The underwater museum of corruption

On September 27, the newspaper La Provincia published an interview with Jason Taylor Decaires, the artist who makes molds of people and submerges them in the sea, which caused some discomfort on the island due to two of his comments. The first of these, used as the headline of the interview, said verbatim: "The underwater museum will put the island of Lanzarote on the world map."

It is not difficult to imagine why this statement felt bad. Last year, Lanzarote received a whopping 2,500,000 tourists (an absolute record) and is one of the main tourist destinations in the country thanks to the combination of climate, beaches, low prices and unique features that distinguish it from other destinations. This has been the case for forty years, a date on which, thanks to interventions in the territory and the combative spirit of César Manrique, Lanzarote appeared to stay on that world map that an artist with pretensions now seems to have discovered for us.

Jason Taylor Decaires has presented himself as a defender of the environment, an environmentalist of art who has skillfully sold his card as an artist aware of nature and the future of the planet. That is why it caused perplexity that, in the interview in La Provincia, and when asked about the urban irregularities surrounding the Marina Rubicón marina, he limited himself to answering that he was unaware of the controversy that surrounded (and continues to surround) the construction of the port that is, today, the official headquarters of his museum. Nor is there any record that he has been very interested in the subject after the interview.

Perhaps because Lanzarote has been on the map for a long time, and in particular on the map of the fight against urban corruption, speculation on our coasts and the defense of the territorial integrity of the island, it is surprising that someone intends to pass himself off as a defender of the environment but has not bothered to find out that his base of operations is the epicenter of island corruption. Okay, it's less surprising if we take into account that the CEO of the Tourist Centers is a relative of the owners of the marina, but in any case it would have been an ethical detail that Jason Taylor would have known that fifteen years ago this island was at war against the destruction of the Berrugo area that the construction of the port entailed. I am convinced that if Decaires had been aware that Marina Rubicón is a place hated by environmental defenders on the island, he would never have agreed to use the port for his museum. At least, if he really is someone aware of nature and not a simple charlatan who came to the island at the hands of a German scammer.

After the discomfort caused by these two pearls that Decaires gave us, another bitter taste remains, perhaps even more intense. It is the anger produced by the fact that our president allows an English artist to come and tell us that Lanzarote will begin to be something thanks to his underwater museum. I think we deserve a president who defends what this island is today thanks to its inhabitants, the effort and creativity of Manrique, and the awareness that he sowed in thousands of citizens of Lanzarote. We deserve a president who is proud of what this island is today and puts aside that self-conscious and provincial attitude of "Welcome Mr. Marshall" that is embarrassing us as a people.

On an island where it took us so long to feel proud of our land, this position of the president and the Canarian Coalition is an insult to the collective memory and a setback of four decades in that spirit of identification with the natural and landscape values ​​of the island and its enhancement as a unique place in the world. "We don't have to copy anyone, let them come and copy us," said Manrique. For that you have to believe in Lanzarote and some have to talk less on September 25 and learn more to look at this island with the eyes of a lover with which César looked at it.

Carlos Meca. Podemos Councilor in the Cabildo of Lanzarote