It has been twenty years of hard work to consolidate the Foundation in institutional, cultural and economic autonomy terms, without forgetting its role in urban and territorial matters, while disseminating the work of César Manrique. There has been everything in this time, but the balance is highly satisfactory. The Foundation is a cultural center of reference in the Canary Islands and also in the rest of the State. Manrique's work has been disseminated among more than six million people who have visited his museum and the institution has provided a recognized service to the island society, through its numerous cultural activities and contributing its point of view in what concerns protecting the territory from indiscriminate tourist growth.
What would you keep from this long trajectory?
Without a doubt, I'll keep the fact that the Foundation is a consolidated and respected reality in the world of art, culture, the environment and the University. And it is from this extreme geographic periphery that is Lanzarote, something not easy. Fortunately, it is a reason for satisfaction.
What do you think has been the role that the Foundation has played during this time?
From within, we have tried to play the role of a cultural institution committed to reality, in general, and to the island, in particular, responsible and critical, as corresponds to any rigorous cultural position, which has moved away from populism and demagoguery in any circumstance. It is not our objective to please or convince, but to fulfill our mission based on the ideas of César Manrique put in relation to current times, ideas that involve intervening in the debate and the public space, as he did, although surely with unequal fortune in our case.
How is its future planned? Do you think the Foundation will last for a long time?
Probably, our concern and priority task at present is focused on drawing and strengthening the foundations of the FCM's future. Not only guarantee, as far as possible, its viability, but reinforce it, grow, and, at the same time, channel the processes of replacement and institutional continuity. Today, fortunately, the César Manrique Foundation has a great future.
Does the Foundation feel the support of society?
The Foundation does not do what it does to seek social adhesions or applause. We do what we have been entrusted to do by statutory mandate, as interpreted by the board of trustees with its president at the head. It may be more or less liked, more or less sympathetic depending on who or for whom or depending on the circumstance. But in any case, it is nothing more than a modest intervention, a small contribution to democratic plurality, of Lanzarote and the Islands, sometimes to the rest of the State, from civil society.
Do you consider, as José Juan Ramírez stated, that the Foundation has paid a high price for its fight against corruption and speculation?
Of course. Small town, big hell, as they say. Sticking your nose into the fight against corruption and speculation is like entering the lion's den. And you don't get out of there without bites in the body. If we had dedicated ourselves exclusively to organizing cultural activities, it would have been a different story. When questioned, the power of money is a fierce wolf, assisted, moreover, by a dense service network. And it could be said that the Foundation has faced that real power, the one that commands, because it takes away and puts. Without shouting, but with discreet tenacity, with responsibility, in frankly difficult conditions when it is done in the open. The urban planning and management of the island's territory are a Gruyère cheese, full of black holes. It is not that things have been done badly, but that there has been a real looting. Someone would be tempted to say that what has happened is similar to a continued action of organized vandalism for the benefit of the usual suspects.
Is it that bad?
We are talking about illegal hotels and partial plans, about thirty annulled licenses, an ongoing criminal investigation, with accusations from the Prosecutor's Office and disturbing assessments about those who have had the accusation withdrawn. A Prosecutor's Office that is following the trail of an organized plot to grant the licenses. There are mayors in jail. It is the persecution of upright officials and proven willingness to public service in the Office of the Island Plan. It is Operation Union with about a hundred defendants and dozens of sticks in the judicial wheel to try to shamefully deflate the case. It is Operation Jable, Operation Montecarlo? Operation after operation, and we don't get out of the operating room... And now it is the scandal of the massive occupation of green areas, of public land, in Yaiza, a scandal of major proportions, in which not a few times the names of the promoters coincide with the same ones of the illegal hotels. And in the face of this disorder, what to do? Look the other way? Promote a new planning, whether municipal or island, or both, that blesses impunity or semi-impunity and here santaspascuas? Or try to give a little decency to democracy and our condition as citizens knowing that we will pay a high price?
In this matter, has the Foundation ever felt questioned by politicians?
