Republika 550 - After four years they've gotten run out

Several weeks ago I wrote an article about Republika 550, an abandoned house that had been taken over by a cooperative of artists and used to over a whole bunch of art and performance related workshops. Check out the orginal article here.

Well today I saw in a couple of papers that the house had been "retaken," ie raided by police and the cooperative that has been using it, Akí, booted out. It's too bad but to me not that surprising. There was a lot of good that was being done there. There were a whole lot of activities going on and all for free. From clowns, painting, theater, urban graffiti to dance and more. For a moment, after all the legal steps were taken to kick the group out, there was some hope that maybe there would be some sort of arrangement. But it seemed at best a long shot. A stuttering bureaucratic state agency in charge of administrating this state owned, but abandoned houses; and a revolutionary/anarchist blend of artist activists who denounced regularly "the system" all coming together didn't seem too realistic.

The house its self needs a lot of work, and although Akí found a lot of creative ways to use the space, as well as cleaned up a decent amount of trash and done some redecorating, a much larger restoration effort is needed for that place. It's a beautiful house, but has been sitting there for too long without much upkeep. I wonder if had they been a bit more active in not just using it but improving it, things might be different.

But in any case I hope some of the creative energy invested into the place over the last four years will convince whoever is in charge of it now that a cultural center open to the public is the way to go forward.

We'll see.