The Tourist Centers will not finally buy Jason deCaires' 'Rising Tide'. The sculptures will be "ceded" for ten years, which implies that the Cabildo takes charge of "both the material and the logistical costs of the production" and also of the "installation", which amounts to more than 15,000 euros, according to the proposal presented to the Board of Directors. The Minister of Tourism explained this Thursday that the Centers have chosen this option and has defended that decision arguing that "zero euros" will be paid to the artist and, even, stating that the fact that those 4 horses are reproductions of the original installed in the Thames is "an attraction". Echedey Eugenio has also accused the opposition of "staging a war, taking advantage of the fact that the Pisuerga passes through Valladolid" with this issue.
"Let people be clear: the cost for the Tourist Centers of the sculptures installed in the castle of San José for the next 10 years is zero euros to the artist. To the artist zero euros, we pay for the installation, but we don't pay anything to the artist", Eugenio stressed on Radio Lanzarote-Onda Cero. Specifically, the proposal presented by the CEO of the Centers includes that the Cabildo pays for the materials and logistical costs of the production and installation, which he puts at 15,000 euros, of those figures that are already next to the castle and adds, in addition, that "the installation and transport will also be paid independently by EPEL CACT". Eugenio, who made these statements after formations such as Somos Lanzarote have demanded that "not a penny more of public money" be spent on payments to deCaires, has also stressed that the molds of these sculptures whose originals are in London "were made in Lanzarote", that is, while the artist was working for the Tourist Centers in the Underwater Museum.
Several opposition parties have denounced this week that the Centers were planning to spend 200,000 euros more on buying those reproductions or, failing that, that they would be ceded for 10 years, with the Cabildo assuming the aforementioned costs. That complaint, which was initiated by Ciudadanos, arose from the proposal with these two options presented by the CEO of the CACT to the Board of Directors. Despite this, in Eugenio's opinion, those parties "lie", because "they know" that the chosen option is that assignment.
"The artist offered us either to buy them or to make a free assignment for 10 years. The Centers, because we said so when we installed it, opted for the free assignment. They know it, but taking advantage of the fact that the Pisuerga passes through Valladolid they have once again wanted to make war with the issue of the Underwater Museum", said the councilor in this regard.
An "attraction" that they are reproductions
Thus, Eugenio has defended the decision of the Centers to opt for the assignment and also the installation itself of those figures, which Somos Lanzarote had criticized because they have "no link with the island, nor with the Centers, nor with the spirit with which they were created nor their needs". The councilor, for his part, has supported their installation, stating that the work is "an attraction" and that "we must have Centers, which are tourist centers, and must be attractive to tourists". In this sense, the councilor has even assured that "proof" of the "attraction" of those figures is "how the Castle restaurant is working since the sculptures are there for the people who go to see them".
For Eugenio, it is also "an attraction" that the figures installed next to the MIAC are reproductions. "It is not true, they are not a copy", he replied when it was highlighted that they are not unique works. "Reproductions are made of the sculptures and, precisely, one of the values it has for an island that lives on English tourism, one of the attractions it has is that they are the same as those installed in the Thames", he added.
To support his argument, the councilor has stressed that "the molds of those sculptures were made in Lanzarote and from Lanzarote they went to the Thames and not the other way around". In addition, he has given as an example the work of César Manrique, alluding to the replicas that are in Lanzarote, his native island, of sculptures installed in other places. "There are some of César's wind toys that are installed at the ITB in Berlin, or in places in South America, or in parts of Spain and that we are very proud of, and it should continue to be so, to have replicas of them in Lanzarote, because they are international sculptures that have replicas in several countries of the world".
Eugenio has also referred to the proposal of Podemos that asks to reactivate the file to protect the environment of the BIC of the Castle, to protect it from "speculative interests". "It's curious the things that Podemos has. A few months ago they criticized on the radio and told me that I was wrong when I said that we didn't have to ask Heritage for any permission because the castle was a BIC in itself but it didn't have an environment. And today, when in theory they said that we had to ask for permission, they say that we have to declare that BIC. What's going on? Either they were lying then or they are lying now", Eugenio considers. The councilor has also pointed to a supposed interest of Podemos so that the MIAC is not expanded. "Be careful when they ask for the declaration of the area of the environment, lest the final objective be to prevent the MIAC from growing", he said.