In Search of the Pluriverse

• Asturias, Spain: Tuning into the struggles of a post-industrial region #8 Group talk: Empathic Communication

  After living a week under one roof, working together at the farm, walking together in silence, sharing breakfasts, dinners and thoughts, the group talk comes quite naturally. Here we are: Chiara, Ana, Pascale, Cynthia, Sophie and Erik, sitting in a circle in the shade of the biggest building in Spain, built during the Franco regime: Universidad Laboral de Gijón. After a tour of art centre LABoral and a soothing minute of silence we look back on the days we spent together. A talk about capitalism and workers cooperatives, about poverty and looking for a better future by walking away from the harsh rural life. About the pros and cons of the revitalisation of industrial cities as Bilbao and Aviles.  What did we learn, what do we take home? These are complex and confusing times, but our talk ends on a positive note: united we stand, plants and humans, and however small, changes can be made. There might me no ’them’ in capitalism, this week there was definitely an ‘us’.  References: LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón/Xixón: http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org/ Universidad Laboral de Gijón, Spains’s biggest building: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universidad_Laboral_de_Gij%C3%B3n Interview “Asturias, a wasted agricultural paradise” between Elena Bandera and Emilio Ricco https://www.lavozdeasturias.es/noticia/asturias/2017/01/25/asturias-paraiso-agricola-desaprovechado/00031485375319442960395.htm Gijón page on regional newspaper La voz de Asturias (the voice of Asturias) https://www.lavozdeasturias.es/gijon/ “Memorias culturales de un pasado industrial”, a film directed by University of Oviedo researchers Irene Díaz and Rubén Vega: https://fb.watch/hqSrwrwljl/ On radical unionism and the worker’s struggle in Spain: https://libcom.org/library/radical-unionism-workers-struggle-spain-ruben-vega-garcia-carlos-perez 

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• Asturias, Spain: Tuning into the struggles of a post-industrial region #7 Pascale Gatzen

  Pascale Gatzen fell in love with fashion as a child, became a designer and quickly fell out of love with the competitive, capitalistic fashion system. In New York she co-founded the workers cooperative Friends of Light that fabricated custom made woven jackets from local wool. This experience evolved into the Dutch ‘Linen Project’ an – also – cooperative attempt to create a value chain from growing organic flax to making linen products with the harvested and processed fibres.  Collaboration comes with communication. Gatzen got interested in ‘empathic communication’ and made that the core of an artistic Master she set up in Arnhem, The Netherlands.  A conversation about getting in touch with felt emotions and underlyning needs, ‘should thoughts’, the succesful Mondragon cooperative and the love for making beautiful things that will never fade.   References: The Linen Project https://thelinenproject.online/ Friends of Light weaving cooperative: https://www.friendsoflight.net/ Nice read: Take back Fashion! by Pascale Gatzen for Apria/ArteZ: https://apria.artez.nl/take-back-fashion/ About non-violent communication (what Pascale calls ‘compassionate communication’): https://www.cnvc.org/learn-nvc/what-is-nvc About the Mondragon worker cooperative: https://www.mondragon-corporation.com/en/about-us/ 

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• Asturias, Spain: Tuning into the struggles of a post industrial-region #6 Cynthia Hathaway

  We decide to have the conversation in a parked car, with an enormous hand made world-of-wool-map on our lap. As if we are on an imaginary roadtrip through Cynthia Hathaway’s practise. It fits her way of working: creating fun, momentum and dialogue. Canadian born Hathaway came to the Netherlands in the late 90ies. She calls herself an artistic ‘searcher’ without the re- attached. Always looking for surprising angles and ways to connect different fields of working and thinking. From miniature trains to giant vegetables, from founding a disco in an academic institute to growing potatoes to embody Gilles Deleuze’s Rhizomatic thinking. Her latest intervention: a wool march. A walk with a herd of 250 sheep, shepherds and dogs straight through the centre of the Dutch textile city Tilburg. To raise awareness for lost connections between humans, animals and landscape.  A talk about the art of not knowing, the dedication of amateurs, the loud Asturian hills, the global versus the local and the ongoing beat of disco music. Yeah.  References: More about Cynthia Hathaway: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAaNgIPbXvc More about Wool Alliance for Social Agency: https://woolallianceforsocialagency.blog/ System D Academy, Sandberg Instituut: https://sandberg.nl/system-d-academy The Department of Search (Zero Footprint Campus): http://www.hathawaydesigns.org/the-department-of-search.html 

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• Asturias, Spain: Tuning into the struggles of a post-industrial region #5 Chiara Sgaramella

  We asked Chiara Sgaramella to join our Asturias edition because her practice as an artistic researcher focusses on the connection between art and agriculture. She was born and raised in the heel of Italy’s boot, but currently lives and works in Valencia, Spain. Sgaramella sees art as an integrated part of daily life, as a collective effort. From this perspective she studies the relations between soil, food and culture. We all know paella as a dish, but what do we know about rice production in Spain? When and how did rice arrive as a crop in Europe? Chiara developed a travelling trolley about the subject.  A talk – that took place in the hazel forest close to PACA – about eco-feminist art, the Zapatistas, radical interdependency and the impact of scarcity.  Immediately after the group talk (#8) Sgaramella needed leave for Piemonte, Italy, where she took part in a 1 year residency. Chiara worked with abandoned tools, found in a barn. She reproduced these ‘extensions of farmers hands’ in large prints, as an ode to agricultural gestures.  References: More about Chiara Sgaramella: https://chiarasgaramella.com/ About the symbolic association between Covadonga (a prechristian place of worship near  Picos de Europa) and the Spanish/catholic identity: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/his.2002.14.1-2.37 Another Possible World, exhibition including works by Zapatista in Museum Reina Sofiá: https://www.museoreinasofia.es/en/collection/room/room-00213 More about Chiara’s Oryza rice trolley: https://chiarasgaramella.com/oryza-collection ‘Dona arbre’, Fina Miralles, 197oies: https://www.macba.cat/en/art-artists/artists/miralles-fina/translacions-dona-arbre-documentacio-laccio-realitzada-novembre 

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• Asturias, Spain: Tuning into the struggles of a post-industrial region #4 Ana Carreño

  Ana Carreño takes us to public beach in Gijón/Xixon that is sandwiched between two industrial sites. While we look for a spot for our the interview we pass three women on a bench. One of them is singing. She says she used to sing a lot when she was young. Singing is a rural tradition. As a young woman she moved to the city for work and stopped singing.  A job in the mines or the steel industry was an escape from rural poverty. But since the 80ies, when Spain joined the EU, mines were closed and industry declined. Architect and researcher Carreño studies the post industrial landscape. What happens when the activitity disappears, but memories and remnants are still present? This spatial confusion – or heterotopia as Michel Foucault calls it – comes with challenges and opportunities. Carreño grew up here, her grandfather drove the coal train from the mines in Aviles the harbour of Gijon. What kind of future does she picture for this shrinking city? How to deal with degrowth? We dive into the economic history of the region and talk about the current spatial quality of the city. We look the revitalisation of Bilbao: from industrial community to cultural hub. But not every jobless mineworker can become a barista in a glossy coffeeshop. We also touch upon Ana’s own practise as an architect and artist. Does she consider Heterotopia as her habitat? References: More on Ana Carreño: https://anacarreno.com/ About ‘heteropías’ (plural places): https://anacarreno.com/Heterotopias More on regional singing: https://www.rtpa.es/video:De%20Romandela_551517181598.html 

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