your ticket through #FesGoteo.
On June 21, from 3:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., the collective of artists and cultural promoters of Fes! Cultura presents the 3rd edition of the Fes! Festival of Cultures in Resistance #AccióMigrant 2024. This initiative aims to continue opening spaces within Barcelona’s cultural ecosystem for projects driven by migrant and racialized artists and creators in the city. It is a celebration of collective strength that seeks not only to showcase projects, but also to create networks and connections around a diverse, conscious, and sustainable culture.
It will be a full day of activities including:
10h30 a 13h30 – Forum – Popular Culture: Whose Culture?
15h a 20h30 – Migrant Cultural Projects Fair
18h a 22h45 – Showcases and concerts
15h – 18h – Live podcast
15h a 23h – Project wall
15h a 22h45 – Gastronomic proposal and drinks
Music, visual arts, gastronomy, performing arts, photography, audiovisual practices, community culture, artistic education, cultural space management, radio, among others. This year, thanks to an alliance with the Cultura Viva, programme, we will feature invited musical artists to celebrate Music Day and the summer solstice.
Fes! Festival of Cultures in Resistance #AccióMigrant aims to continue opening spaces within Barcelona’s cultural ecosystem for projects led by migrant and racialized artists and creators in the city. To continue this work, we invite everyone to support the collective funding campaign #FesGoteo. Become a supporter and get your tickets. The funds raised will help cover management and production costs, as well as provide food and drinks for the more than 60 artists and cultural promoters who will take part in the festival. Supporters will gain access to a variety of rewards, ranging from tickets to books, T-shirts, and risograph posters with exclusive designs, among others.
By becoming a supporter, you secure an afternoon of art, music, and celebration while contributing to the promotion of an anti-racist culture that defends the rights of everyone living in this territory.
We look forward to seeing you at the Fes! Festival of Cultures in Resistance #AccióMigrant!
Fes! Cultura is a self-managed social economy project. All income will be allocated to covering the production costs of the event. Help us continue opening spaces within Barcelona’s cultural ecosystem — become a supporter and share the campaña de Goteo.
Denisse Duncan, a Barcelona-based playwright and theatre director born in Costa Rica, is one of the most active voices in anti-racist struggle and Black feminism in Spain. She uses her work as a means to create social dialogues centred on diversity from an Afrofeminist perspective. Her aim is to build a theatrical and artistic landscape that reflects the diversity of Catalonia. From this perspective, she co-founded the collective Tinta Negra, an Afro-descendant creative space that promotes not only activism but also the strength of cultural work in community. In this interview, Denisse reflects on her trajectory and on the barriers she has had to overcome as a woman, Black, and migrant in a cultural circuit that still struggles to imagine itself as diverse.
Denisse Duncan
Within the framework of the Fes! Cultura Programme, in collaboration with Espai Avinyó, the Cultura Viva Programme, and Fabra i Coats: Fàbrica de Creació.
Interview: Diego Salazar and David Yubraham Sánchez. Cinematography and editing: Luna Andrade and Paulina Quiroz.
Because we believe in the transformative power of art and culture, at Connectats Cooperativa we promote Fes! Cultura.
Fes! Cultura is an incubator for socially impactful cultural projects that encourages the participation of individuals and communities to transform society through culture. It is a meeting space in Barcelona, open to cultural managers, students, social activists, and all those people or organizations interested in developing community-based cultural initiatives through collaborative forms of learning and production.
En 2017 creamos Fes! Film Festival, la #AcciónJoven de Fes! Cultura, un programa de formación en gestión cultural comunitaria dirigido a jóvenes de secundaria. Cada año implementamos un itinerario formativo en horario escolar, en el que desarrollamos colectivamente una muestra de cine documental sobre derechos humanos. Alrededor de 50 jóvenes participan en la creación de la programación, la producción y la comunicación de una serie de eventos que se llevan a cabo en centros culturales de la ciudad. Con esta acción buscamos contribuir a formar una nueva generación de activistas culturales.
In 2017, we created Fes! Cultura, the #YouthAction branch of Fes! Cultura, a training program in community cultural management aimed at secondary school students. Every year, we implement a training itinerary during school hours in which we collectively develop a human rights documentary film showcase. Around 50 young people participate in creating the program, producing, and communicating a series of events held in cultural centers across the city. Through this initiative, we seek to help shape a new generation of cultural activists.
This year, we are launching Fes! Cultura, #MigrantAction. It is a collective space where, over the course of 14 weeks, we implement a training program in the design of socially impactful cultural projects aimed at artists and creators from diverse backgrounds in Barcelona. The program includes workshops, personalized mentoring, a virtual classroom, networking sessions, and community events. Its goal is to foster the creation of mobilizing cultural projects in defense of the right to migrate. With this new initiative, we aim to contribute to building a human and anti-racist narrative around migration, helping to transform perceptions and attitudes by placing at the center those who have experienced migration firsthand.
Fes! Cultura is much more than a training space. Fes! Cultura is creativity, networking, and community. It is an experience of co-creation, co-production, and dissemination of new socially impactful cultural projects in Barcelona.
Artists from diverse backgrounds come together to design cultural projects in defense of the right to migrate.
This is Fes! Cultura #MigrantAction.
Because we believe in new cultural initiatives. Because we defend human rights. Because we believe in the power of culture, in the strength of collective action, in the reach of creativity, and in the richness of cultural diversity to challenge prejudice and transform mindsets and realities. Because we know there is immense talent. And because we know that many transformative ideas are left behind along the way.
That is why the creative team at Connectats Cooperativa, in collaboration with students from the Cultural Management master’s program at the Universitat de Barcelona and invited professionals, came together over six months to imagine and build a collaborative space with a decolonial and anti-racist approach. A proposal open to creative people from diverse backgrounds so that we can meet and experiment through our different crafts and disciplines; learn and share knowledge; build networks; and think about and design innovative, sustainable cultural projects that contribute to the social and cultural transformation of Barcelona. An incubator for mobilizing initiatives that help write new stories about migration in this city — stories that are more human, community-driven, original, and real, allowing us to live together, and better.
We are education. We are diversity. We are community. We are activism. We are creativity. We are freedom. We are Fes! Cultura transforming reality, #MigrantAction.
