Regata Cultural, the programme of activities around the America's Cup, includes proposals for science and the environment.
The Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup arrives in Barcelona accompanied by a Regata Cultural (Cultural Regatta), which starts now and will run until the end of the year. The Regata Cultural is the programme of cultural, artistic, sporting, gastronomic, scientific and leisure activities that has been set up to strengthen Barcelona’s link with the great sporting event that the city will host this summer, and also to facilitate its dissemination.
The Regata Cultural is promoted by Barcelona City Council, but has been built with the collaboration and contribution of organisations and institutions that have also wanted to promote activities or adapt those they already carry out and link them to the sporting event, the oldest in the world and the third with the largest audience, after the Olympic Games and the Football World Cup. Thus, the initiative brings together more than 200 activities promoted by more than 60 organisations, institutions and facilities.
The programme of the Cultural Regatta has not yet been finalised and new initiatives will be added in the coming months, but it already includes activities of all kinds that will position Barcelona as a cultural, creative, participatory and international benchmark capital. Among its proposals, science and the environment play an important role.
For example, one of the annual outreach events promoted by Barcelona City Council and which involves the participation of organisations from the entire scientific ecosystem of the city and its area of influence, the 17th Science Festival, will coincide this year with the Cultural Regatta. In fact, at this Festival, which will take place at the Born Centre of Culture and Memory and at the Plaça Comercial from 7 to 9 June, marine sciences and water will be two of the main themes, in a context created by the Decade of Ocean Sciences for Sustainable Development (2021-2030), the drought emergency we are experiencing and the consolidation of Barcelona as a world reference for nautical science and the blue economy. Thus, the next Festival will feature activities related to water and the sea, and in fact, there will also be a space dedicated exclusively to the oceans.
From this month until October, the Barcelona Maritime Museum will be one of the showcases of the America’s Cup with activities that will bring the technology and innovation behind the regattas closer to the public. On 18 April, the Museum will launch a series of talks on sailing regattas in Catalonia, and will hold two exhibitions, one to explain the technological and competitive aspects of sailing regattas, and the other on the work and dreams of women sailors. Finally, a nautical festival for children and families is also planned for October.
The Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona will offer proposals within the framework of the Regata Cultural that will invite us to reflect on the recovery of seafronts, the role of cities and the sea in times of climate emergency, and will even propose a show that will transport us from the imaginary of mermaids to the present and future of robots. Disseny Hub Barcelona will also join the Regata Cultural with an exhibition exploring the new ecologies and economies of the sea. And the Museum of Natural Sciences of Barcelona will host the audiovisual installation The Oceans Speak, Let’s Listen!, in which celebrities such as Penélope Cruz, Harrison Ford and Liam Neeson will give voice to different marine elements to raise awareness of the significance of pollution and the loss of natural habitats.
Libraries of Barcelona will invite us to immerse ourselves in the culture of the sea, maritime expeditions and nautical sports with various proposals, such as a series of talks entitled Mar de fons, an activity within the framework of the Liternatura Festival or various family summer workshops. And Casa Asia will take us on a trip to New Zealand, the winning country of the last edition of the America’s Cup, through three activities, among which, the workshop Penguins, sentinels of the ocean will bring us closer to the ecology and biology of these characteristic birds of the southern hemisphere.
These are just a few examples of what the Regata Cultural is preparing for the summer and autumn months. Stay tuned for more news, as the programme will continue to grow.