The fifteenth edition of the National Week of Contemporary Art in Asturias, AlNorte, has commenced. The María Cristina Masaveu Peterson Foundation sponsors this artistic and cultural project. This meeting of generations, which revolves around modern art, has an extensive activity programme that will be take place between 29 September and 8 October, including four exhibitions in Oviedo, Gijón and Avilés with the projects of this edition’s Scholarship winners, round tables, workshops and the “Visual Asturias” contest.
The four winners of this new edition are the young Spanish artists Jacobo Bugarín, Mónica Cofiño, María Muñiz and Sandra Paula Fernández, whose work will be displayed at the Niemeyer Centre, the Barjola Museum, the Corinthian Courtyard of the Laboral University and the Borrón Gallery, respectively.

JACOBO BUGARIN (Santiago de Compostela, 1983) will display his interdisciplinary project Ellos quieren zoar [Gamberro, víctima, héroe] (They want to have fun [rogue, victim, hero]), based on the interesting Portuguese word “zoar”, which alludes to attracting attention, having fun, flirting, playing or fighting and which analyses the possible tensions in public areas within contemporary cities. His project is site-specific to room 2 of the Niemeyer Centre, in the multiple-activity building, and it will also be displayed in part of the central square, leading observers to think about the democratisation of the architecture, young people’s quest for their identity, banality and popularisation. “Ultimately, my project is about young people”, states Jacobo Bugarín. “From this perspective I aim to develop a visual materialisation, marking the territory with symbols, icons and the buildings which instigate such collective social action”. The project evokes the memory and ethical commitment of Europe and Latin America, generating a complex exhibition that will be displayed in two different areas: one to accommodate the objects and remains of social events held at the actual Niemeyer Centre and another, in the inner room, with photographs and audiovisual pieces to explain this dialogue between the individual, the multitude, the community and the self-affirmation of the consumer society.

MÓNICA COFIÑO (Barcelona, 1980), dancer, stage designer and performer presents El musical industrial (The industrial musical) at the Barjol Museum in Gijón, a project that brings together trains, Asturian steelmaking, dance and the visual arts and which coincides with the launch of “La Casa del Viaje”, the new headquarters of the “La Xata la Rifa” festival, which she has coordinated for over five years. Links and communications will be set up from certain train stations and the third floor of the Gijón museum to other locations in the region, creating points of communication within the networks along with an exhibition of the images and pieces created during this work in progress. The idea of the project is to present a musical along the Gijón-Laviana line, involving intense human collaboration and that of several institutions (the Historical Archive of Asturias, the Mining and Industry Museum [MUMI], the Iron and Steel Museum [MUSI], the Pérez de Ayala Library…) to collect information and to stream the activities undertaken by the “La Xata la Rifa” festival during the 15th National Week of Contemporary Art. The Barjola Museum is once again a key focal point of AlNorte and its perspective of Asturias, thanks to this lively creator and her collaborators, who allude to “what is happening in everyday life, with the assistance of different artists and life itself”. It is an insightful and live window onto movement, the present and chance, which promises to fuse entertainment with collective activities.

MARÍA MUÑIZ (Gijón, 1984) converts the Corinthian Courtyard, which provides access to the Laboral City of Culture, into a place for silence and collective reflection, based on design, technology and art. Her exhibition, “Etere”, combines methacrylate, paint and electronic systems and analyses the supremacy of the invisible, material and light. It combines scientific study, the idea of the universe, Platonic philosophy and literature with a piece that is both resounding and subtle, an interactive totem inspired by writers and artists such as Saint-Exupéry, who were aware that what is essential is invisible to the eye. The work will react in the presence of people to “free ourselves from an invisible tyranny, letting rise to the keys that reveal the enigma of our identity with the universe”, states this young Gijón-born artist, who founded Todo Estudio and has collaborated with groups such as Thr3hold and Ixlxl. She also seeks to create “a poetic reflection between the tangible, the intangible and the human being in pursuit of a mystic essence”.

SANDRA PAULA FERNÁNDEZ (Oviedo, 1972) presents her work Arte público: la vida no es sólo coser y cantar (Public art: life is not all about sewing and singing), with wall pieces of different versions and sizes. In principle, there will be six exhibits created with texts and cross stitch embroideries, which were commenced some time ago by this Asturian artist who lives in Madrid, and which will take their definitive shape and depth thanks to the scholarship achieved. It is a line of research that Sandra Paula Fernández has developed in recent years to pay tribute to traditional tasks which are generally connected to housekeeping and women, creating an intimate link between material and memory. However, “Life is not all about sewing and singing” is not just an ordinary exhibition, or a complacent or decorative standpoint, quite the opposite, it is a project designed to call into question the terrible sexist stereotypes existing in modern society, which directly addresses the problem of prostitution in Spain and the double standards of our time. “Prostitution is the ultimate form of slavery” states Sandra Paula. “I am horrified by the double standards surrounding these issues and, because of that, I have embroidered advertisements, messages, text from dating websites and other fragments to condemn the fact that, at present, more than four million people are victims of trafficking in women throughout the world”.