The Minister of Culture, Juan David Correa, speaks with LA NACIÓN and calls on the leaders who are elected this October 29 to jointly establish support for cultural managers in their regions. “The responsibility for cultural change in the country is not exclusive to the Ministry of Culture.” The official confirms his visit to Neiva for the start of the celebration of the 100 years of La Vorágine.
Jesus Antonio Rojas Serrano
“It is a dialogue before the end of the year with the Ministry of Culture so that together we can see how their government plans are with respect to culture, what we can collaborate with them on and how they are going to help cultural managers.” With these words, the Minister of Culture, Juan David Correa, proposes an almost immediate meeting with the governor and mayors who will be elected this October 29.
The official also talks about his Culture of Peace, the coca plant, support for cultural managers and the celebration of the 100 years of the publication of the novel La Vorágine.
More than two months later, how has it been going at the head of the Ministry of Culture?
It has gone well for me. Obviously, I am aware that any transformation and change is a historical process; It is not in the blink of an eye that a reality as complex as Colombia is changed, where culture is a central factor of change. And I hope that the population understands that more and more. Culture is not only artistic and popular expressions, but the way we relate to each other and the way we feed ourselves, relate to nature and to people different from us. There is the cultural thing at play, and obviously, there will have to be a mental change in the new generations to overcome cultural issues such as racism, classism, machismo, patriarchalism and all those types of behaviors that are not natural. These are the changes that from Gustavo Petro’s government we want to happen.
Mr. Minister, how does all this materialize?
Jesús Antonio, we want to tell people to organize themselves, to create cooperatives and associations so that we can work with them in the regions and defend an idea of a nation in which we all fit. It is not about excluding anyone, but about including those who have not been included in the national narrative, such as a good part of the indigenous communities, the Pacific and the poor and popular people of the country. For that, we are transforming the institutional, transforming the Ministry of Culture in the face of this new reality. The country changed, it is not just the government, through social movements and large marches. We are facing several processes at the same time such as health reform, labor reform, peace dialogues, among others, and in all these scenarios culture has things to say. Our strategy to address these issues is the Culture of Peace, which seeks to speak with various sectors and give opinions on drug policy, the neglect of territories such as Tumaco, Nariño, among others. I feel very fortunate to know the social experiences that have taken many decades of struggle and search for spaces and that today are crystallized in this government.
Is it possible to make this Culture of Peace a reality in regions like Huila?
It is a strategy that talks with the various sectors of society in the territory. We are working in Pdet and Zomac municipalities; In Huila there are several populations affected by the armed conflict where we want to intervene. How do we do it? One of the strategies are cultural pacts to raise the spirit of Colombians and understand that artistic and cultural expression enhances public conversation; music, art, literature, theater and the circus are expressions in which we can be ourselves and be different and be around those ideas. We are reaching the territory with investment in various aspects, from heritage to museums, from literature to libraries; That is where we signed a culture pact for peace where these monies are allocated and citizen surveillance is carried out. This is a process. We are not going to transform Colombia in two years, nor in three, it is a generational challenge, it is a call to the country for us all to unite.
What could the cultural sector have to say on an issue as complex as drug trafficking?
Why don’t we transform the mentality of the peasants who grow coca, why do we have to punish the peasants who grow coca, which by the way, is not a plant that kills as a previous government said, but is a sacred plant, the which we should recover its cultural dimension and make it part of our productive, essential and spiritual horizon. The Culture of Peace has to talk, for example, with the Ministry of Defense, about what we are proposing to soldiers as a cultural horizon. Colombian municipalities are full of violence, but if we give people a cultural offer, it will change because we are full of musicians, dancers, talented people who want to do other things. Therein lies the true social change in offering opportunities and paths, obviously, being rigorous with public resources, but leaving a bit of the discourse that everything in the public sphere is stolen.
Cultural managers have always felt like the ‘Cinderellas’ of public budgets. What investment is there for them from Gustavo Petro’s government?
