María Pagés presents the dance center commissioned by the Madrid City Council without explanations about its budget, salary or award

Last January, the Madrid City Council signed the dancer and choreographer María Pagés to direct the new Nave de la Danza de Matadero. The winner of the 2002 National Dance Award and the 2022 Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts was chosen to lead the largest cultural project in years by the council; and the most important of its culture delegate, Marta Rivera de la Cruz. Ten months after the appointment, those responsible presented the Center this Thursday, in an event in which the press was not allowed to ask any questions.

Although the presentation made no mention of the budget, salaries or award – which was direct – of the Centre, elDiario.es accessed the figures through the public sector contracting platform. The award of the artistic direction, made up of María Pagés and her partner, the playwright El Arbi El Harti as deputy director, is 150,000 euros per year without taxes, to which is added a maximum of 15,000 euros for expenses. The contract is for two years, extendable for another two years.

According to The Spanish Newspaperthe breakdown of each person’s remuneration is 85,000 euros per year for Pagés and 65,000 for El Harti. These numbers together exceed those awarded to the management of other public projects such as the National Dramatic Center (the annual salary of its director, Alfredo Sanzol, is 94,728 euros) and the National Classical Theater Company (79,586 euros).

The Matadero Dance Center has 38 people working, 20 newly hired and 18 from Madrid Destino staff, the management company of the council’s cultural spaces. To condition Nave 11 and Nave 16 of the space, works worth 2,164,000 euros have been undertaken, which now covers an area of ​​3,000 square meters. 1,200 of them correspond to the exhibition hall, and a maximum capacity of 449 seats with the usual distribution, with the possibility of expanding up to 634 seats if the side stands are deployed.

Space for all dances and international vocation

María Pagés has defined the center as “everyone’s home”, and has thanked the mayor of the city, José Luis Martínez Almeida, Marta Rivera de la Cruz – both present at the event – ​​and the rest of the City Council team for their commitment to the creation of the center “the house of dance for the people of Madrid”. “With it, we are placing the city, the country and dance at the center of contemporaneity,” he defended. The dancer has defined the programming as “hospitable, innovative, transversal and authentic.”

The director explained that there will be seven axes on which the activity of the Nave Matadero Center is based: national and international shows, artistic and technical residencies, co-production of shows, collaboration and artistic exchanges, training programs, space for reflection and awareness, workshops and seminars. At the same time, he has advanced that among his objectives are “to make new audiences fall in love.”

The program is made up of 140 functions (108 from national companies and 32 from international companies and three from Spanish creators from around the world) developed by 5 companies (48 national, seven emerging and eight international). They will be in charge of representing the 66 shows performed by 600 artists. The Andalusian Flamenco Ballet will be the one to premiere the center, with the work Pinedadirected by Patricia Guerrero. Others will follow like Stolen Dances and Fandango! By David Coria; Matarife Paradise by Ana Morales and Andrés Marín, Loop by the company Aracaladanza directed by Enrique Cabrera and Deaffrom the Jone San Martín company.

“We encourage plurality, we promote alliances between artists and institutions, we provide spaces for training and reflection, we promote emerging talents and welcome established ones, we provide artists with all choreographies and languages,” described the person in charge, who has He concluded his speech with the message: “Let’s dance to the world.”

Martínez-Almeida, for his part, has expressed that the Center’s objective was to “encompass all dances, an approach to the world of dance without leaving anyone out.” “We also want to be a window to the world,” he noted, aware that “culture is a hallmark of the city” and that it has to be “in capital letters” with the “search for excellence as a distinctive element.”