Where other dialogues cannot reach

Eugenio Ampudia Fruitful relationships

Intervention by Eugenio Ampudia titled dzzzzdzzzdzz, part of the exhibition El futuro no es de nadie todavía (The future does not belong to anybody yet), held at the CCSMx in 2016. Our connection comes from a long series of fruitful relationships across Europe and Asia, but where AECID really helped establish my career was in Latin America. Perhaps my most ambitious cycle of exhibitions took place in Mexico and Colombia, curated by Blanca de la Torre, and it would not have been possible without the support of Spanish Cooperation. The exhibitions were held in museums and first-class art centres such as Parque Fundidora in Monterrey, the Contemporary Art Museum of Oaxaca (MACO), the Carrillo Gil Art Museum in Mexico D.F. and NC-arte in Bogotá, Colombia. Under the title El futuro no es de nadie todavía (The future does not belong to anybody yet), this was not just an ordinary itinerant exhibition; in each place, site-specific works were presented, in relation to the space and the context. This series of exhibitions received invaluable assistance from the Cultural Centre of Spain in Mexico City (CCSMx), under the direction of Carlos Ruiz, the Cultural Attaché at that time. In fact, the Centre functioned an auxiliary space for the project; a specific installation was created for the Centre’s entrance hall, and although this was independent of the display presented at the Carrillo Gil Museum, it served as an important introduction. Similarly, many visitors to the museum would subsequently come to the CCSMx to see the exhibition there. The display, given the deliberately unpronounceable title dzzzzdzzzdzz, consisted of an installation with a thousand white flags, each bearing the image of a fly, placed beside a bank of loudspeakers which emitted a constant buzzing, as of flies swarming through the Centre. The flags extended all over the entrance to the building, inviting spectators not only to enter, but to take one of the flags with them, thus making the artwork participative. But the role of the CCSMx was not limited to just providing a container for the project. In addition, it helped prepare important aspects of the exhibition’s production, as well as publicising the event and generating connections and contacts. All of these elements contributed greatly to the overall success of the project. In addition to this exhibition, on numerous occasions I had the opportunity to work with the Cultural Centres of Spain, throughout the continent, but especially in Central America. One such event was the exhibition Del texto a la imagen (From the word to the image) at the Cultural Centre of Spain in Buenos Aires, as part of the “Buenos Aires World Book Capital” programme. At that time, the Director of the Centre was Ricardo Ramón Jarne, who was not only an effective head of the institution but also an inspirational manager and an essential focus of cultural contacts and promotion.