The Banco de la República Cultural Center in Villavicencio, located in the city center, is a space for information and access to knowledge. It is also a meeting point between regional tradition and universal visions of culture, and a space for the study and projection of the present and past of the Eastern Plains of Colombia. Through the Cultural Center, the Banco de la República seeks to contribute to the recovery, preservation, analysis, study, organization, research, and dissemination of the nation's cultural heritage, promoting access to knowledge and consolidating a sense of citizenship in the region.
The Cultural Center’s facilities make the entire bibliographic collection of Banco de la República’s Library Network available through kiosks that gather virtual materials and provide lending services from libraries across the country.
The programming at the Cultural Center offers a wide variety of exhibitions, concerts, workshops, conferences, and events that take place in the multipurpose room and concert hall. Users can also enjoy art exhibitions with works from Banco de la República’s Art Collection, concerts programmed as part of the National Concert Season, and all the technical and research capacity that characterizes Banco de la República’s cultural network in Colombia.
History
Banco de la República began operating as an agency in Villavicencio just when Meta went from being an intendancy to a department on July 1, 1960. It opened an office on the second floor of the departmental administration building that was also beginning to operate as the Governor’s Office of Meta.
In 1975, after completing the construction of its own building—which marked a milestone in the city for its avant-garde design for the time and its robust structure—the Banco de la República branch was consolidated, unique in the Orinoco region. In December 1985, the multipurpose room began offering cultural services that, with the mission to recover, preserve, and disseminate the Colombian cultural heritage, have become a high quality option for Eastern Plains residents. Given the limited cultural activities on offer in the city of Villavicencio, the central bank was seen as proposing refreshing opportunities to approach knowledge and various artistic expression.
Villavicencio's residents have seen original works of art that are part of Banco de la República’s Art Collection in the multipurpose room since its times of carpeting and jute upholstered walls. These continued to be presented in the room, which was remodeled in 2015 in order to provide better museographic conditions. Similarly, this space has been the stage for new names in regional and national art, through the institutional programs that are being carried out in all branches to motivate and strengthen the art that emerges from all corners of the country.
At the Cultural Center, the people of Villavicencio also witnessed the birth of the central bank's Library Network Association program, as this was one of the pilot branches in the innovative service of external lending of materials from the entire Library Network's bibliographic collection. In the absence of a consolidated local bibliographic collection, this type of service has been growing in parallel with the benefits of the program and has been widely used at the kiosks that provide access to the network's catalogue, its electronic resources, the virtual library and all the other services on the website. In addition to access to the Library Network, our institutional commitment has allowed the city to create training spaces and literary events with outstanding regional, national, and foreign writers.
The central bank's Cultural Center in Villavicencio has also seen exhibitions of archaeological pieces from the Gold Museum and academic activities around pre-Hispanic pieces wrought in gold and silver, such as seminars, conferences, and conversations about the nation's cultural heritage and the importance of this wealth in social context. Another fundamental part of the Cultural Center's programming has been its musical work, which presents educational programs that promote music appreciation, such as the National Concert Season, strengthening traditional expressions and the construction and interpretation of new musical languages. In the twenty-first century, the Cultural Center is recognized in the city as a fundamental promoter of high quality and significant events in the region's musical calendar.
From the always-welcoming and well-remembered Villavicencio multipurpose room that operated the 1980s with a jute and carpet, to the renovated facilities with new services, the central bank’s cultural work has allowed the residents of Meta to use this space as a stage for dialogue and reflection, as well as for approaching knowledge, musical appreciation, and artistic exercise. At the same time, the Cultural Center has created spaces to enjoy cultural expressions from different times and places, always with the aim of continuing to progress in establishing a sense of citizenship.
