Latin American Communiqué released

IFACCA, 04 June 2009

The board of the International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies (IFACCA) held its 23rd meeting on 12-13 March 2009 in Santiago in coordination with the National Council for Culture and the Arts of Chile and the Avina Foundation. 

This was the second IFACCA board meeting to have been held in Latin America, the first being in Medellín and Bogotá, Colombia in November 2005.

The meeting was an opportunity to reflect on IFACCA’s activities in Latin America over the past eight years: 
• The appointment, in early 2007, of Santiago Jara Ramírez as IFACCA’s Liaison Officer in Latin America, based in Bogotá.
• Translating several IFACCA D’Art research papers in Spanish, for example – Arts and Disability Policies, and Assistance to Arts and Culture Festivals (more reports to come).
• Publishing all IFACCA Progress Reports in Spanish, including the latest Report #11.
• Regular ACORNS articles from the Latin American region.
• Maintaining directory information for arts funding agencies in all Latin American countries.
• Participation by IFACCA in the Advising Committee of the Latin American and Caribbean Summit on Arts and Culture organized by the World Alliance for Arts and Education, Bogotá’s Major’s Office, and Ambar,  which will be held in Bogotá on November 20-23, 2009.
• Participation by John Hartley, Arts and Ecology Strategist from Arts Council England, at the IV Campus of Euroamerican Cultural Cooperation on Arts and Science, organized by the Organisation of Ibero-American States for Education, Science and Culture (OEI), held in Argentina (March 2009) to present IFACCA’s D’Art Report 34 on Arts and Ecological Sustainability.
• Participation by IFACCA in the Organisation of American States Cultural Information Systems Meeting (Bogotá, April 2007), in SEGIB’s X Ibero-American Conference on Culture (Ministerial meeting, Valparaiso, July 2007), in Chile Council for Culture and the Arts’ International Seminar on Arts and Education (Santiago, October 2007), and in Mercosur Cultural’s Regional Coordinating Committee VI Intermediate Meeting (Santiago, May 2008).
• Partnership with the OEI to produce Connect CP in Spanish and Portuguese.
• Publishing The WOW Factor: Global Research Compendium on the Impact of the Arts in Education in Spanish by Spanish publisher Octaedro.
• Participation in the World Cultural Forum (Rio de Janeiro, November 2006).
• Attendance at IFACCA World Summits and Mini Summits by representatives from the Latin American region.

Several Latin American countries are members of IFACCA, including Chile, Colombia, Cuba, and Panama, and the governance of our organisation has benefited from the input on the board of Dr Albanela Pérez-Suárez from Venezuela, Octavio Arbaláez Tobón and Clarisa Ruíz Correal from Colombia, and Fernando Vicario, now based in Spain.

We look forward to continuing to develop our services and involvement in the region.  For example, future activities in Latin American include potential IFACCA mini-summits focusing on key issues such as Arts and Education, and Models for Government Funding in the Arts; an arts and cultural policy compendium for the Latin American region; and in the longer-term, the possibility of presenting a World Summit on Arts and Culture.

Our next World Summit on Arts and Culture will be held this year in Johannesburg, South Africa, on 22 to 25 September.  Co-hosted with the National Arts Council of South Africa, the Summit’s theme is Meeting of Cultures: Creating Meaning through the Arts.  In addition to a dynamic conference program, workshops, seminars and an arts program, IFACCA will host a seminar for the CEOs of its national members, and the 2009 IFACCA General Assembly.  We hope to welcome a strong delegation from the Latin American region at this internationally significant event.

For further information, please contact Santiago Jara Ramirez at s.jara@ifacca.org

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