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Mr. President
JUAN MANUEL SANTOS
President of the Colombian Repúblic
Mister President,
Instead of doing a
Law of Request (In exercise of the article 23 of the Political Constitution and
of Law 397 of 1997,
Modified by the law 1185 of 2008), I prefer to write a PUBLIC LETTER directed
respectfully to You.
I act in my own
name as Guillermo ZAMOR, Artist author of the work “THE BLACK CHRIST“, which was
donated to Nariño's Palace by the Reverend father Rafael García-Herreros, my
uncle by my mother, when there was exercising the presidency Belisario Betancur.
I want to request
you publicly attention to obtain Official information of the whereabouts of my
work “The black Christ”, because they have passed seven years from my first
request to the president Álvaro Uribe (On July 25, 2005: Annexed 1) without up
to the date I has had any news wherefrom it is and without knowing officially if
the donation has fulfilled his purpose: “To be always exposed in the Nariño’s
palace “.
The information
that I could get, not officially, is that the picture was moved from his place
of foreseen exhibition to the National Museum, by the order of the President
Virgil Barco, where it remained several years. In 1994 I obtained the permission
of entry to the Nariño’s Palace, thanks to the president Julio César Turbay, in
order that a professional photographer could do a capture of "The Black Christ
". In that moment they found it in the warehouses of Nariño's Palace. Today, 28
years after having given this work for explicit request of the president
Betancur to collaborate with the Colombian culture, “The Black Christ "
continues rotting in the warehouses of the Palace.
My request is
simple: “THE BLACK CHRIST“ there was donated expressly for the called "
Betancur’s Collection ", to create a Gallery with works of acquaintances artists
of the Colombian plastic arts, recognized internationally, with headquarters in
the Tapestries’ Gallery of the Nariño’s Palace. Since the aim of the above
mentioned Collection was not respected, neither recognized by his successor in
the presidency, Virgilio Barco,
as the
following ones, the donation loses his purpose.
In consequence of
the previous thing,
in my own name I,
Guillermo
ZAMOR, I ask you with all my respect,
that as my work is not fulfilling his purpose, it will be returned to me,
in order that it fulfills the aim for what an integral artist looks with all his
creations, to make them being exposed, valued and spread, even more when they
have been the object of a donation with cultural purposes.
I want to clarify
that during the whole process of this donation, and the following years, I was
living in France, country of which also I am citizen.
I appreciate your
attention to this message. I know in advance that the government is going to
answer me that a donation is not reversible.
But there are
donations and donations. I was employed one year at “The black Christ”,
as an honoring to the black race, which so much I admire, to the model who posed
for this picture and who delivered me his soul to do it, to the History and to
the Religion.
If the topic of the
picture, for being a nude and for being of black race is the reason for not to
be exposed, in this way it is condemned to live locked up.
They must not have
received it if racist or moral prejudices prevent his artistic valuation. Many
persons in the world would receive a great message of love, of solidarity, of
comprehension, if they had access to the contemplation of this image.
Other wise, I
want to represent with this letter all the artists who, with big difficulties,
we manage to survive if we want to be upright, and that we try to collaborate
with causes over our levels to be humiliated publicly.
Respectfully,
Of the gentleman President,
ZAMOR
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