During the 14th Meet in Beijing Festival, music groups from Costa Rica entertained Beijing audiences with their performances and enthusiasm for music. Other than music, the Embassy of Costa Rica has been making important efforts in promoting Costa Rican culture to the Chinese. José David Murillo, Counselor of the Embassy of Costa Rica to the People´s Republic of China, talks about future collaboration between the two countries in an interview with chinaculture website.
Chinaculture (C): What do you think about the recent Meet in Beijing Festival?
José David Murillo (José): First, we want to extend a sincere thanks to the Ministry of Culture of China, the China Arts and Entertainment Group, the artist and all the people involved in the details of the festival.
From an overall perspective, I am quite confident that the festival has been a great success. Latin American, Caribbean and China relationships have been strengthened thanks to people contact, and since this is one of the goals of the festival, we must admit the festival has been a great success. Now we can say that more Chinese as well as Latin Americans and Caribbeans are closer.
Of course, there is always space for improvement, and being direct witnesses of the growth of the festival in the past years; we know the festival will grow in the future.
C: How and why did you choose these two bands to attend the festivals?
José: The whole procedure is divided into two, in order to guarantee that the very best of Costa Rica comes to China.
With the support of the Ministry of Culture of Costa Rica we invited Costa Rican musicians to submit their application to the festival directly. Once their application is received, the final decision is taken (by festival organizers) and an invitation letter to the selected musicians is sent.
This year we were very honored the organizers accepted not only one, but two of the greatest bands of Costa Rica in their gender; Gandhi and Tamela Hedstrom.
The two bands representing our country have great national and international experience and have consolidated careers in Costa Rica. This is an example of how professional and quality oriented the festival really is.
C: What plan will you work on regarding culture promotion, exchange and cooperation between Costa Rica and China?
José: Through music and films, the Embassy of Costa Rica has been making important efforts in promoting Costa Rican culture to the Chinese public. We were able to watch a Costa Rican production at the 2013 Beijing International Film Festival as well as Gandhi and Tamela Hedstrom at the Meet in Beijing and Strawberry Festival 2014.
As you can see we are also incorporating non traditional forms of arts because we aim for the public to have contact with the vast and rich cultural manifestations we have in Costa Rica.
We are now coordinating so that in the future we can have more Costa Rican artists working with Chinese artists to establish cooperation programs, while we plan cultural activities for next year.
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