Supertrama, Public Art Interventions in Rural Spain

Inspired by the successful Tejiendo la Calle initiative—winner of the Design and Citizen Participation Award at the 2016 Ibero-American Design Biennial—Supertrama is a public art program in the autonomous community of Extremadura, Spain, focused on rural areas. In municipalities with fewer than 5,000 inhabitants, residents collaborate with architects, artists, and other creative professionals interested in public art to transform their local public spaces.

“In public space, we meet and recognize one another,” the organizers explain. “We need to identify with a place to position ourselves and act in solidarity. Artistic interventions allow us to build different interpretations and perspectives that help enrich our daily experience of the spaces we inhabit,” they add.

Following two editions in the towns of Valverde de La Vera (2017) and Vivares (2018), Supertrama moved to Hervás this year to design and build three interventions: Cromópolis, Identidad Reflejada, and La Casa a Oscuras.

Cromópolis / Sawu Studio

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Project Description: This artistic proposal is designed to capture the town’s most representative colors based on the input of its residents. It takes physical form as an installation in the garden of the Pérez Comendador-Leroux Museum. The installation condenses diverse perspectives into a single work, showcasing a global image of the town while highlighting how these individual experiences influence one another.

Identidad Reflejada / Greta Crespo Fernández

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Project Description: Identity is a confluence of landscapes, perspectives, and diverse experiences from the past that project into the future. Walking down Rabilero Street means reflecting this accumulation of “the affections, passions, and weaknesses that we are,” that we have been, and that we will continue to be. Breaking away from a unidirectional gaze and experiencing the street through multiple perspectives is the core goal of this proposal, seeking to challenge the tendency to homogenize the landscape. Always the same photo, always the same image.

La Casa a Oscuras / Nuria Cano + Amparo Prieto

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Project Description: This installation project is a participatory exploration of how the territory of Hervás has transformed under the paradigm of “progress.” Along the River Walk, the artists will construct a traditional house using chestnut logs and woven basketry panels. Around this structure, participants are invited to experience a short night walk, aiming to activate collective imaginations surrounding natural resources, human labor, and natural cycles. The project aims for the darkness to take center stage as a pre-industrial context and atmosphere, evoking memories of the dark prior to the arrival of electricity as a primal way of inhabiting and coexisting with our surroundings.

Supertrama is supported by the Presidency of the Regional Government of Extremadura, the Department of Health and Social Policies, the Department of Economy and Infrastructure, the Provincial Council of Badajoz, the Provincial Council of Cáceres, and the Official Association of Architects of Extremadura (COADE). Learn more about Supertrama at this link.