On Sunday we had visitors in Karrantza and yesterday at @bilbaoartefund
Representatives from the Japan Livestock Industry Association (JLIA) —Hyogo, Hokkaido, Oita, Fukuoka, and Niigata— arrived from different parts of Japan.
They came to the Basque Country to learn about different agricultural and livestock projects, and ours sparked their interest in the fusion of art, territory, and the primary sector that shapes Mutur Beltz.
Amidst wool, tools, and stories, they listened to Toñín, Joseba’s father, recount how his elders taught him the craft of shepherding: reading the mountains, understanding the flock, listening to the landscape.
That transmission, made up of gestures and silences, is the starting point from which Joseba and I began to create together a project where tradition becomes innovation, where rural life is thought of as artistic practice and art as a form of working together.
I told them that exactly ten years ago, BilbaoArte was building the Bizi Rueda and the Bizi Karder here.
And, with that, I explained the importance of this production center in the history of Mutur Beltz.
It was here that what continues to beat today began to make sense: the need to return to inhabiting matter, to understand creation as a shared craft and an act of care.
Thank you, Kaori Nishii, for building that bridge between languages and sensibilities, for translating not just the words, but the emotion that sustains them.
🌿🌸
