Still Photo: Situation of Cultural Mediation in Spain 2018-2019

We are happy to present, together with the Invisible Pedagogies collective, Foto Fija. A 60-page study of analysis on cultural mediation in Spain between 2018 and 2019, carried out within a very dynamic general context that has taken place in recent years in Spain.

In 2018, after three years of experience in Spain, the Daniel and Nina Carasso Foundation dedicated a year of work to research their actions and to reflect on the positioning of their programs as levers for Citizen Art and social change. In order to shape a new five-year strategy, one of the areas that the Foundation’s Citizen Art axis has wanted to address is the situation of the agents involved in the field of art and education, of cultural mediation.

In order to refine the relevance and power of its action, the Foundation proposed to Pedagogías Invisibles that it take a still picture of the situation of cultural mediation in 2018/2019 and that, together with a network of territorial collaborators, address certain questions: beyond the financing of specific projects, what needs does the ecosystem have? What challenges, opportunities, strengths and weaknesses do you face? What aspects need to be worked on most urgently: the exchange and dissemination of practices between actors; the consolidation of training spaces; the professionalization of the sector and the development of associations of mediators; the conditions of recruitment and organization of education teams; documentation and research on these practices? What role can a foundation play in this complex scenario?

This study addresses these questions from different angles, carrying out an analysis situated and shared by Artaziak, Clara Boj, Beatriz Martins, Amparo Moroño, Sinapsis or ZEMOS98, in addition to Pedagogies Invisibles itself. The Foundation hopes that the light it sheds can contribute to coordinating agendas and joining efforts in the field of cultural mediation.

The official launch of the study, in the form of a meeting between different agents of cultural mediation, was organised by the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía on 9 October 2019 with the participation of María Acaso, head of the Museum’s Education area, Carlos Almela, head of the Foundation’s Citizen Art in Spain programme, Andrea de Pascual, member of Pedagogías Invisibles, Laura Donis, member of hablarenarte, Beatriz Martins, cultural mediator and Antonio Sánchez Luengo, deputy director general of Fine Arts of the Community of Madrid.

We invite you to read the study and follow closely with us this network around cultural mediation in Spain.

© Visual map made during one of the discussion groups of the research project Photo

©: Ana Cebrián