Arte e Educação - Fundação Bienal do Mercosul

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appearing that are formed based on open
technologies, free software and transversal
communication practices opposed to a unitary,
centralised, colonialist and hierarchical vision of
the world, which are supported on a multiple,
variable and decentralised vision. Renewed
systems of relationships and new socioeconomic
landmarks are demanding changes both to the
cultural structures in the public realm and to those
related to the culture industries, proposing
substantial changes in the modes of operation,
which are still based on control of the material
object, (the book, the disc, the art object). So it is
that, independent of academic hierarchies or
obsolete authorities, these new networks are
operating based on social and participative
structures that support a complex fabric and
consider new tools of production, storage and
distribution of knowledge based on connections
of interaction. These networks aim to work in the
general framework of the public domain and in
the democratisation of universal knowledge, what
Boris Groys calls “profane space” and which
appears as a new paradigm of heterogeneity and
diversity in the face of the homogeneity and
selectivity of the classical register and traditional
models of representation. 16
In experiencing this new fabric, signs are appearing
of a possible process of emancipation and autonomy
faced with the standardisation of conventional means
of representation. The challenge is to know whether
we can retain our knowledge in the realm of the
public and universal domain or whether we will
allow this knowledge to be reduced to commercial
transactions and converted into scarce assets.
Between that initial discussion with Asier
Mendizibal and reading the text by Txomin
Badiola, I received a telephone call from another
Basque artist, Juan Luis Moraza. Concerned about
the negative effect of Rosa Martínez’s exhibition
proposal on the selected or non-selected artists,
the critics and some cultural-management figures,
the Bilbao Guggenheim Museum was seeking help
in any way of correcting the secondary effects that
might be caused by the exhibition. He suggested
that they organise an almost titanic education
programme to attempt to present the same
questions asked of the organisers in a different way,
and which it seemed the museum itself is unable –
or does not know how – to resolve as well as might
be expected. In other words they were hoping
that Moraza’s approach would be able to
contextualise the exhibition, give it meaning,
construct a discourse and contribute with a critical
reading of the reality attempting to be analysed.
As he himself said, to present conditions of
interpretation, the contexts of production,
genealogies, references and evolutions 17 . In other
words, everything one would expect of such an
exhibition. Faced with the ambivalent situation
and aware of the difficulty of the task, J.M. Moraza
accepted the challenge, thinking that he could not
miss this opportunity of allowing some different
rules of the game to be established in relation to
the norm and to future programmes. And he
believed that it could be an occasion for replacing
the usual feeling of relentlessness, frustration and
suspicion produced by the Guggenheim’s cultural
policy with a involvement that he believed
would benefit the cultural climate and the future
development of art.