We are inaugurating Cuévana, a sculptural intervention by Todo por la Praxis in Barruelo de Santullán
The work, which seeks to recover the memory of the women of Barruelo, will be inaugurated on October 3rd
On October 3rd, we will inaugurate Cuévana in Barruelo de Santullán, a collective sculptural intervention that recovers and brings together the memories of the women of the territory. The work is part of ALILAND, the European project coordinated by Concomitentes that explores processes of repair in territories shaped by industrial activity through participatory art.
A collectively woven memory
Over the past few months, a group of women from Barruelo de Santullán has been meeting to talk about the individual and collective memory of the town and about the ways of life that developed around the coal industry. Through walks, conversations, writing exercises, exchanges of objects, sound recordings and the collection of family photographs, the group has been creating a shared space from which to look at the history of the territory from different perspectives.
This process has given rise to Cuévana, an 8-metre-diameter circular intervention that proposes a symbolic restitution of the memory of the women of Barruelo. The work starts from a mining narrative historically centred on the figure of the miner and expands it to include other presences and forms of work that were fundamental to sustaining life in the town: care, child-rearing, household economies, labour, the transmission of knowledge and everyday networks.
Inside the structure, images and texts are organised into five symbolic layers — political positioning, work, pleasure, the transmission of cultural memory and care — offering different ways of approaching these experiences. The photographs come both from family archives and from new portrait sessions with the participants, in which the palms of their hands become an intimate trace of their stories.
The structure takes its inspiration from the cuévano, a handwoven basket traditionally used to collect coal from spoil heaps and carry loads. The feminisation of the name, Cuévana, shifts this image towards the memory of women and towards the gestures of carrying, gathering, containing and sustaining. Its circular, black and woven form evokes the mine, the earth, the coal seam and the spoil heap, but also the womb and other spaces of interiority and survival.
The weaving of the structure will itself be a collective action: over several days, the piece will be completed through an open process of making and conversation. In this way, building Cuévana will also extend the process of listening and collectively producing knowledge that gave rise to the work.
Inside, warm lighting will make the images emerge from the darkness, like presences returning to occupy a place in the shared narrative. A bell installed at one of the entrances will also evoke the memory of the old bell that once stood in the mining area. It can be rung by visitors and will also sound with the wind.
Programme
Start: 6:30 pm
Meeting point at the Mining Interpretation Centre
Walk to Cuévana
Activation of Cuévana
Refreshments
End: 10:00 pm
No registration is required.
Cuévana is part of Art Living Lab to Repair the Land (ALILAND), a European project coordinated by Concomitentes since 2025 that works across three European territories affected by the consequences of different industrial activities. In Barruelo de Santullán, the project addresses the traces left by coal mining and explores the idea of repair through memory, participation and collective creation.