Guadalajara City Creative
FORUMGUADALAJARA
CREATIVE CITY
As part of Guadalajara’s application to join the Creative Cities Network, the Management Team and the Advisory Board, working together with representatives of the local creative industry, civil society, and local talent, organized the International Forum during April 5th and 6th, 2017.
For this event, we welcomed local, national, and international experts who took part in discussions aimed at defining the strengths and challenges that the city faces to support our creative industry, and turn it into a strategic component for sustainable urban development.
PANELISTS
Hugo Luna Vázquez
Chief of staff, Government of Guadalajara
Andrés Valencia
President at Innovation and Design Promotion Council
Nancy Duxbury
Member of the European Culture Experts Network
René Castillo
Fellow Director at Mandaraka Producciones
Hugo Luna Vázquez
Chief of staff, Government of Guadalajara
Holds a Masters in Administration with a specialization in innovation by the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. He also has an undergraduate degree in International Business by the Tec de Monterrey. He is a founding associate of KLS International, a consulting firm specialised in business and government. He has been a professor at Tec de Monterrey, ITESO and UNIVA and is currently the Chief of staff at the Government of Guadalajara.
Andrés Valencia
President at Innovation and Design Promotion Council
Co-founder of Change Consulting, company dedicated to innovation, futures design and design thinking, present in Guadalajara, Monterrey and Montevideo. During two consecutive periods, he was the chair of the Design and Creative Industry Section within Guadalajara’s Chamber of Commerce.
Nancy Duxbury
Member of the European Culture Experts Network
Holds a PhD in communication with a specialization in cultural public policy. Since 2009, she is a researcher at the Centre for Social Studies at the University of Coimbra, Portugal. She is also since 2010 the coordinator of the Cities, Cultures and Architecture Research Group.
René Castillo
Fellow Director at Mandaraka Producciones
He studied communication science at Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Occidente (ITESO) in Guadalajara. He discovered his passion, stop-motion, in 1992 and since then he has been learning animation. His first short film “Sin sostén” won the prize to best short film at Guadalajara’s International Film Festival ad became Official Selection at Cannes Film Festival in France.
Mario Valle
Co-founder and Managing Partner at Altered Ventures
Octavio Kulesz
Digital publisher and philosopher
Victor Larios
Director at Guadalajara Pilot Program Experience
Alexander Jachnow
Head of Urban Strategies and Planning at the Erasmus University Rotterdam
Mario Valle
Co-founder and Managing Partner at Altered Ventures
With almost 20 years of experience in video games he is considered one of its pioneers in Latin America and he is a preacher of global entrepreneurship in emerging markets. He worked for 10 years in Electronic Arts, one of the largest and most importante video game companies of the world. Altered Ventures is a seed capital fund focused in the industry of video games and disruptive technologies such as augmented reality and virtual reality.
Octavio Kulesz
Digital publisher and philosopher
In 2007 he founded Teseo, one of the first digital publisher in Latin America. In 2011 he worked on the first study on digital publishing in developing countries. He is also one of the coordinators of the Digital Laboratory of the International Alliance of independent Publishers (Paris) and is a UNESCO expert on the Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.
Victor Larios
Director at Guadalajara Pilot Program Experience
For over 15 years he has worked for the University of Guadalajara where he has a leader and collaborator in various international projects related to virtual environments, masses simulators, parallel computing and smart cities. He is currently the Director of the Innovation Center on Smart Cities at Centro Universitario de Ciencias Económico Administrativas.
Alexander Jachnow
Head of Urban Strategies and Planning at the Erasmus University Rotterdam
He has dedicated his professional career to urban development, specializing in capacity building and urban governance. His work in research and teaching focuses on the opportunities and challenges of urbanization processes faced by countries in the global south. Moreover, he belongs to the working team of the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies.
Sam Adams
Director at the World Resources Institute
Mario Arauz
Director of Governmental Innovation at the Government of Guadalajara
Nuria Sanz
Director and Representative of UNESCO’s Office in Mexico
Gideon Schmerling
Media and Communications Director, Government of Tel Aviv-Yafo
Sam Adams
Director at the World Resources Institute
As the head of the World Resources Institute, he has analysed and developed public policies that favour the sustainable growth of cities. He has also helped forge alliances within the United States to promote the transition to a strong economy based on less reliance on carbon fuels. From 2009 to 2012 he was the Mayor of Portland, Oregon, United States.
Mario Arauz
Director of Governmental Innovation at the Government of Guadalajara
He is a specialist in digital media, an activist for free access to internet and governmental transparency. He has many years of experience in data mining and big data. He was the head of the team in charge of the digital strategy during the Pan American Games hosted in Guadalajara in 2011.
Nuria Sanz
Director and Representative of UNESCO’s Office in Mexico
She has wide experience working in multilateral organizations such as the European Commission, the European Council and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). She has been Director and Representative of the UNESCO’s Office in Mexico since 2013.
Gideon Schmerling
Media and Communications Director, Government of Tel Aviv-Yafo
Communications Director and Spokesman for the local Government of Tel Aviv-Yafo. He is responsible of designing and implementing the marketing and media strategy, as well as managing new media and the public relations of the city. He is also in charge of the creative work of his city in the cluster of Media Arts as part of his city’s commitment as a member of the Creative Cities Network.
