Fundación Otazu

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The Fundación Otazu was born in 2016 and its purpose is to manage and direct the activities of the art center located in Otazu, Navarra. The Foundation is not only in charge of preserving and exhibiting the Contemporary Art Collection of the Otazu Foundation.

in the framework of a unique place full of history such as the municipality of Otazu, but also proposes a rich program of artistic activities.

The Foundation is a testimony to the sense of interest in culture of the founders of Bodega Otazu, as well as its international and broad-minded character. The Foundation represents the consolidation of the deep relationship that Otazu has established with all the agents of cultural creation through its Collection: over the years Otazu has developed links with artists, curators and art critics, architects and other promoters of cultural creation.

The Foundation is a testimony of sense
of interest in the culture of the founders
from Otazu Winery

Since 2016, already with the structure of a Foundation, Otazu lays the foundations of an artistic mission at the service of society and the environment.

The Foundation aims to drive this dynamic inertia towards society, creating value from the reflection on the sustainability equation with the environment and on artistic creation as one of the drivers of social innovation.

The key to the Foundation’s activity will be the creation of mechanisms for understanding art and a firm commitment to attracting the talent of international artists and supporting young creators, curators and art educators.

Education, in these different variants, will in fact be the Foundation’s element of value generation in society: art in a natural environment, creating a positive return cycle for society.

In 2020, the Foundation received the A Prize for Collecting, awarded by the ARCO fair, for its work in the conservation and dissemination of contemporary art.

Purpose of the Foundation

The Foundation serves a general interest, and its mission is to promote an experimental space of art related to nature, the environment and the challenges of today’s society, in which the artist is present, and the creative process is the key to stimulate people to action within a conceptualization of the artistic from a reflective perspective and promoting an active and multiple understanding of art.

The Foundation seeks to create knowledge and help to think about the social, economic and creative mechanisms that mark the era in which we live and where reflection on nature, communication and the generation of ideas are part of the debate of contemporary artists.

Otazu集团—艺术周末
The Foundation starts from curatorial excellence in the approach to decision-making for the creation of the art and education project and will seek the following as fundamental goals:
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Fundación Otazu, through the activities it carries out and the discourses present in its Art Collection, aims to activate a dialogue between nature, art and the challenges of contemporary society. The Foundation believes that art is a space of recognition that allows us to reflect on man’s place in the world.

Through the relationship with art, the Foundation aims to promote critical thinking. Otazu is an environment where the relationship between art, nature and society can be understood in a vivid way: including the elaboration of wine, which is one of the historical elements that for centuries have marked this place and ultimately shaped the landscape itself.

Otazu intends with its Foundation to expand its commitment to the generation of value in the land in which it is sustained, contributing not only to the care of the environment and awareness of respect for nature, but also influencing social improvement through artistic creation and putting this region in dialogue with the entire spectrum of international creativity.

The Foundation provides professional curatorial work for the Otazu Collection, promoting an education about it that fosters values of harmony and understanding in society, developing an important training activity, with pioneering educational dynamics and creating a space for understanding art from a liberal and transversal perspective.

Activities

The activities of the Foundation seek to create tangible impacts on society following the strategic lines set out in the foundational purposes. Otazu with his Foundation aspires to contribute to the appreciation of art in its different contemporary manifestations, relating and delving into the issues that artists present in their works and in the context of a natural environment such as Otazu.

 

The Foundation attends to art as a clear element of value generation in society through artistic education and promotes the international vision and multicultural reading of art and culture , highlighting the original connections of the Foundation between Navarra and Latin America, this relationship between Spain-Latin America being the central argument of the Otazu Foundation Art Collection. The Foundation wants to be a catalyst for patronage and involve artists in generating a dialogue with nature and with business.

 

A new place for communication and recognition of art as a driver of social progress. All these activities make up a space in Otazu with dynamics focused on transversal education on art and its connections with nature, creating complementary links that enable the creation of culture with educational programs, programs to intensify artistic skills in schoolchildren, and art workshops. and creativity.

The fundamental activities of the Foundation are the following:

Creation
and custody of a collection
of art

Artistic
education

Generation of
programs of
scholarships of
production
artistic

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Biennale of Monumental Art

The Foundation has a central activity consisting of the organization of a first level international award on sculpture through the Biennial of Monumental Art, which began in 2016. This is an international competition in which different artists are asked to submit a project for a monumental work to be installed in a specific location in the winery. So far, the winners of the different calls have been Alfredo Jaar, Asier Mendizabal and Hans-Peter Feldmann. The jury is chaired by Manuel Borja-Villel, director of the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid.

