Isabel Laguna I Cádiz, (EFE)
From an original score, from 1897, of the historic copla “La bicicleta” by Tío de la Tiza to video-installations that allow you to immerse yourself in the streets of Cádiz during one of its last carnivals or a model of the Gran Teatro Falla, the tempo of the Carnival couplets, are part of the tools available to the new Interpretation Center of the Carnival of Cádiz, also baptized as “the house of Carnival”.
“It has been a challenge how to put something that happens on the street in a closed space”, says the councilor of the Cádiz City Council Paco Cano during a visit to that property, which is “a dream come true”, in the words of the mayor of Cádiz Jose Maria Gonzalez.
An investment of around three million euros from the three administrations, the central government, the Junta de Andalucía and the Cádiz City Council, has made it possible to rehabilitate the Palace of the Marqueses of Recaño.
Built in 1730 and after performing numerous uses (in 1847 the masked balls were held in its patio) it now houses a museum in which the Carnival of Cádiz, which aspires to be Intangible Heritage of Humanity, exhibits its legacy and offers a space for research, training, and the meeting of all groups and admirers of the party.
a living space
The Casa del Carnaval has started two months of open days this week, when it finalizes its move.
The rooms on the two upper floors are still empty, which will house, in addition to the offices, research units, with the newspaper, video, and documentation files, and four training rooms, where workshops will be held, from composition of couplets to changing rooms or sets, and in which the different groups can meet.
“We consider it a house because, as in all houses, it will be studied, debated…”, says Paco Cano about this project that has been conceived as a living space, which has faced the challenge that something so “popular” as the Carnival of Cádiz feels comfortable in “a stately palace”.
And as in all houses, visits will be received. In this case, many are expected. And two floors are dedicated to them. The most “noble” for a permanent collection that can satisfy both people who are approaching the party for the first time and seek to obtain a general overview, as well as the most “jartible” who want to delve into the greatest details of its intrahistory or of its most famous authors.
A huge Arab vase now welcomes the visitor, a 12-meter-high replica of the one designed by the Cádiz-born artist Antonio Accame (1869-1952) for the 1929 carnival.
The Carnival of Cádiz by Antonio Accame
Because to this painter who between 1907 and 1936 designed giant decorations for the celebration inspired by the aesthetic trends of the time, from modernism to art-deco or the avant-garde of the beginning of the century, the first temporary exhibition is dedicated: “Carnival by Antonio Accame, from ephemeral art to enduring memory”.
His legacy, donated by the family to the city, is exhibited in this exhibition that includes sketches and photographs of his gigantic constructions (an umbrella, a flamingo, a Japanese hut, a peacock), his carts, his boxes of brushes or watercolors. and many other objects, such as a costume designed by him, which give an idea of the spectacularity of his creativity to turn the streets and squares of Cádiz into a stage design.
“He had a motto, his decorations had to be as spectacular during the day as they were at night,” says Carmen Gómez, from the municipal archive and curator of the exhibition about the lighting that, even then, the artist gave to his creations.
The noblest floor of this palace house is dedicated to a permanent exhibition, into which all visitors will enter with a tablet-guide.
Pictures from the previous party
Some originals of his most famous posters such as those made by Hernán Cortés, Rafael Alberti or Eduardo Arroyo, the collection of works on the Costus carnival, original scores such as the 1887 “Las Viejas Ricas”, a single by “The Beatles de Cádiz”, old carnival instruments, photographic catalogues, the history of its most famous authors, family trees, are strung together through panels, displays and touch screens throughout rooms that distribute the colors of confetti.
A video installation, in which images of the previous party will be projected each year (in this case the very unusual one because in 2022 due to the pandemic it was held in summer), allows visitors to enjoy the atmosphere of the streets and the art of the carnival of Cádiz.
It will be a space in constant movement, and constantly updated. “We want the public to make it their own and to be inhabited by the people”, said the mayor. EFE