Art Returns to Círculo de Bellas Artes de Tenerife

“Hold onto the now, the here through which all future rushes into the past.” Inspired by this quotation from James Joyce’s Ulysses, art commissioner Octavio Zaya has reintroduced art to the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Tenerife. The institution is celebrating its centenary and has reopened its doors in style after being closed for seven years, returning to its roots with a contemporary twist featuring more than 30 Canary Islands artists.

Contemporary Artists Showcase

This Thursday marked the beginning of the line-up of contemporary artists, starting with Idaira del Castillo, a Canarian teacher and artist who, despite being at the early stages of her career, is already slated to participate in international exhibitions. Other artists will include Estefanía Flores, Juan Carlos Batista, Julio Blancas, and Santi Palenzuela. There will also be a “parenthesis” dedicated to Carnival, curated by Cristóbal Tabares. Each artist will be displayed for a month and a half on the ground floor of the circle.

Canarian Intertwavings

Zaya’s proposal also features a programme entitled “Nudos y enredos,” involving 20 Canarian artists. During the press conference opening the exhibition, the curator explained that this programme is more “complex” as it revolves around individual exhibitions and his refusal to impose a specific theme on the artists. “I started from a list of these 20 artists and began to play,” he notes, “considering the fortuitous, the random, what does not have a predisposition beforehand, hence the name Nudos y enredos (Knots and Entanglements).” The human condition is, in essence, the “fundamental factor” of this exhibition, visible on the first floor of the circle.

Art Beyond Beauty

“Art, in general, is not just a matter of beauty, but of relationships,” explains the artistic commissioner. He argues that if art were solely about beauty, we would have to dismiss the origins of modern art, which trace back to Goya. “Art is not only about this or that but about everything that relates to the human condition,” he emphasises. From this perspective, the curator formed random groupings of artists as he appreciated their ability to present “different entanglements” to the viewer. Essentially, these situations relate to Canarian geography and its implications for tourism, landscape exploitation, identity issues, or how materials alter the perception of realities. Among the artists featured in this supplementary exhibition are esteemed professors from the University of La Laguna and emerging artists at the start of their careers. “I was interested in confronting established artists with emerging ones; I like examining how the radicality of certain languages is maintained in the Canary Islands, and how, in other respects, it has become more institutionalised,” he explains.

A Window to Art

Another initiative by Zaya, in addition to individual and collective exhibitions, is the creation of a ‘window’ that serves as an art showcase, as the circle is situated on the main commercial street of the capital. This window will feature a single work by an artist each month. Ten artists will be included, among them Fernando Álamo, Pepe Herrera, Laura Mesa, Cristina Maya, Luis Palmero, and Gonzálo González. Beyond the exhibitions, the circle has prepared an extensive programme of debates, workshops, performances, and lectures to accompany the exhibitions.