The city of Santa Cruz de Tenerife will house the Rodin Museum, according to the agreement signed this morning in Paris by the mayor of the city, José Manuel Bermúdez, the vice president of the Island Council, Enrique Arriaga, and the director of the aforementioned Museum, Amelie Simier. This agreement establishes that throughout 2022 the City Council and the Museum will finalize this agreement in an agreement that determines the participation of the institutions involved and the time frames for its execution.
The agreement signed today in Paris is the result of months of work from the Santa Cruz de Tenerife City Council, a city that has behind it a cultural history closely linked to sculpture. Since the 1970s last year, and at the initiative of the Official College of Architects of the province, some thirty sculptures by world-class artists (Henry Moore, Joan Miró, Josep Guinovart, Pablo Serrano, Martín Chirino …) are located in the streets of the city after the first international exhibition of sculpture in the street was held 48 years ago. These antecedents give even more meaning to the agreement signed today that will mean the arrival in the city of the father of modern sculpture.
The mayor has described this agreement as “exciting for Santa Cruz, for the Island of Tenerife and for the Canary Islands, and it will be a pole of attraction for visitors as it is the first international museum of these characteristics to be installed in the Islands, a unique opportunity, cultural and economic for the Archipelago ”.
Bermúdez has indicated that the objective is “to connect this project with the permanent exhibition of sculptures in the street, which has existed for almost half a century in our city, by world-famous authors, and that with the future Rodin Museum it will complete that hallmark of our city, as the international capital of sculpture ”. In addition, the mayor has indicated that “we generate a focus for the dissemination of work, both local and national and international artists.”
For his part, the vice president of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Enrique Arriaga, has indicated today’s date as “a very important day for the city of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, for Tenerife”. “With the signed agreement,” he added, “we will be able to enjoy the Rodin Museum, a fact that will put Tenerife at the top in terms of cultural offerings, with original pieces by the French artist, and which can be visited by tourists. who come to the Island, consolidating an alternative offer to the traditional sun and beach, in this case also cultural and world-class ”.
The director of the Rodin Museum, Amelie Simier, has highlighted the French artist as “the most famous sculptor, father of modern sculpture, and author of iconic works such as The Kiss, or The Thinker, which represent what modern sculpture really is” .
Yesterday afternoon a work meeting was held in which, in addition to José Manuel Bermúdez and Enrique Arriaga, the councilors of Finance and Culture, Juan José Martínez and Gladis de León, other representatives of the Rodin Museum participated to start working in the content of the future agreement and the space management formula, and it was agreed between the parties that during the month of December those responsible for the Rodin Museum will visit Santa Cruz to see the Viera y Clavijo Cultural Park and continue working on the development of the details of this important project.
The space chosen to house this important space is the Viera y Clavijo Cultural Park, whose rehabilitation project is currently being drawn up by the architect Fernando M. Menis, also present at the aforementioned meeting held in Paris.
This rehabilitation project will be adapted to the use needs arising from the agreement, and will also include a space for temporary exhibitions that give visibility to local artists, in addition to giving rise to promoting a future International Center for Modern and Contemporary Sculpture, with the objective of introducing a space in which not only to contemplate pieces of art, but to contribute to their interpretation and dissemination, and which will also revolve around the exhibition of sculpture in the street.
The Viera y Clavijo Cultural Park will be rehabilitated for an amount greater than 10 million euros, the result of an agreement between the Santa Cruz City Council and the Government of the Canary Islands that was signed in 2018.
It is a complex whose construction began at the beginning of the 20th century, according to the plans of the architects Mariano Estanga and Miguel Pintor, for the construction of a first neo-Gothic church commissioned by a congregation of Belgian nuns. A few years later the entire enclosure was enlarged, with the congregation acquiring the property adjacent to the building and later an old assembly hall was used to turn it into the Pérez Minik theater.
In addition to being a school, it has been the seat of the City Council itself (Culture area), the Menéndez Pelayo International University, the University of the Mayors or the School of Music. In 1986, the entire complex would be declared a Historic-Artistic Monument of Interest.
About the author and the Museum of Paris
Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) is considered the father of modern sculpture. The space occupied by the museum that bears his name was opened to the public in 1919 and receives an average of half a million visitors each year. In addition to this headquarters, there are only two spaces on the planet dedicated exclusively to the French artist: the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia (USA) and a wing dedicated to the sculptor in the Shizuoka Prefectural Museum, Japan.
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