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Toubisme

This documentary addresses the relationship between tourism and culture in Senegal through a series of interviews. It offers different visions of tourism from the local perspective. It also makes direct references to language and tourism and their link to the consequences of colonialism.

It shows the difficulties of a fragile and changing sector in the lives of those who depend on it, after the latest global Covid-19 crisis. And how international policies impact the daily economies of this sector. It also proposes culture as a vehicle for cooperation and common development. Giving examples of projects under construction that give a vital meaning to the tourist environment.

Writer/Director
Juan Sebastian Aizpitarte Juan Aizpitarte’s work draws on a variety of disciplines, appropriating himself indifferently of the possibilities ranging from sculpture to installation, from graffiti to urban interventionism, from performances to editorial projects, from writing to single-channel video and video installation. He began studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Leioa (University of the Basque Country) in 1993, specialising in Sculpture and graduating in 1998 at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Bordeaux (France). That same year he began collaborating with the Zebra 3 Association on the Buy-Sellf Catalogue and with the Permanent Food magazine. His work explores how history, economics, and politics influence us as individuals, and also how these phenomena contain the stories that make up our cultural myths. Through films, performances, sculptures, installations and interventions in the public space, Aizpitarte proposes questions and reflections in the public sphere, about our relationship with others, our place against power, against art. His works are purposeful, sometimes impertinent and even rebellious, always keeping a playful and at the same time firm atmosphere. His works have been exhibited all over the world in multiple research projects such as Ciudad de Vacances , Agur Jaunak, Signos Sobre Signos, or, and personal exhibitions such as “Mater” (Horno Space, Pamplona 2022), “Ex_ile” (Altxerri Galery, San Sebastian 2021), “Anthropometry” (Vita Kuben, Umëo 2020), Yo el traitor (Maritime Museum, Donostia 2019), Souvenirs (Galeria Maior, Palma de Mallorca 2018 ); In Between (Public Art, Stockholm 2015); Cosmic Ray (La chaufferie, Strassbourg 2012); The Gray Wall, (MA Studio Beijing 2012) ; Exodo (Biennial Event, Bordeaux 2011), or The rise of Rad (Torrence Museum, L.A. 2010.) among others.

Juan Sebastian Aizpitarte

Juan Aizpitarte’s work draws on a variety of disciplines, appropriating himself indifferently of the possibilities ranging from sculpture to installation, from graffiti to urban interventionism, from performances to editorial projects, from writing to single-channel video and video installation.

He began studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts in Leioa (University of the Basque Country) in 1993, specialising in Sculpture and graduating in 1998 at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Bordeaux (France).
That same year he began collaborating with the Zebra 3 Association on the Buy-Sellf Catalogue and with the Permanent Food magazine.

His work explores how history, economics, and politics influence us as individuals, and also how these phenomena contain the stories that make up our cultural myths. Through films, performances, sculptures, installations and interventions in the public space, Aizpitarte proposes questions and reflections in the public sphere, about our relationship with others, our place against power, against art. His works are purposeful, sometimes impertinent and even rebellious, always keeping a playful and at the same time firm atmosphere. His works have been exhibited all over the world in multiple research projects such as Ciudad de Vacances , Agur Jaunak, Signos Sobre Signos, or, and personal exhibitions such as “Mater” (Horno Space, Pamplona 2022), “Ex_ile” (Altxerri Galery, San Sebastian 2021), “Anthropometry” (Vita Kuben, Umëo 2020), Yo el traitor (Maritime Museum, Donostia 2019), Souvenirs (Galeria Maior, Palma de Mallorca 2018 ); In Between (Public Art, Stockholm 2015); Cosmic Ray (La chaufferie, Strassbourg 2012); The Gray Wall, (MA Studio Beijing 2012) ; Exodo (Biennial Event, Bordeaux 2011), or The rise of Rad (Torrence Museum, L.A. 2010.) among others.

Director Statement

Juan Aizpitarte alters what is easily recognizable by reconfiguring the meaning or function of its surroundings. He works methodologically to displace social and architectural codes by modifying the spatial or acoustic references particular to the sites in which his projects are developed.

All operational modes – whether conceptual, comic, poetic, symbolic or fictional – are envisaged here. Nothing is overtly fixed, leaving the viewer free to mentally reconstruct his or her own version of the project. His references come from everyday speech as much from the theatre, allowing different worlds to encounter and interact with one another. The transformation of the space happens through the public. The progressive transmutation of the site designates, signals, delimits and identifies the space, turning the visitor into the potential agent of that process.

Toubisme
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