The curator comments on artists’ relationship with technology at the 18th Festival. According to her, the democratization of technological media has both improved artwork quality and facilitated its dissemination. The circulation of information has led to languages becoming more refined, and to apparatuses being effectively appropriated of, eliminating the ‘star-struck’ quality that often drove artists participating in past editions. Tejo also presents her view on the geopolitical South – the region targeted by the Southern Panoramas competitive show – as a place of transition, inhabited by those who have not been given a “powerful, clear voice” just yet. She discusses how artists register for the Festival and says she approves of the open call, because it places curators in a fruitfully unstable terrain, away from comfort zones, and free from delusions of absolute judgment. According to her, the open call is more coherent with the Festival’s proposal of critiquing hegemonies, although the admission of there being a center, she says, is becoming more and more questionable. To her, the works featured in the show are attempts at breaking down the wall that separates the art world from the rest of society. She speaks of the pleasant surprise of uncovering powerful art scenes in places such as Cameroon, and the new generation in Lebanon. She also notes that straddling different media and languages with mastery is the challenge faced by artists today.