A day before the reopening of the CIC El Almacén, the Plenary of the Lanzarote Island Council has approved changing the name of this emblematic space in the capital, which has gone from being called the El Almacén Island Cultural Center to the 'El Almacén Cultural Innovation Center'. The proposal has been approved with the favorable votes of Ciudadanos, Nueva Canarias, Somos Lanzarote, Coalición Canaria, Partido Socialista and Partido de Independientes de Lanzarote, and the vote against of the Partido Popular and Podemos
The Councilor for Culture of the Cabildo de Lanzarote, Óscar Pérez, explained that before the closure and the reforms and rehabilitation carried out by the Institution in this center, "more than 75% of the useful space was used for offices of the institution's civil servants." "With the new operation and project for the CIC El Almacén, almost all of the useful space will be used for cultural production, artists and creative entrepreneurship, which motivated the change of this name to El Almacén Cultural Innovation Center, so that the acronyms 'CIC' and the name will remain the same as to date, but its name will change, adapting it to the current reality and operation", he explained.
For his part, the president of the Cabildo de Lanzarote, Pedro San Ginés, pointed out that with the reopening of this center "the commitment transferred and included in the Lanzarote 2020 Strategy document" to "create a special, creative, innovative, technological and cultural center to support the arts and culture, where in addition to carrying out a program of exhibitions, screenings, concerts, talks, workshops and other activities, new projects, spaces and functions will be put into operation".
Among them, there will be "a room dedicated to technological experimentation through art; a creative industries and cultural tourism office that will be launched through a collaboration agreement with the Chamber of Commerce; and an exhibition space for artistic experimentation that will also be carried out, among others, with the collaboration of the Biosphere Reserve Office", detailed the Minister of Culture. These and other novelties will be presented this Thursday, September 29, at 8:30 p.m., with the reopening of the 'El Almacén Cultural Innovation Center'.
Subsidies for cultural projects
Similarly, the Plenary of the Cabildo approved allocating cultural subsidies for a total of 74,559 euros to 19 of the 24 projects presented during the past month of September in the Area of Culture. The subsidies have been nominated under technical criteria based on the bases that were approved unanimously in the previous Plenary of the Corporation.
The projects to be financed must be executed during this entire present year, that is, from January 1 to December 31, 2016. "Of the 24 proposals received, 5 were rejected precisely because 4 of them would not be fully executed in this 2016 and a fifth because the object to be subsidized was not contemplated within the approved technical criteria", Pérez specified.
Of the remaining projects to be financed, 7 correspond to plastic arts, 5 to musical projects, 5 to film and video creation and 2 to theater.