One of Bigas Luna's dreams was “that people could eat my work, as happens with the cook's work,” he explained. This year marks the tenth anniversary of the death of a filmmaker who advised: “Don't eat anything you don't know what it is, where it comes from and what it contains” and who dedicated himself to knowing in depth everything he consumed, from water even chocolate, which was the first and last thing I had every day.
His daughter, Betty Bigas, remembers him as a pioneer: “20 years ago there were no totally organic and ecological stores. He set up a garden, with donkeys and chickens, and was learning; “He traveled all over Spain looking for the best producers and products.” The filmmaker's vital philosophy was built with what he called “the three fluids”: blood, milk and water, or in other words, the heart as the engine of life, the first food as humans and the essential liquid.
The filmmaker and gardener also urged us: “Touch the earth at least once a week. Think that everything you eat comes from it. And thank him.” He himself, when filming for several days in urban environments, “always found the time to escape to the countryside and get his hands dirty,” recalls Betty Bigas.
This commitment to returning to the land and the original raw materials that was part of Bigas Luna's philosophy is linked to the CoCo Sapiens project, which takes the film director as an example and lighthouse to build what they call “a community of consumers.” conscious". This young non-profit organization wants to value and give visibility to producers committed to what would today be the champions league of the highest standards in terms of sustainability, health (human, animal and plant), gastronomic quality and social commitment.
In Europe alone there are 450 types of seals that certify different characteristics related to different aspects of organic production, a mass that, rather than informing, causes misinformation in the consumer. The promoters of this initiative, Xavi Sala Bufill (41 years old) and Lucas León (39), propose to escape from the noise and confusion generated between the options of "green", sustainable, ecological, vegan, plant-based..., and that the starting point is an authentic connection with nature and the earth. It is what they call the “brown color”. Good real and verifiable production and not marketing linked to green or greenwashing.
“Because if the consumer does not have information about what they eat or knowledge of how agriculture, livestock and fishing are produced, they do not have decision-making capacity. There are no miraculous solutions, but ignorance empowers big brands,” explains Xavi Sala, a precocious environmentalist who, while still a child, had The Self-Sufficient Horticulturist, by John Seymour, as a bedside book. He was a chef, he had an organic restaurant and today he has his own garden for self-consumption.
CoCo Sapiens is in the process of reviewing the standards with people from the agricultural and fishing sector, scientists and external agronomists and already has producers who have signed a commitment contract to continue working on good, ethical, healthy and sustainable nutrition. It is an enormous task, because, as Sala explains, they want to take into account “all the ethical possibilities that surround the production and marketing of food.” From, for example, highlighting traditional forms of fishing that do not involve trawling, encouraging the consumption of fruit that has not been picked green or stored, penalizing waste and committing to gender equality to ecological packaging.
They have also launched a project with prestigious chefs to propose recipes that do not cost more than two euros, because “the problem with good food is not only the price but also how to manage the family economy. It is always preferable to eat fresher and less processed foods, even if they are certified. Because an industrial lasagna made with organic zucchini has nothing to do with making it at home.”
CoCo Sapiens is also inspired by the dinners that Bigas Luna organized to publicize the best quality foods and give a voice to those who produce them. He has already organized the first, in which the filmmaker could be seen and heard thanks to unpublished videos in which the biophile film director recorded himself with one of his first mobile phones. In them he leaves a testament to his ideals with forceful phrases: “Don't eat anything that your grandmother couldn't understand as food.” “Eat only eggs from happy chickens (…) and if you eat meat, make sure they have lived outdoors and with a dignified life.”
Bigas Luna left a great cinematographic legacy, but also books and exhibitions, such as Ingestum, at the IVAM (2008), which planted a seed that he wanted to water to inspire and contribute to improving people's lives: “It is the desire to review all the rituals and symbols linked to food and enhance the sensuality that the act of eating can provide. The desire to provide energy and new points of view, without forgetting that even today, on our planet, there are many people who lack the means to feed themselves with dignity."
Less known is his plastic work, although before his first feature film, Tatuaje (1976), he had already exhibited in several Spanish cities, London and Turin. Many of his paintings are made with seeds, with earth, with vegetables... like the one that will be seen starting November 29 in Infinite Natures, at the Reial Cercle Artístic in Barcelona, as part of the International Festival of Art and Sustainability of Catalonia. Or in the exhibition presented by the Aínsa-Sobrarbe Contemporary Art Center.
