During Boris Johnson's time as Mayor of London, the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, the artist Jason deCaires Taylor was invited to participate in "Totally Thames", an art festival that every September transforms the Thames into an exhibition space open to the city. The creator responded to the invitation by placing in the river, as it passed in front of the Houses of Parliament of Great Britain, four sculptures with a clear message of an ecological nature that, during the time the installation lasted, reminded the members of the Lower House, those who meet periodically to show the world the enormous arsenal of insults that a Briton can handle, of their responsibility in making decisions against the global disaster of climate change. The artist generated a limited edition of two original sculptures of each rider, and called his work "The Rising Tide". Four of these unique pieces now form the sculptural ensemble that for three years we have been able to observe on the coast adjacent to the International Museum of Contemporary Art of Lanzarote, in the Castle of San José, and that continues to transmit from the Canary Islands the message proposed by deCaires.
Last week, we learned through the press that the current government of the Cabildo of Lanzarote had recently met with Jason deCaires to warn him that the new corporation intends to break the agreement for the free transfer of his sculptures to the island of Lanzarote, and that they will be removed imminently from their current location in front of the MIAC. The reason, according to what the new head of the presidency of the Cabildo explained to the artist, is that the government considers that his work "damages the image of César", in reference to the Lanzarote artist César Manrique, creator of the museum.
That titanic blunder was sounding bad in the media until finally a spokesman for the PSOE in the Cabildo tried to step in, indicating that the desire to remove the works of art is also (or rather) due to the intention of María Dolores Corujo, current president of the Cabildo of Lanzarote, to eradicate from the Tourist Centers and from "the work of César Manrique" those elements that were added under the mandate of Pedro San Ginés, former President of the Island, with whom I governed as Minister of Culture in the past legislature. This attack of sincerity has left the grassroots social democrats stunned, seriously wondering on which side of the political spectrum the people who currently run the PSOE of the island of Lanzarote are actually on.
After the rejection that the announcement of the removal of the sculptures has produced, the new government group must have already understood that they have a problem that they will not be able to solve by putting on a watermelon smile in front of the flashes while they wait for collective Alzheimer's to do its job, and that is that not a single art historian or museum curator from the Cabildo or the CACT will throw their professional credibility out the window by signing a document that serves them, those who govern, to technically justify this regrettable political revenge.
On the other hand, the hoaxes that try to support this nonsense are intensifying. It has been said that the institution pays an annuity to deCaires for "The Rising Tide", or even that the document that was signed with the artist obliges the Cabildo to buy the pieces after a certain period of time. Of course, all this is totally false. The agreement between Jason deCaires and the Cabildo only includes the following parameters:
The artist has ceded his work to the Cabildo for ten years, and it must remain installed in the place previously agreed with the author until 2026. Jason deCaires neither received nor will receive any payment from the Cabildo of Lanzarote for this transfer in the future, but he maintains, like any author, the intellectual property rights over his work and the possibility of selling it after ten years, in which case the Cabildo will receive 20% of the sale. It is said that this project involved a large outlay for the Tourist Centers, but the truth is that the expenses were 15,000? in terms of logistics, production and installation of the pieces. It is true that the possibility of acquiring the work for 200,000? was considered, whose market value is currently between 600,000? and 800,000? according to independent appraisers, but the idea was rejected and finally the first of the two options was chosen, the transfer.
Probably more and worse hoaxes will arrive to try to divert our attention from the real problem that this case reveals, which is none other than the fact that for the new Cabildo revenge seems to be above all else. We must not allow the work that has been developed in our islands to be systematically guillotined just because it was the idea of "the others", we really cannot afford it, but seeing how the severed heads of projects that are really valid and beneficial for those of us who live here roll week after week, I have the feeling that Lanzarote has been governed in the last three months by the Queen of Hearts of Alice in Wonderland.
*Óscar Pérez is a CC councillor in the Cabildo of Lanzarote and former Culture councillor
