Merthyr Rock 2011

Tato is a 17-year-old orphan with no direction in his life and, together with his friends, he must resist and find alternatives to the violence present in his neighbourhood.

Director: Henry Rincón. Colombia.

97 min.

A concert that brings together two of the region’s music groups: both classical and a mixture of tropical and rock genres, with a popular touch: Filarmed y La Toma. A space to enjoy music as an art, as a profession and as a lifesaver for young people who are at risk of entering the armed conflict. “We strongly believe that we are equal, from Ciudad Juárez to Patagonia: we all laugh, cry, love, enjoy and suffer for the same reasons, the only thing that separates us is our accents”.

Selva Almada (Argentina), a journalist and writer, is one of the most respected authors in Latin American literature. Author of the non-fiction Chicas muertas (2014) and of the novels El viento que arrasa (2012), No es un río (2020) and Brickmakers (2021), her books have been translated into at least nine languages and, among other awards, she received the 2019 First Book Award given at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. She has contributed to an anthology that the Hay Festival and Anagrama have published recently, one about how the Latin America collections reached the British Museum. She will talk about her recent work with Catalina González.

Roberto Palacio presents his book La era de la ansiedad, which tackles the vertigo and unease that are characteristic of our times. From the construction of identities based on seeking virtual approval, to the way in which we relate emotionally, via investments in intangible products, Roberto Palacio explores how society’s new practices and dynamics seem to feed an ever more widespread sense of anxiety. In conversation with Adriana Villegas, the philosopher will offer some ideas about how to behave in a world full of pressures and tensions.

Irene Solà (Spain) is the author of the publishing phenomenon When I Sing, Mountains Dance (2019), written in Catalan and translated into over 20 languages, with 15 editions in circulation and winner of the 2019 Cálamo Prize and the 2020 European Prize for Fiction. In her new book, Et vaig donar ulls i vas mirar les tenebres, Solà portrays a world full of witchcraft, ghosts, beasts and demons, and a group of women gathered around the deathbed of the oldest of them. Together, they reconstruct over three hundred years of history. In conversation with Sara Jaramillo Klinkert.

In his work, Eduardo Romero analyses and criticises matters of the foremost importance, such as colonialism, migratory policies and the leftovers of capitalism. In his most recent book, ¿Cómo va a ser la montaña un dios? (2023), he traces the route connecting the Colombian Caribbean coast with the Spanish region of Asturias, in a surprising way, one that is almost invisible to us under normal circumstances: coal mining. Romero tells a powerful story that links an old man in Gijon, Spain, who was once a miner, with a group of Colombian migrants who flee their country in a boat that transports coal from El Cerrejón, in La Guajira, to a Spanish port. In conversation with Pascual Gaviria.

A country with the biodiversity of Colombia, which has within its borders ecosystems that are important to the survival of life on Earth, including the Amazon, the Andes mountains and the Sierra Nevada, faces serious challenges with regard to the climate emergency and the increase in global temperatures. The University of the Andes lecturer, politician and environmentalist, Manuel Rodríguez Becerra,(Colombia), is the author of numerous books including Colombia y sus bosques and the recent El futuro ambiental de Colombia; Becerra will talk to Andrés Roldán about the significant steps regarding environmental care taken over the course of the last decade, including the strengthening of institutions that care for biodiversity and the construction of political will.

Eliane Brum is a Brazilian journalist, writer and documentary maker. She was educated at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica in Rio Grande do Sul and has won over 40 Brazilian and international reporting awards. She participated in the compilation of special reports on Doctors Without Borders, ¡Dignidad!, which also featured authors such as Mario Vargas Llosa. She is the co-director of two documentaries: Uma historia severina and Gretchen: filme estrada. She is the author of La Amazonia: viaje al centro del mundo (2024), a book that narrates her move from Sao Paulo to Altamira, a city where the construction of one of the world’s largest (and most ecologically devastating) dams is taking place. Brum will speak to Adriana Villegas.

Simultaneous translation from Portuguese to Spanish available

Nowadays we define ourselves as stories, narratives that we only need to say out loud about ourselves and others must accept them as true. It seems that, above and beyond this, nothing solid or objectively true can determine us: I choose my gender, my desired pronouns, my ideological inclinations. However, I would like to be supported by others; the new forms of constructing my identity involve “likes” in virtual groups. And if the “like” never arrives? This is la era de la ansiedad, a time without utopias in which I am always waiting for a clue about myself. At this talk with Roberto Palacio we will deal with the intricate labyrinths that we have been led into by a world in which nothing seems to be any better than anything else… and the paths that are there for us to find meaning in all of it.

