At the end of last year, the Planetarium of Bogotá, cultural and scientific stage of the Instituto Distrital de las Artes - Idartes, was selected to assume as vice president of the Asociación de Planetarios de Amércia del Sur - APAS by its acronym in spanish, - Association of Planetariums of South America, and therefore, will be the venue for the XII Meeting of this organization from December 5 to December 8 this year.
Bogotá will be the first city in the northern of the South American continent to host this meeting, which makes this congress a unique opportunity to stimulate regional participation.
The theme of the APAS’ XII Meeting – More than a dome will be “Planetariums building communities around scientific, cultural, artistic and technological knowledge”, so during these four days, the Planetarium of Bogotá will organize a series of activities focused on this vision.
The programming will be diverse, as it will feature conferences by international guests, as well as planetariums and observatories. There will also be experimental talks, workshops, laboratories, projections of astronomical content, video installations, work tables and a commercial showroom. Additionally, different artistic activities will also be carried out throughout the meeting, such as the Full Dome Festival of the Art, Science and Technology Line of Idartes, in which the works of artists who create audiovisual pieces in full-dome format will be exhibited.
Carlos Molina, coordinator of the Planetarium of Bogotá, affirms that “APAS is above all a meeting to share, to realize what we do, the best practices, the difficulties and above all to connect the planetariums around South America and from here with the planetariums in the world”.
Likewise, the second edition of the Comet Magazine, which seeks to make visible the work, experiences and research of different groups and organizations related to astronomy and space sciences in Colombia.
The activities will be carried out mostly in person, not only in the Planetarium, but in different parallel scenarios in Bogotá. Some will be broadcast live.
As an appetizer to this great celebration that will take place in December, the Planetarium focused on the fourth season of its podcast a universe of stories to talk about the Planetariums of South America. Here we visit some of these astronomy dissemination centers in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Peru to discover their stories, discoveries and contributions.
APAS is a non-profit organization bringing together the main planetariums of the countries of the region. Its intention is to generate interinstitutional cooperation and exchange through conventions, seminars and meetings. Initially it was born with the planetariums of the southern cone such as Chile, Argentina and Brazil in 2003 and, later, it extended its network and began to have the participation of more countries such as Perú, Bolivia and Colombia since 2013.
This will be done thanks to the support of the Department of International Relations of the Mayor’s Office of Bogotá and the Idartes International, a window to the world project.