Bogota | El Castillo: From home to a cultural center – Bogotá

What was once one of Bogotá’s most famous and extravagant houses of crime, will now be a center of art, culture and memory.

This Wednesday, The District will make official the launch of the project ‘El Castillo de las Artes’, which will seek to include in the old building of El Castillo, a school of arts and crafts for life, a museum of the night, a library, social cartography processes, laboratories of collective creation, dialogues of knowledge, workshops for the reactivation of the arts and a permanent circulation stage for the arts.

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This new cultural hub in the town of Los Mártires, located at 23 No.14 -19, will also work in context with the populations that circulate in the sector: women, the LGBTI community, victims of the conflict, indigenous communities, migrants.

“El Castillo de las Artes will benefit communities and territories affected by multiple violence, particularly in the towns of Santa Fe and Los Mártires, highlighting, making visible and recognizing their wealth and the political, social, cultural and artistic diversity found in these territories, especially of the social and population sectors that live there ”, says Catalina Valencia, director of Idartes.

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The scenarios are expected to be delivered in mid-2021. For now, the District Institute of the Arts – Idartes, the District Institute for the Protection of Children and Youth – IDIPRON, the Gilberto Alzate Avendaño Foundation – FUGA and the District Secretariat of Security, Coexistence and Justice, will work in coordination with various entities of the district, private and communities for the recovery of the place.

El Castillo was raided in 2017 for the purpose of domain extinction after the Prosecutor’s Office verified that the place had links with the mafia. Precisely, it was EL TIEMPO that, in 2014, revealed that among the names in the El Castillo deed was that of José Ricardo Pedraza Díaz. It is about a noted mafia boss and launderer who apparently sold his stake two years later, when he was already in prison and ready to be extradited. In the investigation that the Prosecutor’s Office later carried out, a second name linked to illicit businesses was traced: Carlos Medina Acosta.
El Castillo offered the services of sex workers, luxury ‘suites’, night shows and a strong security scheme for the powerful clients who frequented the place.

Now, the place will have a new face without ignoring the past and the social context that surrounds it.

“The Castle of the Arts represents an effective solution to the revitalization of the city center and a commitment to the reactivation of the activities of the cultural and creative sector of this strategic area of ​​the city. Likewise, it allows to redefine a stigmatized territory and convert it as a symbol of a caring city, of social inclusion and of new opportunities, positioning the center as a space in which creation does not stop “, says Adriana Padilla Leal, director of the Gilberto Alzate Avendaño Foundation – FUGA.

First programming

This Wednesday, the District will offer programming in place to tell and share the project with the public. All with very limited capacity and with biosafety protocols.

This is what the Idartes reports in activities:

“Among the activities scheduled will be the Citizen Culture Group and the Javier de Nicoló Conservatory of IDIPRON, the musical theater work Papucho, Christmas must continue from FUGA and the Marcato Foundation, the artistic intervention in situ of the Trans Community Network , the presentation of the Raíces del Manglar group, among other activities.

In addition, the Art and Memory Forum will be held, with the participation of Tatiana Piñeros, Local Mayor of Los Mártires; Carlos Marín, director of IDIPRON; Catalina Valencia, director of Idartes; Virgelina Chara, leader and artist, victim of the armed conflict and Ammarantha Wass, trans leader of Cuerpxs en Resistencia. It will be moderated by Ivonne Cortes Castillo, artist, social worker and leader victim of the conflict, and broadcast on Idartes’ Facebook and the Idartes platform at home at 5:00 pm

The presentation of LEs FantastiquEs CaimanEs by the Ensamble Artístico Trans, made up of trans artists from the towns of Santa Fe and Los Mártires, as well as the projection of a mapping in tribute to the victims of these towns, is highlighted. To close, there will be a tour of the photographic exhibitions of memory and a visit to some spaces of El Castillo de las Artes.

Throughout the day, the facade of the building will be covered with a loom built by the Group of Women Victims of the Armed Conflict – Asomujer and there will also be photographic exhibitions for memory, a proposal developed by the Circo Nicoló and tactical urban planning advanced by the LEAKAGE”.

BOGOTA