The man who made people happy
My friend Jean Francois Zurawik was the man who made people happy. It was his obsession, his reason for living. He was the visionary who made the Fete des Lumieres in Lyon the most visited mass event in Europe.
A powerful and kind mirror
A few hours ago, my much-admired friend Margaret Sayers-Peden, or Petch, one of the great Spanish to English translators, died. She never got to read this letter.
Above the clouds the world remains undisturbed
When I can return to the sea, to my mountains, to my cloud forests, I hope I will be able to feel that same amazement.
Without memory there can be no identity
Speech by Pablo Corral Vega, Secretary of Culture, on the Day of Interculturality. I maintain that identity is built around three great forces: memory, intimacy and the encounter with others.
We speak to connect with one another
Speech at the 2018 Quito Book Fair and portraits of Haruki Murakami during the event. We speak to connect with one another, language is the mirror in which we discover ourselves.
From the wonder of the light to the sway of the city
In
Blog Home, Interviews
Interview by Milagros Aguirre to Pablo Corral Vega for Diners Magazine of Ecuador, January 2018.
Intimacy is political
Speech at the opening of the exhibition of the same name. When we allow ourselves to observe the political dimension of intimacy we are forced to be defenders at all costs of tenderness, of consent.
Cultures do not dialogue, people dialogue
Speech for the day of multiculturalism. Indians do not dialogue with mestizos, nor do blacks dialogue with whites. It is human beings who dialogue
Photography as language
Professional photographers have lost the exclusivity of photographic language. Billions of people can now take high quality photos and also share them, that is, use them beyond the private sphere.
Remembering Harvard
In the summer, one sheds all extra clothing, casting off one’s belongings to the point of near-nakedness. Without memory. Without dreams. Without knowledge.
Gabo is not dead
I've heard a terrible rumor. They're saying that Gabriel Garcia Marquez is dead. Who could think up such a hoax? To say that Gabo is dead is the same as saying that Aureliano Buendía never existed.
I don’t wish you happiness
Happiness is a glass of fresh water on a hot day, the breeze on your skin, the evening light that kisses everything with its honey.
This is my Tango
This is the text I wrote in October 2012 as an introduction to the book Tango, published by Dinediciones. It is a postcard taken halfway through, from a project that has taken me decades.
Introduction to the book ’25’
When we press the shutter, we are saying Here I am; This moment matters, I matter; These are the people I love; I wish this moment would last.
Questions without an answer
How does the last orange taste? What becomes of an island that knows no poetry? How much is a tear worth in the desert?
From Patagonia to the Caribbean
South America is a continent of geographic extremes. There we find the largest tropical rain forest on the planet and the driest desert, and on its west an entire coastline, from Patagonia to the shores of the Caribbean, is dominated by the Andes.