The exhibition includes 19 case studies of projects committed to education that have in common Jorge Oteiza’s demand for places to meet, train and progress culturally.

The exhibition is curated by Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío and Sergio Rubira and stems from a collaboration with the Jorge Oteiza Museum Foundation

The exhibition is part of a priority line of action of the museum aimed at the production of projects that highlight and enhance the relationships established between artistic practices and experimental pedagogical models. Programs such as the JAI Institute of Artistic Practices and the MAGNET educational project are included in this line of work.

The Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country, Artium Museum, presents the exhibition A Place to Think: Experimental Art Schools and Educational Practices in the Basque Country, 1957-1979, (A3 Gallery, until 5 June 2022). The exhibition is divided into 19 case studies that analyse 19 projects developed during this period characterised by their educational commitment and desire to create places to conduct research and meet within the context of art. A Place to Think is linked to other projects developed by Artium Museoa that connect art and learning, such as the exhibition by Antonio Ballester Moreno held in 2021 or the JAI study programme. Artium Museum has published a catalogue and guidebook to accompany the exhibition. The research and curatorship of A Place to Think was carried out by Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío and Sergio Rubira. The exhibition is organised in collaboration with the Jorge Oteiza Museum Foundation in Alzuza, where a new case study, A Transitive Eye: Irun Film Club Project, will be on display from Wednesday 26 January.

Stemming from a statement by Jorge Oteiza published in Quousque Tandem…! (1963): “We, who have neither a place of convergence nor a simple place to meet and think, cannot speak of research”, the exhibition addresses this call to action to create meeting places that can enable the socio-political, cultural and intellectual training and growth of boys and girls, men and women in the Basque Country. The exhibition recalls and brings together a series of projects with an educational vocation, whether collective or individual in nature, developed between 1957 and 1979 and sharing the same argument of necessity indicated by Oteiza.

By adding names and places to the map that outlines these experiences, existing connections between artists and geographies are revealed that shared an interest in key aspects of the Basque and Spanish art scenes at the time: the debates between abstraction and figuration, the defence of integrating the arts, the urgent need to renew art teaching or consider the social function of art, in which boys and girls as subjects and recipients received special attention. An approach to the foundational episodes of contemporary Basque art is therefore proposed by this, now based on the processes of configuring the artist as educator and artistic education, without losing sight of studying both focal points from the social and historical context of the time.

The time span begins in a year that saw the convergence of various initiatives and programmes in and outside the Basque Country, and it coincides with the moment when Jorge Oteiza abandoned his process of sculptural experimentation to focus on considering the social and political role of the artist (1957-1959). It extends to the year in which the School of Fine Arts of the Basque Country entered a new stage as a Faculty, a conversion in which the factor of its name contained the promise of a substantial transformation of its structure, programme, facilities and teaching renewal.

Between the two years, a set of cases, names and places is presented according to a diachronic order affected by a synchronic narrative, thereby demonstrating the simultaneity of experiences and development of various educational initiatives of an experimental nature from the visual arts. A number of diverse proposals in terms of their statements and modes of articulation, developed in the Basque Country over several years marked by processes of renewing and reconstructing Basque society, and whose common denominator was not to follow a formal or official education, thereby indicating that each activated “place to think” became a space of possibilities.

Press release (pdf)  Exhibition guidebook (pdf)  About the exhibition  

Parallel activities

Conversation between Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío and Sergio Rubira
Friday 21 January, 6 pm. Artium Museoa Auditorium. Streaming also available

Roundtable: Educational Practices and Audiovisual Media: José Antonio Sistiaga and His Context, 1957-1979. With Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío and Sergio Rubira
Thursday 10 March, 6 pm. Plaza Kutxa Kultur (Tabakalera, San Sebastian)
Activity carried out jointly with Kubo Kutxa. Kutxa Fundazioa

Online encounter on the context of experimental schools and practices in the 1960s and 1970s and their possible application to contemporary educational structure and practice
Wednesday 16 March at 6 pm. Organised by the Jorge Oteiza Museum Foundation and Artium Museoa

Upcoming guided tours for A Place to Think: Sunday 23 January, 12.30 pm; Wednesday 26 January, 6 pm; Saturday 29 January, 5.30 pm; Sunday 6 February, 5.30 pm; Wednesday 16 February, 6 pm; Saturday 26 February, 12.30 pm

A Place to Think. Experimental Art Schools and Educational Practices in the Basque Country, 1957-1979

A3 Gallery, from 21 January to 5 June 2022
Curators: Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío and Sergio Rubira
Catalogue, including essays by David Fuente, Juan Pablo Huércanos, Irene López Goñi, Mikel Onandia, Rocío Robles Tardío, Sergio Rubira, Fátima Sarasola and Miren Vadillo (soon to be published)
Guidebook publication of the exhibition
The exhibition stems from a collaboration between Artium Museoa and the Jorge Oteiza Museum Foundation, where one its case studies will be on display, A Transitive Eye: Irun Film Club Project (from Thursday 27 January to 30 April 2022).