Jesús Antonio, there are three things that we are already implementing: the first, creating a code in the RUT on the profession of cultural manager. The second, we have a census of almost 150,000 people from a registry that was made in the previous government and called Soy Cultura; This census is made up of artists and cultural directors; We are going to soon issue a card, that is, a plastic card for those 150,000 managers and give them identity and offer aid and discounts on services; It is a card that will concentrate a number of offers that we can generate through agreements, for example, we are trying to reach an agreement so that their data plan is cheaper. And the third is a conversation that I want to propose – and I do it through the Diario LA NACIÓN – to the governor and the mayors of Huila who will be elected on October 29.
Mr. Minister, and what is this conversation for?
It is a dialogue before the end of the year with the Ministry of Culture so that together we can see how their government plans are with respect to culture, what we can collaborate with them on and how they are going to help cultural managers. The responsibility for cultural change in the country is not exclusive to the Ministry of Culture. Mayor’s offices are obliged, by governance, to address cultural issues, to include culture in their budgets, strengthen cultural houses, equip libraries and protect social and cultural leaders. That is my invitation for us to build a dialogue together. We want to build that dialogue with the new governor of Huila, the new mayor of Neiva and the other leaders who are elected. The Ministry of Culture is ready to go to the capital of Huila and hold a large meeting with the new leaders to look at the cultural investment contemplated in their development plans for the next four years and the support that the national government will provide.
The festivities are the most authentic cultural expression of a town and Neiva has San Pedro, but the national government’s investment in these festivities is poor. Are there possibilities that in the Petro government the economic support will be much greater?
The call for national projects is currently open. I removed the so-called discretionary resources from the Ministry of Culture’s office and transferred them to a list of national projects; The call is published on the website and is open until October 23. All the popular festivals in Colombia can compete there to obtain budgets ranging from $100 million to $500 million. We need to democratize contributions so that they are not according to the sympathy or antipathy of a minister, the management of a congressman or the exchange of political favors. I believe that popular festivals are excellent opportunities to insist on a concept that is essential in this government and that is the popular economy. People must understand that the festival of San Pedro is not about obtaining resources to hold a celebration, but rather about promoting an industry, a clothing industry because there are costumes, a dance industry because they can have dance academies, a food industry. because they bring out food and tamales. If it is seen that there is a production chain that can be sustainable throughout an entire year to reach the great event that is San Pedro, we will be transforming reality. If we keep dreaming that they will give us $500 million to have a party, buy drinks and have two orchestras, no reality will be transformed. The message for the community of Neiva and Huila is: let’s organize and see the economic opportunities that can be generated with what we have so that we return popular festivals to cultural industries. Let’s not let ourselves be convinced that the holidays are only once a year, that we spend half the budget and that the next day we are with a monumental guava tree because there are no longer resources for anything else.
The celebration of the centenary of the publication of the novel La Vorágine is approaching, what will the Ministry of Culture do?
Jesús Antonio, La Vorágine has been the great metaphor for this country for 100 years. It is the metaphor of our tense relationship with nature, of how extractivism was established among us since the 1920s due to a colonial war that took place throughout the Colombian, Peruvian and Ecuadorian Amazon. José Eustasio Rivera’s novel is a central novel that has to be read again in other ways by Colombian society. The novel was read, schooled and became a required text, but people assumed it was a boring text. What we are going to create for this novel next year is a collection of 10 books that will go to all the libraries in the country. This ‘La Vorágine library’ as we title it contains a biography of Rivera written by Isaías Peña; a fantastic book called ‘Holocaust in the Amazon’ written by historian Roberto Pineda; a story that Roberto Franco wrote called ‘History of Orocué’, among others. There are 10 books that are not necessarily literary, but that do illuminate and accompany La Vorágine.
What other activities are planned?
La Vorágine is going to become the great literary theme of the year in the international fairs in which Colombia will participate and in the Book Fair in Bogotá. We will start this November 4th with this celebration in Neiva where I will be personally; We will hold regional fairs, seminars and discussions to also cross over a central issue for this government and that is climate change. From culture we can also imagine what that means about the jungle, what that means about our relationships with nature. The launch of the ‘La Vorágine library’ will be next March in Mocoa, Putumayo, and in La Chorrera, where we will hold an apology ceremony to the communities of the region for the murder of more than 60,000 indigenous people a century ago. Brazil will be the guest country at the Book Fair and through Brazil we will put the emphasis on the Amazon. It is an ambitious celebration program that brings together literature, anthropology, community, environment and history.