This celebrated Spanish author Javier Moro will talk to Ana Cristina Restrepo about his most recent books. Moro, one of the bestselling Spanish-language writers, is also a journalist and has worked as a screenwriter and film producer in Hollywood. His books include Senderos de libertad (1992), El pie de Jaipur (1995), Las montañas de Buda (1997), a work written together with Dominique Lapierre: Five Past Midnight in Bhopal (2001), Passion India, The Red Sari, El imperio eres tú (2011 Planeta Prize) and, more recently Nos quieren muertos, which the author will talk about at this event. This book, which is both an exciting read and a rigorous study, is about a key figure for understanding contemporary Venezuela: Leopoldo López. Upon being jailed in 2014, after leading massive protests against the Maduro government, López became a symbol of the struggle for democracy in the country.

Nona Fernández is a Chilean actor, writer and screenwriter. She contributed to an anthology, published by Hay Festival and Planeta in late 2023, about Latin American viewpoints on the Colombian truth report. She has been awarded with the prestigious Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize, given by the Guadalajara International Book Fair. She is the author of a number of books, including the novel Mapocho and the book of memoir, Voyager. She will talk about her most recent work with Perla Toro.

A journey between past and present, showing us the career of the maestro Edy Martínez, the Colombian pianist, composer and music arranger who was one of the major forces in Latin music in the 1960s and 70s. In the magnificent and grey metropolis of New York walks the slight figure of a man whose brilliance was hardly suspected, and even today goes unnoticed by many, despite the uniqueness and magnitude of his legacy.

Director: Carlos Ospina. Colombia.

91 min.

Los Hermanos Aicardi Gianny and Rodolfo, talk to Diego Londoño about the history and legacy of tropical music in Colombia and how the songs of Rodolfo Aicardi and other artists of his time show us the culture and popular identity of Colombia.

Rodolfo Aicardi was a Colombian singer-songwriter of tropical music considered by many “the King of ‘Chucu-Chucu’”. His sons, Los Hermanos Aicardi, want to make the history of this music unstoppable and continue with the musical and cultural legacy that represents the experiences of Colombians, from their joy, told through cumbia, to their most poetic feelings told through ballads and boleros.

Jorge Franco is a Colombian writer, known for his novel Rosario Tijeras (1998), which was adapted for film and television. His book El cielo a tiros (2018) tells the story of a group of children of drug dealers, and deals with how the guilt of their fathers reaches down into the next generation. His most recent work, El vacío en el que flotas, was published in 2023. He will talk to Pilar Gutiérrez.

One of Colombia’s best known and loved comedians, Dany Alejandro Hoyos, is also a writer, cultural promoter and creator of the character Suso el Paspi; he will talk to Pascual Gaviria about his recent book, El árbol de guayacán, in which he talks about his relationship with his grandfather (whom he lost during the pandemic), about life in his small town in Antioquia (Ituango), Colombia’s recent past, and mourning, always with a sense of humour.

Freddy Lupin belongs to a proud family of werewolves. Confident that he will soon become a fearsome werewolf, Freddy is surprised to discover that he is not as terrible as he had hoped.

Director: Alexs Stadermann (Australia)

96 min. For children.

Beatriz Helena Robledo has written the biography of the Colombian pianist Teresita Gómez, covering the six decades of her music career. Gómez, from Medellin, started to play the piano very young, and since then has displayed a talent that has taken her to the most famous stages around the world, including the Chopin Society in Warsaw, the Royal Palace in Madrid, and the International Franz Liszt Festival in Weimar. As well as covering the career of this great figure, Robledo deals with the systemic racism that the pianist has had to overcome in order to achieve her true potential. In conversation with Paola Mejía, the pianist Teresita Gómez and her biographer Beatriz Helena Robledo will talk about a life dedicated to art, an unstoppable vocation, and a great inspiration for new generations of musicians in Colombia.

The lawyer Humberto de la Calle (Colombia) was a government minister during the César Gaviria presidency, Vice-president of the Republic, and Ambassador to Spain and then the United Kingdom in the late 1990s; in 2012 he was designated Head Negotiator of the government delegation during the peace process with the FARC. After the signing of the Final Agreement at the Colón Theatre, he was presidential candidate in 2018. Today he is a Senator in the Congress of Colombia. He has recently published a novel based on real events: La inverosímil muerte de Hércules Pretorius, about a young lawyer who has always been interested in the idea of a peaceful social revolution. The M-19 movement is growing in the convulsive Colombia of the 1970s, and this gives Hércules, and many others, an option and hope in terms of fighting for his ideals. In conversation with Octavio Escobar.