IT’S now 15 years since the the Tiuna El Fuerte project was set up by Caracas’s artists, who took over a 10,000 square-foot vacant lot near a motorway in the heart of the working-class El Valle neighbourhood of the capital in 2005.

Tiuna thrives as a space that challenges the traditional and elitist forms of cultural production and consumption. It’s commitment is to social transformation and overcoming the inequalities that fuel poverty and exclusion.

As reported in the Morning Star (August 24 2017), the self-governed culture park has remoulded the ways in which the city is experienced by its inhabitants. It is a model of urban transformation, the result of empowering its participants by employing their creativity and practical and professional skills.

In 2013, in recognition of its achievements, Tiuna was the recipient of the first joint international award for public art by two magazines — China’s Public Art and the US-based Public Art Review. Others followed.

Miqueas “Piki” Figueroa is the live wire at the heart of both the project and the phenomenon that is the band Bituaya. They’ve just released a superb video clip on youtube.com/watch?v=AvpUJrbE03U that calls for “making humanity more human.”

It offers support to quarantined fellow Venezuelans during the pandemic and beyond and invites everybody to send in clips of themselves dancing to it. Figueroa, writer of the video clip’s lyrics, says that the group wanted to do something to help, to participate as nurses and doctors do.

“It was a challenge but we seem to have succeeded,” he says, buoyed by the impressive response to the initiative. “Bituaya focuses on research and composition, where we mix popular music with contemporary urban music and this piece was no exception.”
 
In addition to the pandemic, Tiuna is facing — as does the rest of the country — intensifying sanctions and economic blockades, with the attendant problems of disruptions to transportation, electricity and internet access.

The deteriorating quality of life and zero investment in culture “reduces the possibilities of self-sustainability and sustainability,” Figueroa says. “We are looking for international alliances to carry out cultural projects for the community.”
 
Tiuna has a hugely impressive track record in doing this. Since 2005, it has generated thousands of activities and workshops to develop, promote and nurture the many talents in the working-class areas of Caracas.

Tiuna El Fuerte (“the rampart/fort” in Spanish) is many things — a space, a park, a laboratory, an art factory and a socially based software and hardware centre. “It aims to improve life and provide solutions for the people,” Figueroa says. “We have helped to incorporate popular aesthetics in the communications panorama of our country.”

Recently, as soon as the government introduced lockdown to combat the pandemic, Figueroa was considering ways to bring art closer to the people in a time of confinement. The Tiuna amphitheatre is surrounded by 14 tower blocks, so they set up a talk radio station and invited new artists from the area to exhibit their art and project their work on large screens and the wall of buildings.

Dance workshops are next, and people will be able to participate simply by looking out of their windows. Each session has a different input by leading artists — La Tercera Clave, Bituaya, Akilin, La Buena Vibra, Embandolados, Burriquita and Young Regal — among them. Instead of applause, people flash their lights off and on and you can see it on Instagram @tiunaelfuerte.
 
Key projects for Tiuna in the immediate future include a travelling radio show that moves around neighbourhoods in Caracas, reaching 20,000 people, a live radio phone-in aimed at 6,000 El Valle locals and the dance challenge, referenced above, where everybody WhatsApps their moves, challenging neighbours to better them.

The band Bituaya has been “reborn” because of the quarantine, Figueroa says. They are recording a new album, “due in about three months,” he says with an excitement that’s infectious. Nobody makes socialism more danceable than Bituaya.

But the big picture — the state of the revolutionary mood in Venezuela — is something that exercises Figueroa too.

He’s adamant that there is a lot of awareness among the people, who have been resolute in the face of difficulties and there is much encouragement and a creative urge to go forward. Tiuna are one of many groups who are providing options to help Venezuelans stay focused and strong in adversity.
 
In this dangerous historical moment — Spain in 1936 necessarily comes to mind — selfless internationalist support is required and with some urgency.

As Figueroa stresses: “We are open to forming alliances, connecting with international organisations or trade unions to share and launch projects together and promote cultural and communication networks that can generate local actions with a global impact.

“Covid-19 questions the way the world is being managed,” he states. “It’s time to make a change, to make everything transparent, to question the current world and build that other possible world.

“You can count on us, together we will achieve it, and we count on you.”

If you, your trade union, Labour Party branch or other organisation are interested in helping, contact tiunaelfuerte@gmail.com or via Instagram: @tiunaelfuerte.

For more information, visit http://tiunaelfuerte.com.ve and you can become a friend at tiunaelfuerte.com.ve/hazte-amigo