Artistic production grants

The Foundation also gives support to creation through artistic production and curatorial grants. The scholarship program was inaugurated in 2016 by the artist Mario Santamaría whose creative practice studies the phenomenon of the contemporary observer, paying attention to both representational or symbolic practices and technical apparatuses of vision and mediation and using tactics of appropriation, remake or montage, his projects intervene in different territories such as conflict, memory, virtuality or surveillance.

Collections

The Otazu Foundation has a rich program of artistic and curatorial activities, which are based on the creation and conservation of its permanent Collection.

This Collection forms the core from which a series of artistic and curatorial activities are created, ranging from the research of the Collection and its enhancement to the creation of links with its creators through stays at the Foundation. The Collection is based on a didactic program prism, focused on diverse audiences. Along with the creation of exhibitions, the Collection is open to the loan of its funds to other museums and art centers for exhibition in national and international exhibitions, always seeking to generate visibility in the work and the artist.

Collaborations

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Manolo Valdés

Manolo Valdés (Spain, Valencia, 1942) is the son of María Gracia Blasco Marqués, a native of the Castellón town of Altura, his childhood and adolescence was closely linked to that population.

In 1957 he enrolled in the Valencian School of Fine Arts of San Carlos where he spent two years, abandoning his studies to dedicate himself to painting.

In 1964 he founded the artistic group Equipo Crónica together with Juan Antonio Toledo and Rafael Solbes in which he remained until Solbes’s death in 1981, even though two years after the foundation of the group, Toledo had abandoned it.

After the death of Rafael Solbes he continues to work alone in Valencia for a few years, until in 1989 he travels to New York where he opens his studio and continues experimenting with the new forms of expression. He belongs to the Marlborough Gallery and the Freite Gallery. He also creates a studio in Madrid for the realization of large sculptures, alternating creation in both cities.

Work: Ariadne, 2007

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Xavier Mascaró

Xavier Mascaró (France, Paris, 1965), is a Spanish sculptor who graduated in Fine Arts from the University of Barcelona in 1988, specializing in painting. In 1989 he begins to make his first works in bronze; six years later iron becomes the protagonist of the materials he uses. Between 1996 and 1998 he lives in New York, to later return to Madrid where he works on the realization of monumental works. In 2004 he moved back to New York. Around that time he began to experiment with works in different materials, including leaded glass, resin and stone. He currently works in his workshops in Mexico City and Madrid.

Mascaró has a prolific sculptural career in works that have been exhibited in cities such as Paris, Caracas, Vienna, Monte Carlo, Cartagena de Indias, Madrid, New York and London, among others.

His collection of monumental works by him has recently been shown in London, Madrid, Seville and Malaga after being first presented at the Jardin du Palais Royal in Paris in 2008.

Works: Guardian I and Guardian II, 2008

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Jordi Bernadó

Jordi Bernadó (Spain, Lleida, 1966) is a Catalan photographer. He lives and works in Barcelona, ​​his work is characterized by research on architecture and urbanism, trying to highlight the new systems of inhabiting the world in a strongly globalized society, and sometimes using a fine irony. Jordi Bernadó was studying architecture when he became interested in photography as a medium with which to observe and define the city from another perspective.

Since his beginnings, one of the subjects of interest in his photography has been the city and architecture. It is not about documenting but about narrating the great transformations of urban space. These began in the 20th century and have been determined mainly by phenomena of overpopulation or abandonment of certain areas.

He has received various awards, such as the Fotopres Scholarship in 1993, the Endesa Scholarship in 2007, the Laus Prize in 1999 for Good News, the Photo Prize for the best photography book in 2002, the Ministry Prize of Culture to the best art book of the year 2003 by Very Very Bad News.

Work: portraits for each label of the 1 Ha range. A History of Bodega Otazu

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David Magán

David Magán (Madrid, 1979) trained at the Madrid School of Arts and Crafts. His work is developed within the field of sculpture and installation, and explores its possibilities in relation to the space in which it is located. His pieces are presented as geometric modules, conceived in glass or methacrylate, that flood the space in which they are found with color when light penetrates their surface. Far from being simple aesthetic objects, the works created by David Magán are dynamic elements that transform depending on the place where the viewer is and the constructive possibilities of the piece.

Work: The secret behind the barrels, 2016

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Pablo Armesto

Pablo Armesto (Schaffhausen, Switzerland, 1970) lives and works in Asturias (Spain). He is a painter, graphic designer and creator of installations and public art, through site-specific interventions. “My works are a bit synaesthetic, since apart from sight or touch, they have rhythm like music and the energy of light. A singularly poetic work that always brings light and beauty that inhabit the duality of black and white, light and shadow”. His artistic research takes place in an experimental territory in which sculpture and painting coexist with the immateriality of light and shadow. In this process, technology and science are absolutely crucial elements. The luminescence of his pieces is achieved through systems of LEDs, neons, cathodes and fiber optics, combined with wood and lacquered metals and with which the public can interact directly.

he has participated in international fairs as well as numerous solo and group exhibitions. His work is present in public collections in different countries such as Japan, Switzerland, London, Spain and France.

