For the Bolivarian Government, and in particular for its Ministry of the People’s Power for Foreign Affairs, it is a pride to participate at Expo Shanghai 2010, amongst more than 230 countries, with a museological proposal full of novelties, ideas and revolutionary proposals for the XXI century. Venezuela has landed with its project in one of the sister nations from Asia – China, with whom it enjoys a close friendship and a strategic alliance for shared development –, in order to exhibit the big transformations that the country is experiencing with the Bolivarian Revolution, fostered by its people throughout the last 11 years.
2010 is a very special year for Venezuela. Since last April 19th, we are commemorating the Independence Bicentenary, as a new cycle prompted by the struggle of the peoples of Our America. It is a year that inaugurates an Era, and which makes us be committed to fulfilling, in the course of the next 20 years, the endeavour initiated by the great liberators of this continent, a task associated with independence, self-determination and the union of nations of Our America.
Furthermore, 2010 is a year of a strategic importance for Venezuela, since the country will have to work actively for the reinforcement of the new regional entities such as the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA-TCP) and the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), which have remarkably grown throughout recent years, and strengthened with dignity the voice of the region before the world. Likewise, it is also necessary to give shape to the unanimous mandate presented by Latin America at the last Summit held in Cancun, so that next 5th of July we simultaneously celebrate, in Caracas, Venezuela’s Bicentenary of the Independence, and the Foundational Summit of Latin American States and the Caribbean Community (CELAC), a space to represent the great voice of Our America, – the region’s multilateral future, without interference or foreign meddling.
In view of all the challenges and flags, the Bolivarian Government feels a huge satisfaction of being at Expo-Shanghai 2010, not only showing the achievements of the Bolivarian Revolution, but also confirming that it has been possible thanks to the friendship, solidarity and cooperation of many friendly nations which nowadays promote the construction of a democratic, pacific and multipolar world.
Venezuela is just one of the five Latin American countries with a pavilion of its own, exclusively designed for Expo-Shanghai 2010 (together with Mexico, Brazil, Cuba and Chile). This is an event of great international significance for the promotion of cultures, sustainable development and environmental protection, where some 70 million visitors are expected from May 1st to October 31st 2010.
The motto for Expo-Shanghai 2010, chosen by the organizers, is: “Better city, better life”. The Government of the People’s Republic of China wanted to put an emphasis on the proposals and urban solutions that can guarantee a future for the planet’s big cities. Venezuela, nonetheless, did not want to waste the chance to illustrate its perspective of an alternative to the eco-predatory capitalist development system – in the midst of this era of climate change – through a museological proposal arising from the idea that if cities want to remain alive and sustainable in the XXI century, the root causes of inequality and poverty must be tackled – those factors that originate exclusion, deprivation and violence: problems faced by today’s societies, more and more at war.
Venezuela reversed the motto of Expo-Shanghai 2010. Its pavilion chose the motto: “Better life, better city” because in Venezuela we firmly believe that if we do not look after everybody’s lives, if we do not implement policies of inclusion and justice, if we do not re-establish equality, there will be no sustainable cities in the XXI century. We are certain that the right to life, and therefore to health, education and food, is the cornerstone to build a better city, without exclusion; a city that grows, in short, from the maximum amount of happiness of its people. That is the socialism of the XXI century.
The team that worked together at Venezuela’s Pavilion did so with commitment and a lot of effort, with no personal interests, self-promotion or the vanity so much encouraged by the market, and the overall current advertisement schemes of capitalism. Venezuela’s project at Expo-Shanghai 2010 does not use a trademark or a great figure of architecture or museology – the only and indispensable one –; it rather uses a group of wills and talents that jointly and diligently worked to achieve the best results and solutions.
People who worked for this project are very sensitive and talented, but above all, they have the necessary humbleness to face a national project of such characteristics; it was a team that knew how to translate the goals that were set out into a fabulous space, using the shape of a Möbius strip (with no beginning or ending, with no distinction between the outer or inner space), where the best design coexists with the use of state-of-the-art technology, audiovisual tools, narrative strategies, music and photography.
Venezuela’s Pavilion, consistent with the new reality of the Bolivarian country, is the result of the multiple efforts made by public ministries and institutions, cooperatives, civil associations, community producers and private companies. Thanks to the collective work, Venezuela’s Pavilion will have enough dignity to show the accomplishments of the socialist nation to those 70 million visitors that will attend Expo-Shanghai 2010.
