The eight members of the technical commission of the Andalusian Centre for Contemporary Art (CAAC), a consultative body, have resigned after the cessation as director of Juan Antonio Álvarez Reyes, who has been replaced by Jimena Blázquez Abascal by decision of the Ministry of Culture.
The members of this technical commission, in a letter to the Minister of Culture, Arturo Bernal, say they feel obliged to resign because they are part of a consultative body that has not been consulted about this change, which they consider transcendental for the future of the CAAC.
In their letter, the members of the technical commission recall that Álvarez Reyes, whose dismissal they have described as "fulminating", was appointed director of the CAAC in 2010 "after an open call in which the Document of Good Practices in Museums and Art Centers signed in 2007 by the Ministry of Culture and the associations of the sector was applied.
According to the commission, Álvarez Reyes "has developed a very valuable management, overcoming difficulties of all kinds, particularly those of a budgetary nature, and also the health alert of the coronavirus", carrying out important temporary exhibitions, increasing the funds of the collection and initiating the incorporation of the Fifteenth Century Pavilion to overcome the spatial limitations of the center.
That task, according to the technical commission to the minister, "would have deserved a different procedure, persevering in the good practices for its cessation and replacement".
The commission is made up of Juan Cuenca, Estrella de Diego, Francisco Jarauta Marión, María Dolores Jiménez-Blanco Carrillo de Albornoz, Luisa López Moreno, Víctor Pérez Escolano, Ana Salaberria and Berta Sichel.
On the other hand, the Association of Directors of Contemporary Art of Spain (ADACE), as a member of the Sectorial Table of Spanish Contemporary Art that includes all associations and platforms of professionals in the sector, has expressed in a statement its "deep rejection and concern at the way in which abruptly and without respecting the minimum procedures of institutional continuity, there has been a change in the management of the CAAC."
Last Thursday, the organizations of the contemporary art sector that were convened by the Ministry of Culture to form the Sectorial Table of the Visual Arts of Andalusia also showed their rejection of the procedure by which this Ministry has appointed the new direction of the Andalusian Center of Contemporary Art (CAAC).