It is true that when we think of “contemporary art“, among the more or less immediate word associations, we surely end up naming “urban”, “civilized”, “cosmopolitan”, “enlightened”, “developed”, “international”. On the contrary, terms such as “nature”, “terroir”, “vegetal”, “oral”, “illiterate”, “underdeveloped”, “local” seem detached from what one relates to art made at this point in the Third Millennium. What does art contribute to the rural world? Can contemporary art really grow in rural soil? Why is art so detached from the reality of the common people? All these questions are not new to us and their answers continue to generate more questions. We believe that Art can also have a function of accompanying a useful project.
In our adventure—Mutur Beltz—around the ovine world, we face its execution from a broad perspective, with the initial purpose of fully contributing to the habitat to which it belongs. Starting by making the decision to move to its environment, to Karrantza. Experiencing day by day looking from the rural, not looking at the rural, as is often done. Transforming the gaze and deconstructing stereotypes is an important step before the idealism and paternalism with which we often approach the countryside. But, this approach has also made us see that we cannot load a responsibility that does not belong to us. That is, for a problematized situation in a territory to change, the community must want to change it, otherwise there is nothing to do, and in addition, there must be an adequate political climate.
In recent decades, the countryside has transitioned from a subsistence economy to having to be an entrepreneur, and there is a tremendous gap there. Populations assume that the countryside does not work. You either invent the work, as the artist does, or you are lost. That is related to entrepreneurship. Youth in rural areas needs a lot of creative capacity and faith in creation. Art can help the inhabitants of the villages feel proud and that the youth have a reference. Art is necessary for a rural revolution that this world needs.
Each one can be an actor of change. Among our tools, there is art. This allows us to rethink new paradigms that revive our time: such as giving meaning back to productions, with respect for people and for the land. It is what we usually call, in short, local development and it is no less art for that. Perhaps it is a more authentic art, because it renounces the rewards of the cultural market and assumes only its transformative capacity. A necessary art, because it approaches the essential of existence, to life and its happening.