"Canal", by the artist Christian García Bello, wins the fourth call for applications for the 'Nudo/Knot' research and creation grants, which in this case contemplated water as the main focus of work. A total of 53 projects were submitted to the new edition of this initiative organised by the Instituto Leonés de Cultura and the Cerezales Antonino y Cinia Foundation, which is one of the most important research and creation grants in the country.
The fourth edition of the 'Nudo/Knot' artistic grant, organised by the Fundación Cerezales Antonino y Cinia (FCAYC) together with the Instituto Leonés de Cultura de la Diputación Provincial, will go to the project entitled "Canal", by the Galician artist Christian García Bello (A Coruña, 1986), who proposes to explore the handmade river traps as sound recording devices with which to begin an exercise of composition and distribution of the sounds, flows and dialogues that take place in the waters of the Porma and Curueño valleys.
Of the 53 projects received by the deadline, and after an initial pre-selection phase, seven finalists were chosen to win the fourth edition of a call that this year focused on the element of water as the main working theme. After an exhaustive debate among the participants, the winning project was that of Christian García Bello (Galicia, 1986). The project, which will be formalised in different phases and processes, will focus its research on the construction of river traps to be transformed into instruments for capturing the sounds that flow in the water. Fibres, strings, membranes and resonant surfaces will be the materials in charge of recording the infraleural discourses of the landscape. According to the artist, "Each sound will be a testimony, a song of the territory and an echo of all that it carries". These sound flows will be the basis of different experimental musical compositions that will be retransmitted only through an ephemeral station that will allow the songs of Porma and Curueño to be shared and connected with the rest of the waters of the Leonese territory.
The jury for the 'Nudo/Knot' 2024 grant was made up of Rosa Yagüez Juárez (chief curator, FCAYC), Alfredo Puente (curator, FCAYC), Emilio Manuel Martínez Morán (deputy for Culture and vice-president of the ILC) and Emilio Gancedo Fernández (coordinator of ILC Projects). All of them unanimously valued the solidity of the winning project, its anchoring in the rural environment of the province of León, the transversality of the proposal towards the whole territory, as well as its intention to explore water as a matter in flux with its own agency.
Both the Leonese Institute of Culture and the Cerezales Antonino y Cinia Foundation positively valued the high number of participants, with a great variety of projects coming from other European and Latin American countries with a clear focus on Leonese culture, as well as the plurality of professional areas that have been involved.
The research, which will last a total of nine months, has a budget of 9,000 euros for the development of the research, as well as transport and living expenses. The artist, who will carry out his or her research during three stays over the period of the grant, will be monitored and mediated by the FCAYC and ILC teams. This is currently the only research and creation residency grant of its kind in the entire autonomous community and one of the most important at national level.
About Christian García Bello (Galicia, 1986)
Christian García Bello (Galicia, 1986) is an artist with a degree in Fine Arts and a Masters in Contemporary Art from the University of Vigo. He currently lives and works between Barcelona and A Coruña.
He has had solo exhibitions in national art centres such as the CGAC (Santiago de Compostela) and in private institutions such as Appleton (Lisbon) and the DIDAC Foundation (Santiago de Compostela). He has taken part in group exhibitions in institutions such as La Casa Encendida (Madrid), CaixaForum (Barcelona), Museo Patio Herreriano (Valladolid), Es Baluard (Palma), CondeDuque (Madrid), Museo Lázaro Galdiano (Madrid), MARCO (Vigo) and Maus Habitos (Porto).
His work can be found in collections such as Banco Sabadell, the DKV Collection, the OTR Collection, the Rucandio Collection, the DIDAC Collection and the CGAC Collection. He has been selected and awarded prizes in competitions such as Generation 2022 of the Montemadrid Foundation, the Cervezas Alhambra Prize, the María José Jove Foundation Prize, and has received grants from institutions such as the MAC Naturgy Foundation, the Ministry of Culture and Sport and the INJUVE to develop projects and residencies in Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Russia.
His body of work seeks to fictionalise past histories and alternative future landscapes through a broad investigation of hyperlocal narratives, the vernacular forms of the territory and the poetic condition of materials. These investigations are materialised through sculpture, works on paper, sound or performance, always seeking a balance between the sophisticated and the austere.
At the same time she lectures, gives workshops, works on strategic design programmes focused on innovation and sustainable development in rural and urban environments, and collaborates on public affairs projects focused on culture.
