The Art, Culture and Tourism Centers will receive in the coming days the first copies of César Manrique. One Hundred Years of Living Memory, a meticulous work of documentation and writing carried out by Francisco Galante, professor of Art History at the University of La Laguna and professor, researcher and academic consultant at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, in Belgium. In addition, he is the director of the César Manrique professorship at the University of Tenerife and a member of the Institute of Culture and European Society.
César Manrique. One Hundred Years of Living Memory is a manual that explores the life and artistic trajectory of the genius throughout a century. It is a publication that delves into his school notes and his experiences in New York; that immerses itself in his years of study at the San Fernando Academy and his return to Lanzarote.
It is a book that delves into unpublished sources to reveal some of the keys to his creative process, his passion for nature, his boundless love for Lanzarote, and the keys to the Green philosophy that made him immortal. It also reviews all the details of the program of events that took place in different settings coinciding with the anniversary of his birth.
The president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, Oswaldo Betancort, and the councilor of the Centers for Art, Culture and Tourism, Ángel Vázquez, are participating in the prelude to the work. For the former, the publication "pays tribute to the unrepeatable figure of a man (...) who understood that the true wealth of a land lies in its essence, in its history, in its people and in respect for its nature." Vázquez, meanwhile, invites readers to discover "a landscape explorer, an environmental initiate who instilled his enthusiasm for a territory (...) for which he interpreted a future full of opportunities based on his great artistic work, the Centers for Art, Culture and Tourism." Betancort and Vázquez agree that it is an "essential work to understand the stature of the artist and the dimension of the human being."
César Manrique. One Hundred Years of Living Memory is presented in a case with three luxury volumes published in Spanish and English. A total of 1,000 pages with plenty of illustrations and photographs, many of them unpublished.
Initially, a print run of one thousand copies will be made, which the Tourist Centers will distribute free of charge in the island's educational and cultural centers, as well as in libraries and study spaces.
This publication is part of the Program: 1.5.3. on Dissemination of Heritage of the EPEL-CACT Programs included in the Lanzarote Strategy 2016-2025 of the FDCAN, managed by the vice president of the First Island Institution, María Jesús Tovar, who highlighted the value of "a work that allows us to build and disseminate Lanzarote's Heritage based on one of the most enlightened minds in the history of this island."
