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Under Construction
Madrid (1992)
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The objective of Madrid 92 was summarised in the strapline used in the event's promotional campaign: "Madrid Culture is Capital". This was intepreted to us as seeking to establish "newly-democratic" Madrid's credentials in Europe as a cultural capital. Initially, the Ministry was minded to take the responsibility itself for the year. After a tussle with the City and then the Region, organisation was vested in a consortium of the three authorities. At the outset, membership of the Consortium was carefully constructed in line with the socialist majority on the City Council. Subsequently, the state of the political parties changed as a result of local elections which had the effect of creating a political stalemate in the Consortium, and conflicts of personality became a regular feature of the management of the event. The problems involved in managing the Consortium were at first kept under control by the Lord Mayor, but when he died in office, it became an unwieldy machine. In the initial concept of the Madrid programme, the Consortium took note of the approaches that had been adopted by previous cultural capitals and set itself the task of re-discovenng and reflecting on Madrid's own cultural heritage and creative traditions. It did this neither with a "self advertising festival" nor by means of one "distinctive artistic project". Rather, the Consortium added its own programming ideas to the mix of the city whilst seeking to complement and co-ordinate the activities of existing institutions. The balance of regular and new activities in the Consortium programme was roughly 35/65, according to one of those involved. At an early point in the proceedings, some consideration was given in the Consortium to a programme of infrastructure development linked to the year. Time was never sufficient for this to be followed through, though the City Council was able to target the completion of a number of projects on the year.
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