Miquel Navarro, the Quixote of the sculpture that fights against the windmills that will surround his open-air museum

Image of one of the sculptures located in the Miquel Navarro open-air museum, with the summit of Pico del Tejo in the background, where wind turbines would be installed.

A wind project promoted by the Spanish multinational Acciona, with 10 windmills planned, will have a great visual impact on the open-air museum that the Valencian sculptor Miquel Navarro, winner of the National Plastic Arts Award (1986), has installed on his estate in La Alqueruela , in the Valencian town of Siete Aguas.

The multinational has included this area of ​​La Alqueruela within the Special Plan for Wind Zone Number 9 of the Valencian Community.

It is planned to install a total of 63 wind turbines that will be distributed in eight wind farms in mountains that run between the towns of Camporrobles, Fuenterrobles, Utiel, Requena and Siete Aguas.

The sculptor has already presented allegations to the project in which he exposes, among environmental reasons, the negative impact that the park would have on the museum that he has been building for years, "a legacy similar to the one created by Chillida in Hernani", comments the 77-year-old creator. .

“Would they dare to surround that sculptural space with wind turbines?” he wonders.

The project had been going in and out of the drawers of the public administration for 20 years.

Presented for the first time in 2001, discarded in 2009 and rescued in 2020, it was this month of December when it was put on public display, after it was unblocked by the Generalitat Valenciana in November.

What has become known has put the sculptor on a war footing.

For years, Navarro has been installing some outdoor sculptures on a farm he owns.

The creator is the only living Spanish artist with work in the Unesco collection in Paris, where he is part of a select list that only includes Picasso, Miró, Tàpies and Chillida.

His most popular works are the enormous urban creations, of monumental size.

With works in the main museums of the world, from the Guggenheim in New York to the Reina Sofía in Madrid, from the Pompidou in Paris to the IVAM in Valencia, with pieces in the squares of cities such as Brussels, Barcelona, ​​Zaragoza, Vitoria and, of course, Valencia, among others, Navarro wants to culminate his career with a kind of museum in harmony with Nature, a proposal that evokes experiences such as Chillida-Leku.

Many of the sculptures that have been installed belong to the Foundation with his name that he has created to order the future of his personal collection of large pieces, a foundation that will also convert his workshop in Mislata into a permanent museum.

Navarro's totem poles, inspired in some cases by the mountains where they are located, now face the threat of windmills, structures over 40 meters high that would rise above the Pico del Tejo and destroy the museum.

A threat to which must be added that of a web of cables, since an electrical substation is also planned to be installed in the area, to which all the evacuation cables from the towers will reach, which will further intensify the impact.

Demonstration this Saturday

In his fight, Navarro is not alone.

The Valencian Coordinator for the Rational Location of Renewable Energies, which brings together more than 50 associations from more than 40 municipalities in the Valencian Community, has called a protest demonstration in Valencia for this Saturday.

Under the slogan "Renewables yes, but not like this!", the march will start at 12 am from the Palace of Justice of Valencia and will end at 2 pm in Plaza de la Virgen.

The sculptor plans to attend and wants to go in front of it.

Like the Cervantes character, Navarro has decided to launch himself against the mills.

Navarro insists that the various groups that are mobilizing against the plan do so not "against renewables, but in the way they are doing it" and points out that in his specific case it is "an aberration against the art and nature” locate that wind farm there.

In addition, the artist recalls that the area is also a protected area for the Bonelli's eagle, and it already has climbing prohibitions in the vicinity by the Valencian Generalitat itself.

Thus, he points out that the report by the NGO SEO / Birdlife recommends the protection of perimeters with a radius of 15 kilometers around raptor nests, to ensure a danger-free camp, something that would not occur on this occasion.