Bigott Foundation

Fundación Bigott is a private institution in Venezuela; it is dedicated to "preserving and making known making known the values of traditional culture".

History

Since founding in 1963 by C.A. Cigarrera Bigott Sucs—a subsidiary of British American Tobacco-- has been carrying out an ongoing institutional venture through educational, cultural, agricultural and environmental programs. In 1981 Later on, and due to the need to expand, it decided in 1981, to concentrate activities on the promotion, development and encouragement of traditional culture.

With the Talleres de Cultura Popular (Popular Culture Workshops) it contributes to the creation training of a large group of students.

Publications focus on the analysis/research into traditional popular culture, reflection its analysis and register of traditional popular culture, through manuals, books, calendars and specially through the Revista Bigott (the Bigott Mmagazine), which has a wide circulation and is known throughout the world.

Mission

The institutional mission of Fundación Bigott is to promote and to disseminate make known traditional Venezuelan culture in all its aspects.

This mission has expanded in response to the demand for its products and services.

Its slogan is Siente la tradición (Feel the tradition).

Vision

Fundación Bigott's goal is to work towards the preservation preserving and dissemination conveying theof Venezuelan cultural heritage, and aiming at becomingto become a principal reference in the study of Venezuela's popular culture.

Fundación Bigott aims at becoming turinng into a model of participation and cultural integration guided primarily by the in which recognition of the idiosyncrasy of Venezuelan people’s idiosyncrasy and its cultural identification with the country are its main goals. The approach for reaching this goal is developed through enthusiasm, pride and a sense of belonging.

Goals

• To develop a sense of belonging in a national as well as a local scale.
• To assert national and local identities as cultural capital for the integration and consonant development of the country.
• To support and carry out research on expressions of popular Venezuelan culture and its validity and socio-historic context.
• To generate a permanent record for the conservation of the testimonial, written, photographic and audiovisual heritage.¨
• To offer programs in musical education for playing instruments, songs, dances and popular handicrafts through the Talleres de Cultura Popular.
• To maintain an editorial program that comprises series of books, specialized magazines, pamphlets for mass diffusion, and guides for educators with regional and national topics on traditional culture.
• To foment exchanges with local TV stations for the projection of documentaries on the musical expressions of traditional popular Venezuelan culture.
• To support national and international dissemination of musical as well as dance groups as representatives of traditional, popular Venezuelan culture.
• To offer technical cooperation for the development of informative, educational and communication programs that link tradition and modernity in Venezuela, through transactions with public and private institutions.
• To lend services on specialized information through its Documentation Center and through its web site :www.fundacionbigott.com
• To create new languages for bringing to attention the creative diversity of popular traditional expressions, in places such as schools, theaters and other social scenarios for the enjoyment and amusement of communities.
• To acknowledge the experiences carried out by the communities themselves which contribute to the social appropriation of their cultural heritage, through institutional support, or its dissemination in the media.