Iván Abreu
Digital Artist
Carlos Gutiérrez
General Director at Creative Digital City
Jim Butler
Creative Industries Development Manager at City of Austin, Texas
Susana Chávez
Director of Culture at the Government of Guadalajara
Iván Abreu
Digital Artist
He has a degree in Information Design from the Superior Design Institute of La Habana and took a Master’s degree in Engineering Information Technology at the Anáhuac University in Mexico City. His work is characterised by the integration of different processes of art, design and technology such as drawing, photography, electronic devices, software development, sound experimentation and industrial design.
Carlos Gutiérrez
General Director at Creative Digital City
Founder and CEO of Metacube, a company specialized in the production of visual effects, digital animation and films. Thanks to his company, since 2000 he started making way for the industry of interactive media, being the first one of its kind in Jalisco and becoming the starting point for many other companies that now form Jalisco’s animation industry.
Jim Butler
Creative Industries Development Manager at City of Austin, Texas
Since the 90s he has worked on economic development projects, first at the Office of the Governor of Texas and then as part of the local Government of Austin. His work focuses on improving the economy of Texas and that of Austin through the development and collaboration of the technology, entertainment and arts sectors.
Susana Chávez
Director of Culture at the Government of Guadalajara
For the last 10 years she has worked in the management and promotion of museums in the city as well as the development of academic programs that employ current theories on museums which understand these spaces as places for social dialogue and local development. She is currently Director of Culture at the Government of Guadalajara.
Iván Trujillo
Director of the Guadalajara International Film Festival
Felipe Ponce
Founder and Director of Ediciones Arlequín
Javier Audirac
Music promoter
José Ángel Santos
Artisan
Iván Trujillo
Director of the Guadalajara International Film Festival
He graduated from the Centro Universitario de Estudios Cinematográficos and the School of Science at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). In 1980 he entered to work at UNAM’s film archive and in 1989 he became its General Director, a positioned he held until 2008.
Felipe Ponce
Founder and Director of Ediciones Arlequín
He studied Literature at the University of Guadalajara and was awarded a scholarship to participate in the 4th Formation Course for Iberoamerican Publishers at Universidad Complutense, Madrid. He is currently Head of Publishing at Editorial Página Seis, a company specialized in publishing for universities and governments. He also writes a weekly column at Diario NTR called #LetraBastarda where he addresses topics related to publishing. He has also collaborated in many newsletters and books.
Javier Audirac
Music promoter
He is co-director at Radio por internet and an event promoter at psiconauta.net. We was the spokesman for iconic record labels from Guadalajara such as Happy Garlic, Abolipop, Poni Republic y Barrilete Cósmico. He also worked as co-director of Sociacusia Ciclo and was producer at el Salón.
José Ángel Santos
Artisan
He began to learn the profession at the age of 7. Thanks to his experience, he entered to the School of Plastic Arts at the University of Guadalajara. His work in ceramics stands out for the ways in which he has experimented with new ways to blend tradition with modern techniques. He has also worked promoting traditional art and culture in Mexico and internationally.
Jorge Ramírez
Digital Artist
Francisco Ruano
Chef and founder of Alcalde Restaurant
Lourdes González
Scenic producer and cultural agent
Melissa Aldrete
Co-founder of the design studio Popdots
Jorge Ramírez
Digital Artist
Mexican artist whose work meets at the intersection between art and technology. He is one of the founders of of the duo Mico Rex which is a pioneer in live coding music. This group focuses in the creation of a form of experimental pop that makes use of a versatile array of music styles from the 8-bit and glitch to breaks and punk. This has resulted in something he calls dissonant but also rhythmic.
Francisco Ruano
Chef and founder of Alcalde Restaurant
Gastronomic creator from Guadalajara whose work has made popular the cuisine from his city. He founded Restaurante Alcalde, considered an exponent of the best cuisine in Mexico.
Lourdes González
Scenic producer and cultural agent
She holds a Master’s degree in Communication specialized in Science and Culture. She also has a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology. She has wide experience in cultural promotion and fundraising as well as in theatre productions, teaching, researcher and cultural manager. Performing arts is her field of speciality.
Melissa Aldrete
Co-founder of the design studio Popdots
She has produced international exhibitions in galleries such as Mare Street Galleries (London, 2007) and the Sir John Soane Museum (London, 2008). She is the co-founder of the design studio Popdots (2013). She is also the Director of General de Celulosa y Polímeros, a company dedicated to graphic arts. She founded editorial MERMA (2015), focused on experimentation and knowledge building. She is currently a collaborator in the platform Creative mornings.
MAIN CONFERENCE:
GUADALAJARA,
CULTURAL CAPITAL
OF LATIN AMERICA
This conference addressed the role of cities in defining the creative profile of societies in the 21st century when culture becomes a strategic resource for the creation of more inclusive societies.
PANEL 1:
Creative industries and culture as tools for social transformation
This panel addressed specific cases in which the potential of culture and the creative industries for social transformation and development was used as a strategic tool.
PANEL 2:
Creativity and sustainable urban development
The panel focused on the role that cultural and creative industries have played in the transformation of urban spaces, namely, on the recovery of public spaces and the creation of safer environments that promote peaceful coexistence.
PANEL 3:
Creative Cities: UNESCO’s Network and Media Arts
This panel addressed the challenges towards sustainable urban development faced by member cities of UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network in the category of Media Arts, as well as lessons-learned and their prospects.
PANEL 4:
Guadalajara as seen by its creators
In this panel, creators and and members of the local creative sector shared their experiences on the cultural projects that have transformed the face of the city.
