While Barcelona has just installed some Plensa doors at the Liceu (not precisely one of his best works), near the Hudson River, a monumental Plensian Carlota has been asking for silence in Manhattan for a year now, putting her finger to her lips. That would be the summary, that they are over everything, and that they dare. While in Barcelona it is decided to cover the Gran Via with unwatchable psychedelic colors, arguing that this will gain space for pedestrians and that it is "tactical urbanism," New York years ago redid the abandoned railway tracks of the High Line and today it is an elevated park of more than 2 kilometers full of plant species of all kinds, works of art and musical and theatrical performances, totally integrated into the urban landscape and city life. It is something so difficult to define, so easy to detect and at the same time so fundamental for the persistence of the species as good taste. The only urbanism that should interest us is not the tactical, but the strategic, just as the only method to transform a frog into a princess is with a kiss and not with a speech.
The argument that it is another league, another budget, another planet is not valid for me. No, look, this is not just a matter for the City Council. From this side it is better seen: making a friendly city is mainly the responsibility of its inhabitants.Allowing emblematic establishments to be lost is not only the mayor's fault, but also our growing indifference towards what makes a difference. When you open a restaurant or a cafe, you can think a little about the Barcelona you want to present, or, instead, do a stingy, tracksuit interior design. There is no political decision in New York, whether left or right, more social or more speculative, that does not always and in any case pass through the filter of aesthetics.This is their ethics, it's not urbanism, stupid: it's urbanity. And that is how its naturalism becomes naturalness, its communitarianism is simply community, and its liberalism is nothing more than freedom. The fewer "isms" things have, the more genuine they are and the more human measure they demonstrate. An excess of "isms" is still a way of putting up a barrier, whether in the form of a smoke screen or an iron curtain. There are many things that Barcelona cannot do, due to its size, history, and means, but it can do all those that have to do with a minimum sense of urbanity. If you are genuine and truly have something to say, you don't need ideological artificialities.The big problem we have had in recent years is that ideology has weighed more than the sense of cityit's like that conceptual art where they assure you a thousand times that the important thing is the concept and you're just in a hurry to tear your eyes out. No, the important thing has never been the concept: that's why Gordon Bunschaft can undulate the Grace Building, not because the concept is funny, but because it draws a smile on the city and elegantly lifts its skirts. And that's why the Ford Foundation building (a foundation for Social Justice, I know you), by Roche and Dinkeloo, offers a huge garden in the transparent atrium, which is not a minimalist garden, but lush and welcoming:in New York if they make a garden they make a garden, and not a decalogue of political intentions. And if they build a square, they dedicate all possible space and all possible physical narrative to it, so the urban landscape does not seem designed by architects but by the best screenwriters.There are many things that Barcelona cannot do, due to its size, history, and resources, but it can do all those that have to do with a minimal sense of urbanity.Manhattan would have every reason to seem like the most artificial city in the world and, instead, it is one of those with the most soul. Evidently, it also has its gentrifying warts, and the prices of new homes are impossible, but they try to compensate for all this with talent and imagination and not by dogma. It would never occur to them to put a tram on Fifth Avenue, much less if in all the votes this idea has been rejected by the citizenry: there is a place for everything, and New York has not been New Amsterdam for many centuries now. It's as simple as that, if you wish with all your might to be Amsterdam, don't worry, you will end up becoming Amsterdam.The worst gentrification is not that caused by the nouveau riche or tourist neighborhoods, but the gentrification of ideas, bad copies, the renunciation of carrying out a unique and singular project.While you worry about looking good in the photo because you've put on the fashionable suit, the best have been trying to create fashion for a while. To set the trend. To be fashion. Barcelona had become like that, setting style, being unique and inimitable. Many things are asked of Barcelona, from one side and the other, from all sensibilities, but it has been too long without its own narrative. Right now, everything is a vulgar substitute for great ideological concepts, but surrounded by an almost pathological paralysis, always invoking the memory of '92 as a Pompeii crystallized under the ashes of the years of splendor. While the left wants to imitate Sweden, the right only offers phantasmagorical Winter Olympic Games and a third runway that has been explained like a Monopoly square. Meanwhile,Barcelona is only asked to be Barcelona.This is what those who love you always wish for you. Others will believe that you have a little too much of this, or that you lack the other, and even if they are right, the only acceptable phrase is be yourself and don't stop. I would never wish decline on any of my loved ones. Nor tactics as a way of life. Nor being co-capital of anything. Nor the reflection in models that are not designed for you. If you have to make a super-block, make it your way. Don't try to put it everywhere, don't repeat yourself, don't think they are made for everyone or that they are the solution to everything.And above all, do not lose the desire to grow, nor imagination, nor the sense of elegance. After almost ten years, I have found a New York that is safe, welcoming, green, clean, creative, and unstoppable. And beautiful, which is how you look when you are yourself. It is not a perfect city; it has its share of darkness, but it is absolutely delighted to exist and does not confuse humility with surrender. Nor popularity with vulgarity, nor progress with ugliness.Just as we should not confuse the stagnation of Barcelona with Barcelona
El presidente de la República, Gabriel Boric, se refirió este lunes a la conmemoración de los 50 años del golpe de Estado, que se cumple el próximo 11 de septiembre, y a la polémica que se ha generado en torno a la fecha.
En ese contexto, el Mandatario hizo un llamado a “no empatar las responsabilidades” entre quienes “quebrantaron la democracia” y quienes “la defendieron”.
“No es aceptable, no es aceptable, que se relativice o se justifique el golpe de Estado. No es aceptable que se relativice o se justifique la violación a los derechos humanos”, dijo Boric en un punto de prensa en el Palacio de La Moneda.
El jefe de Estado enfatizó que “no hay dos bandos, no hay dos bandos, no hay dos bandos. Hay quienes defendieron la democracia y quienes la quebrantaron”.
“Y eso es algo que tenemos que tener muy claro, muy claro, muy claro. Y no podemos empatar las responsabilidades”, añadió.
Boric también se refirió a la propuesta de la oposición de firmar una declaración conjunta en la que se condene el golpe de Estado y se defienda la democracia.
“Nosotros estamos disponibles a firmar una declaración conjunta, pero no a cualquier precio. No a cualquier precio”, sostuvo.
El Presidente explicó que “no vamos a firmar una declaración que relativice o justifique el golpe de Estado. No vamos a firmar una declaración que relativice o justifique la violación a los derechos humanos”.
“Nosotros estamos por la verdad, la justicia, la reparación y las garantías de no repetición. Y eso es algo que no vamos a transar”, sentenció.
Las declaraciones de Boric se dan en medio de la polémica que se ha generado en torno a la conmemoración de los 50 años del golpe de Estado, que ha generado un fuerte debate entre el oficialismo y la oposición.
La derecha ha criticado al Gobierno por lo que considera una “instrumentalización” de la fecha, mientras que el oficialismo ha acusado a la oposición de “negacionismo” y de “justificar” el golpe de Estado.
En este escenario, el Presidente Boric ha buscado marcar una postura clara y firme en defensa de la democracia y los derechos humanos, en un intento por cerrar las filas de su sector y evitar que la polémica escale aún más.
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