The Foundation, with exceptions, which there have been and there are, has had a bad relationship with island and regional politicians of all ideological stripes. And this is so because the bad relationship is with power. I am still surprised by the inability of power to coexist with criticism from civil society and, in particular, from culture. It bothers them a lot, as if it unleashed an atavistic inferiority complex. The Foundation has not only been and continues to be questioned by politics, but we have been mistreated, without separating the institutional limits required of public administrations, which represent all of us, those who applaud and those who boo. It is illogical, but the Foundation survives despite not a few politicians and businessmen who have tried to undermine it, destroy it and end its leaders. There has been a lack of political intelligence and a sense of institutional responsibility. I have the impression that little by little things are beginning to change or take on new nuances, in distrust and disaffection still.
Likewise, do you think it has hurt to denounce the illegalization of the hotel plant?
The denunciations to the illegal hotels and apartments are at the root of the problem, as is the long conflict of the Islas Canarias parking lot, also illegalized. Manrique's legacy puts paintings in one hand and the responsibility to denounce speculation and the destruction of the island in the other. It is our obligation.
In addition, the Casa de las Cúpulas has also been immersed in a great controversy. What does the Foundation think about it? Do you think they will end up demolishing this building?
The game with the Casa de las Cúpulas is in the package of attacks on the Foundation. The Foundation requested the necessary authorizations to build a cultural facility of public interest, as declared by the Government, on protected rural land using an exceptional route contemplated then by the Land Law. Following the same procedure, numerous authorizations were granted on the island: well-known wineries in La Geria (on land with greater protection than that of Tahíche), gas stations, rural hotels, sports facilities? More than a dozen buildings are in operation today. It is not true that the Foundation has built one thing and was given permission for another. It is pure intoxication.
But isn't that what is said from other sides?
Of course, the campaign is trying to do its work of attrition. It is logical. But things are as they are. The Foundation built with the coverage of a municipal license for new construction, which is the ultimate enabling title. It built what was authorized and nothing more than what was authorized, as evidenced by the license of first occupation issued by the City Council. If the authorization and the license have been annulled because they were processed incorrectly, the reasons are attributable to the administrations concerned, as the sentences make clear. And, if necessary, we will ask those administrations for responsibilities, if an irreversible damage is caused to the Foundation, even if the damage has been supervening and unintentional.
Can the workshop be legalized?
In 2000, the law was modified and the route that allowed the license to be granted was eliminated. Now the road is uncertain. Our position, after having offered the farm to the public administration precisely to avoid the eventual compensation, is clear: execute the sentence in its own terms and, if it can be legalized without forcing the regulatory framework or doing strange things, do so; otherwise, demolish it. I have no doubt that the courts will proceed in this way. And this that serves for the workshop near the Casa de las Cúpulas, is extensible to everything that is in similar situation, that is, with annulled license and in execution phase of sentence. The will and the conduct of the Foundation are not going to be broken with intimidations or pressures.
Does Lanzarote still retain the spirit of César Manrique?
César's spirit is increasingly blurred, more battered. It is an extraordinary patrimonial loss. If we continue to grow in places and trivializing the destination, uniforming the island with golf courses, theme parks, sports docks? César's spirit will be definitively ended.
What do you think Manrique would think of the current Lanzarote?
He would be horrified, I have no doubt. César was very clear that the island that existed in 1992 had little to do with the island that he imagined in the sixties and early seventies, with his utopia. But I think that would not be an obstacle to continue fighting for things to improve or, at least, not to worsen.
The Foundation has positioned itself against the surveys. Is the entity going to continue fighting to stop them?
We will collaborate with the institutional and social dynamics and contribute whatever is in our hands. And our legal services have been working for weeks on an appeal that we have already formally initiated. The surveys, in a Biosphere Reserve, are an irresponsible extravagance. What do we gain? Nothing. Nothing compensates for the catastrophe of a spill.
What would César Manrique, a great defender of the environment, have said about oil extraction?
It takes a lot of imagination and very singular to imagine César promoting Lanzarote next to an oil tower. We do not like to interpret César's will. However, in this case I think that no one would doubt that, out of pure common sense, he would have raised his energetic voice to defend Lanzarote and, at the same time, he would have felt proud of the massive popular reaction in the demonstration of last March 24, a sample of dignity and citizen responsibility, which the arrogance and self-absorption of power should take into account.
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