Vicente Durán, first name of the rapper known as subversive, is going to Chile. who grew up in Detroit, Michigan, United States, take your partner and your children to know the land, the neighborhood, which took its first steps. The return date is indefinite.
For at least a couple of years, the subversive message was gradually crowded at the point of an audiovisual work posted on YouTube, which, based on contingency, constructed music with a neat installation, the pair spontaneous and effective, despite the self-taught in the management of that language.
Topics verses were the last presidential election, a jug of water thrown into the former Minister of Education for the Student Music Sepúlveda, the Bicentennial, the Mapuche people's struggle and its repression by the Chilean state, the Telethon and Don Francisco, Bachelet, a much-needed demystification of the late General Bernales and, in general, the disclosure of the entire network linking business, political, and economic and political ideology in search from within than without disturbing the order of the estate they manage.
But before appearing as subversive, in 2004/2005 brought to life with CoN $ PiRaZioN Skape, duo with the album "Pull the Plug", shook their combative lucidly load the hip hop scene national recognized radio and major labels for non-existent or ambiguous attempts to politicize.
Last Monday we met in Screening Library, where today has enabled a small studio where he is recording songs before leaving. We walked to a soda fountain and maintained a rapid and intense conversation.
"Today, only days to go, How do you remember the hip hop scene for some years in Chile?
"I came from America with the idea of \u200b\u200blearning more of hip hop here. When I arrived in the mid-'90s there was a whole world was exploding in all populations had a rap group, then I started to meet people and began to put music to the poems he wrote. It was just boom Tiro de Gracia, Makiza, that were at the level of the major labels, but was slow down. The places where he played in the beginning, are activities of social organizations, then the mobilization of the secondary, university students, workers.
In this world I was moving, making a bridge between hip hop, rap and social organizations.
- How would you describe the development of the hip hop scene that has participated over the years?
"I look on the one hand, it's been a long road with a few groups, pines, singing, dancing, doing graffiti, from the beginning with post rebellious, critical, acid, about reality slum. Then he branched out, looked different streams .... As elsewhere in the world, but the origin linked to the social reality is that some follow. Reality is full of social injustice, and deal with that, we give an answer and a proposal.
First rap lyrics, the content community, generous and supportive in a world that offers the individualism, selfishness, such values \u200b\u200band then, a proposed organization to be developed over time, with Hiphología experiences (of which I participated) in the early afternoon, where the workshops were used hip hop as a meeting place, identity and self-education, which spoke of music, while our realities and dreams. These workshops were giving birth to new organizations, groups, territorial activities of hip hop, becoming a social and political proposal. This current through the years has continued to strengthen, as well as the artistic development of rap groups.
"It's interesting how these spaces for self-education and reflection to achieve return of little hip hop its original meaning (social, critical), considering the recovery than rap suffers at the hands of the Cultural Industry: Gangster, jewelry, women , drugs, weapons, imposing and functional values \u200b\u200bassociated with the dominant culture ...
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worldwide hip-hop is alive as it relates from underneath, keeping roots alive with marginal urban communities, whether in towns, ghettos, favelas ... The thing is, as you point out, there is a music that crossed borders and was taken by the global industry as a way to make money, and not only that, but as a way to alienate, to impose certain cultural patterns and deny others, promote sexism, consumerism, individualism , competition, creating the feeling that these were the values \u200b\u200bof hip hop ... that originally are the opposite.
But beyond what happens in the U.S. and some European countries (where there are fewer immigrants), Africa, Asia, Latin America, hip hop is a powerful tool that enables young people, especially, to express and show their reality.
In Chile there are different kinds, hip hop that talks about different things and from different realities as well, but we believe that hip hop is a tool that supports the goal of social transformation, the claim of reality and the proposed change , so within that we are much closer to someone who is organizing from the population activity for the right to housing, education, health, that of a rapper who talks about other things or their Letters do not reflect these realities.
The hip hop goes hand in hand with social movement with the struggles of peoples, that is the hip hop that I follow and I think it's a contribution. This hip hop is a long tradition in Chile, as art is bound and committed to social struggles, which occurred in all periods before and after the dictatorship.
"As for the art work you have done, how and why you step from pure sound to visual, with that kind of" raperiodismo "contingency, facts and figures?
