The Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) held this Tuesday the first day of Museums and Sustainability. An initiative that the museum intends to carry out every year and whose objective is that museums do not remain oblivious to the problem of climate change
The day had different guests such as Evelio Acevedo, director general of Thyssen; Miguel Zugaza, director of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum; Manuel Ciraqui, curator of the Guggenheim in Bilbao; or Markus Reymann, director of TBA21-Academy, as well as the director of MACBA, Elvira Dyangani; the head of exhibitions at MACBA, Hiuwai Chu and Cristina López, director of the MACBA Foundation.
All of them have shared their respective experiences in the cultural sector, as well as the challenges that arise both in the present and in the future, among which the importance of reducing the impact of the carbon footprint stands out. Something for which all of them, they say, are working. “Sustainability is a culture. Whatever you do has an impact”, admitted Zugaza.
The appointment has also been an opportunity to expose the role of digitization in all this process. "A path that was accelerated due to the pandemic," Acevedo acknowledged for his part, recalling the months in which museums were forced to close doors due to the covid health emergency. “It was a period in which we were more aware of what this transformation represented, although we quickly realized that not everything was worth in digital. The Thyssen has its consolidated museum model and the digital one has to broaden horizons and possibilities, but not change its character”, he reflected.
However, the speakers have contemplated the new possibilities that arise, such as "being able to create virtual exhibitions and tours or invite curators to explain their samples without the obligation to travel for it", Dyangani pointed out. Ciraqui has expanded on this point of view in her subsequent talk and has insisted on other aspects, such as "the importance of choosing transport, prioritizing electric over combustion, whenever there is an option". And, on the other hand, he has stressed “the need to transform the infrastructures on which we base our programming. If you can choose between building and not building, the latter will be chosen. Whenever possible, walls will be recycled. If options that consume energy can be avoided, they will be avoided and natural light will be prioritized, for example. And, of course, local artists will also be promoted.”
During the conference there was also an opportunity to highlight "the importance of public and private financing and of generating resources autonomously, since this provides security when working and fulfilling all projects, many of which have more and more relationship between sustainability and climate change.
