Artium Museoa, Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country presents until 18 June 2023 the film San Simón 62 by Irati Gorostidi and Mirari Echávarri as part of its Z Gallery programme, in which the museum presents projects that explore the limits of cinematographic and exhibition formats. In this film, made in 2022, Gorostidi and Echávarri visit the Lizaso convent in Navarre, which was home to the Arco Iris Community in the 1980s, attracted by the memories of their mothers, who spent time in that group. In order to mark the exhibition, Artium Museoa is producing a new publication in the Z Gallery series with a text by Sara Torres. The museum is also organising a conversation between the two directors and the season’s curator, Catalina Lozano, on Saturday 25 March at 12 pm to mark the opening of the exhibition, to be preceded by a screening of the film in the Auditorium.

A convent in Lizaso (Navarre) was home to the eccentric Arco Iris community in the 1980s. The bland walls of the building were decorated with huge floral motifs and its rooms hosted large gatherings during which people experimented with cathartic practices of a new age tinge. The building today is home to cloistered monks and the traces of that era are almost unperceivable.

Irati Gorostidi (Eguesibar, 1988) and Mirari Echávarri (Pamplona, 1988) arrived there attracted by the testimonies of their mothers, who spent time at the Arco Iris community in an effort to rid themselves of the after-effects of Francoism and face the personal and political challenges of this new era.

As Sara Torres indicates: “The approach to the community in San Simón 62 that captured Gorostidi’s attention in the initial phase of the project occurs through an intimate archive, the documentation kept by their families [...] The beginning of the short film commences with her family’s home archive to look back at her childhood with the feminist knowledge acquired in her adult life, re-narrating it by reconsidering the images and collective rituals that passed through her.”

The directors

Irati Gorostidi and Mirari Echávarri lived in the same block of flats during the early years of their lives. A move to another city separated them until they met again some time later while studying Fine Arts in Bilbao. They have since then collaborated on musical and film projects.

Some of Echávarri’s projects have recently been exhibited at Tabakalera, Artium Museoa, Museum of Navarre and Okela Sormen Lantegia, and her first audiovisual work, Cuerpos #1 Santa Águeda, has been screened at the London and Dublin Feminist Film Festivals, Porto/Post/Doc international film festival, Cinespaña in Toulouse and Oberhausen International Short Film Festival, among others.

For her part, Gorostidi is currently developing her first feature film, Anekumen, which has been selected for Ikusmira Berriak 2022 and has participated in various mentoring programmes and markets. Her short film Contadores, currently in production, has received support from the Basque Government, ICAA and the Government of Navarre. Her previous films have been screened internationally at various film festivals and museums.

Z Gallery

The Z Gallery programme (from zinema, cinema in Basque) is a project that creates a middle ground from which to reflect on and highlight works by artists venturing into the territory of film as well as filmmakers exploring the exhibition format. It is a programme that stems from an interest in acknowledging the importance of thinking about the moving image from a contemporary perspective and its place within the museum. A programme that aims to bring to the public authors interested in seeking new narrative forms in order to rethink the genres that historically categorise film language.

Its seasons until now have included names such as Patricia Esquivias (Caracas, 1979), Rosalind Nashashibi (London, 1973), Eric Baudelaire (Salt Lake City, 1973), Aura Satz (Barcelona, 1974), Ainara Elgoibar (Mungia, 1975), Ephraim Asili (USA, 1979) and Edurne Rubio (Burgos, 1974). Its new season began in 2023 with the participation of Irati Gorostidi (Valle de Egües, 1988) and Mirari Echávarri (Pamplona, 1988), Laida Lertxundi (Bilbao, 1981) and Naomi Rincón Gallardo (Raleigh, 1979). Their projects employ a variety of approaches to explore the relationship between the affective and the political in changing contexts.