"There are many rappers in the world that put the amount of realism, data collection and interpretation of what is going, I like that kind of rap that talks about very concrete things. As for the audiovisual
are two things. One, as you note, the audiovisual is a tool hits, which is much more effective and complete a song, poem, etc.. But on the other hand, has to do with my desire to know and learn self-taught what was the videotape, to take the tools and making them available to social organizations. I did 10 or 15 videos with residents, students, before making a clip with my songs, so they could display in their environment in their areas what they were doing, it served them very powerful tool ....
"It is surprising dialectical while Con $ PiRaZioN said "Turn off the TV!", denying the other hand, were making inroads and developing audiovisual material, overcoming the rejection ...
- Sure! (Laughs). It was a confrontation, to develop what some call a counter-information, popular communication, alternative communication or criticism, which are ways to counteract the duopoly / oligopoly in the media "news" (which for me has been a constant theme) where the same business are purchased from them. Today we have Luksic on Channel 13, Piñera had Chilevisión (now a crime) ... The information in Chile is well managed, there is a large consensus that is generated from the most common news to the senses, tastes, there are plenty of things homogeneous pattern imposed from the television and newspapers because there is no alternatives.
Spaces like the Citizen are among the few alternatives that are growing today. We hope to continue to grow and grow many more, but challenging what exists is difficult from the precariousness or, rather, from the vastness of resources with which they have.
So, yes, was to use the visual to counteract the effect of television and radio, in the sense of what is required as musical taste. Also disseminate more massively the message, because I do not believe in the message marginalized, only to believe: If we change things, we must add, the widespread dissemination and install it in the debate. Must be discussed with the mass media, politicians, the elite, with the school and its rigidity and structure, with everything that keeps us oppressed. You have to enter that debate, standing firm, with clear arguments, with a capacity of coherence and organization.
(...)
I think most people know how exploited lives, how precarious their situation, their very lives, but the issue is how to solve that, if decisions are always in the hands of others ... With unity, organization , and with the clarity to see what issues are important.
- How do you explain the current stagnation of Chilean society in general, against the many injustices and attacks it receives from the ruling class? Fear, indifference, apathy?
-Although there expressions of rejection, 40 years after the coup and dictatorship, and the years of the Coalition (which very effectively paralyzed the social movement) the effect is still strong. There are various elements that keep us liabilities to gross injustices: One is fear, and not just the physical thing, but the daily fear, fear of the boss, the fear of ridicule, fear to be different ...
And, of course, what else are distractions and diversions, the time when the delivery system to avoid problems, because they are facing, but also cope with problems, avoid them.
On the other hand, the super-deep conviction that we can not transform things, that this is almost natural, and we do not have the strength to change things. There is an issue that has to do with history, with a big break with our memory, because in this land have always been able to carry great potential for transformation, generating organizations function and to be combative, but that history is erased, asleep, and that is the story we have to recover all the experiences of a people organized and rising. So remember this and also analyze the reasons for our failures, because there were moments in situations where trust should not have to trust who ever: The political class, the military ... We need to believe in ourselves, when we unite, and that's what happened in the '80s and ended throwing the dictatorship. Sure, it fell, but then came the problem: We trust and we stayed in the cottage, once again we hope, always trusting in the leader, the party .... and end demobilized. We no longer believe in them, but I do not believe in anyone, in or us. We have to believe in us, I think.
- And how are your expectations for the current scene?
-is difficult, there are a lot of work to do, plenty to sow join. One of the great weaknesses of those that question and are able to see reality as it is, we know that to change things we must fight, is that we are divided. We have both small group who think the group over there is the problem, when in fact we are all parts of the same front that seeks transformation. There is a great task of building the will, which today is very difficult because we have stuck distrust, arrogance, narrow ideological .... Because I have my position, many do, but must be able to look beyond and know that if we do not build the unit can not move forward. Sometimes, working together is not easy, but the will is essential.
We must remember the Blest Clotaire labor movement, which made the secondary a few years ago, what happened recently in Magellan, you can not pass if you bring together ... What is happening in the Middle East, independent of output you have, is an example that if you you stand on the square 30 days, the government falls, because governments are that fragile. People have this power, forget it, but at times you remember, when the cup overflows and say no more! By Christopher Cornejo
The Citizen.
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