Work: The spirit of wine, 2019

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Leandro Erlich

Leandro Erlich (Argentina, Buenos Aires, 1973) is an Argentine conceptual artist with international exhibitions. In 1992 he obtained a scholarship from the National Fund for the Arts and in 1994 from the Antorchas Foundation to attend the barracks workshop directed by Pablo Suárez and Luis Benedit. In 1997 he was selected for the first Mercosur Art Biennial, Porte Alegre, Brazil. Between 1997 and 1998 he participated in the Core Program of the Glasell School of Art (Museum of Fine Arts of Houston) thanks to the Pan American Cultural Exchange Foundation.

In 2001 he represented his country at the Venice Biennale and was included in its main section, as well as in 2005.

The artist’s work was also included in the 2001 Istanbul Biennale. In 2008 Erlich created a pool installation, which was on display at MoMa Ps1 in the Long section. Island City in Queens, New York.

In the summer of 2013, Erlich exhibited his work Dalston House, an optical illusion at the Dalston Mill site in Dalston, east London, featuring a huge mirror suspended at 45º ( from horizontal) on a life-size model of the facade of a Victorian house placed horizontally on the ground, giving the appearance of visitors climbing or hanging from part of the building. On September 20, 2015, the Obelisk of Buenos Aires seemed to dawn without its tip thanks to an intervention by the artist Leandro Erlich made using a mirror.

Work: Valkyries of Otazu-Prelude to the Lordship, 2017

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Tony Orrico

The work of Tony Orrico (USA, Illinois, 1979) has achieved international recognition for his ingenuity in moving between the language of performance and conceptual art. He uses his own somatic research, Symmetry and Suspension, as an entry point to his artistic practice. He is interested in how consciousness is structured and in the ways in which the body can interact with a surface, object or process.

Orrico has performed and exhibited his work in the US, Australia, Belgium, China, Denmark, France, Germany, Mexico, the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain. His work can be found in collections such as the National Academy of Sciences – Washington DC and the University Museum of Contemporary Art – MUAC, Mexico City, as well as in important private collections.

“I devote my attention, rationally, to the sensitivity of my body on a receptive level – as a set of points and lines in space. In this way, I acquire a sense of my corporality as something geometric and mechanical. By acting without a sense of a dominant axis or directional force, I find the possibility to move in a new way. The flow of movement does not have a goal, it is a continuation of a path and the response to the stimuli that appear in it.”

Work: Penwald: 2: 8 circles: 8 gestures, 2018

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Héctor Zamora

Héctor Zamora (Mexico, Mexico City, 1974) graduated in graphic design from the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco, Mexico City in 1998.

In recent years, Héctor Zamora’s work has focused on actions that involve the participation of people. Héctor Zamora’s work transcends the conventional exhibition space, reinventing it, redefining it, generating friction between the common roles of public and private, exterior and interior, organic and geometric, wild and methodical, real and imaginary. Drawing on his technical expertise and knowledge of the architecture of light structures, and a meticulous emphasis on the process of conceptualization and construction of each piece, Zamora engages the viewer and requires him to question the everyday uses of materials and the functions of space. .

Work: Stock issuing movements, 2019

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Alfredo Jaar

Alfredo Jaar (Santiago de Chile, 1956) is a Chilean artist, architect and filmmaker based in New York since 1982. His work has been exhibited extensively around the world. He has participated in the Biennials of Venice (1986, 2007, 2009, 2013), Sao Paulo (1987, 1989, 2010) and Documenta (Kassel, 1987 and 2002).

Notable solo shows include the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, Whitechapel, London, Museum of Contemporary Art, Rome, Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Centro d’Art Santa Mónica, Barcelona and YSP, Yorkshire, United Kingdom.

he has carried out around 5 projects in public spaces. More than 60 monographs of his work have been published.

His work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, Guggenheim Museum; Whitney Museum, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art; Los Angeles, Los Angeles Museum of Art; Art Institute of Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Houston Museum of Fine Arts; the TATE in London; the Pompidou Center in Paris; the Reina Sofia in Madrid; the MACBA in Barcelona; the Moderna Museet in Stockholm; M+ in Hong Kong; and countless institutions and private collections around the world.

Work: The color of our lives, 2015

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