The Insular Library of Lanzarote has, since this Tuesday, March 8, International Women's Day, a Violet Room, which aims to be "a safe space for meeting and reflection for women."
The room has been inaugurated by the president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, María Dolores Corujo, and by the councilor of Education, Youth and Equality of the Island Corporation, Myriam Barros, who has promoted the creation of this space. The room has been named 'Mararia' as "a tribute to the first association of Lanzarote that attended to the needs of women and that, since 1994, provides an extraordinary service, focused especially on the care of victims of gender violence", they emphasize from the Cabildo.
In addition to representatives of the various feminist groups on the island, the event was attended by the island director of the General State Administration in Lanzarote, Juan Ramón Pérez, the island director of Education, Celeste Callero, and the councilor for Equality of the Arrecife City Council, María Jesús Tovar.
"Today we inaugurated the Violet Room. A room that bears the name of Mararía, an association that has been in a tireless, persevering struggle for almost three decades, in favor of equality and against gender violence," said María Dolores Corujo, who wanted to especially praise the figure of Nieves Rosa Hernández, president of this association and “a fighting woman who has dedicated her life body and soul in favor of women".
“As feminists, we can only rejoice in their good work and their recognitions, because it is a success shared by all”, said Councilor Myriam Barros, who explained that this is why they wanted to pay this tribute to Mararía.
For her part, the president of the social and cultural association for women Mararía thanked the recognition and the creation of the Violet Room, “a space that is fair to exist”. “It is justice for all. Mararía only took a torch, a torch in which nobody believed and in which it was necessary to bet on giving service and support to women”, said Nieves Rosa Hernández.
A space to welcome women and groups
As detailed at the inauguration, the newly opened Violet Room will host from this Tuesday “all women who need a break”. “It will be a safe space, a look of confidence, a place to go when they feel that life is getting the better of them”, explained the Councilor for Education, Youth and Equality of the Cabildo.
According to Myriam Barros, the Violet Room will not be an ordinary study room, but is designed "to also welcome feminist groups and their meetings and activities." “All are welcome to this space, which is already yours, and build around it a more egalitarian and more empathetic society”, she indicated.
”The road to real and effective equality is long and is just beginning”, the councilor insisted, and both she and the president of the Cabildo have made a call "to continue fighting against the social scourge of machismo and to strengthen the rights of women." “We represent half of society and we are not going to settle for less than half of everything, of all institutional, social, cultural, sports or scientific spaces”, said Myriam Barros.
In her speech, the councilor also wanted to highlight “the legacy of resilience that our ancestors left us” and that she wanted to represent in the mural that the artist Judith Morales has made in the new Violet Room of the Insular Library.
Exhibition on the problem of the kellys
Likewise, the Insular Library hosts from this Tuesday, March 8, a photographic exhibition, carried out by the enfocArte collective, which aims to give visibility and raise awareness about the problem of the kellys. A work “feminized, invisibilized and precarious”.
The exhibition, which will later tour the seven municipalities of the island, has been conceived as a small tribute to all those women who have dared to raise their voices and become visible.
Performance by Las Revoltosas and unitary demonstration
With the inauguration of the Violet Room, the agenda of events programmed by the Cabildo of Lanzarote for this March 8 has begun, which continued at 1:30 p.m., in the Ramírez Cerdá Park, with a performance by the murga Las Revoltosas
In this same space, at 7:00 p.m., a unitary demonstration called by the feminist groups of the island will begin. A march to which the Cabildo of Lanzarote will join, inviting all citizens, men and women, to participate.
