Barcelona, Valencia, Palma de Mallorca,
If the more than fifty galleries belonging to the Arte Madrid association present their first exhibitions of the new season next week at Apertura, from September 19 to 22 we will also be able to join Barcelona Gallery Weekend, a project by ArtBarcelona.Galeries that celebrates a decade seeking to make visible and strengthen the artistic fabric of the Catalan capital, encourage collecting and emphasize the importance of the work of art galleries as spaces that generate culture and are open, always free of charge, to all citizens.
The venues in Barcelona and L’Hospitalet will be joining in, which, around their autumn exhibitions, will be scheduling guided tours, meetings, presentations, performances and other free-to-attend activities focused on contemporary and modern art in the city. There will also be the Barcelona chapter of the ARCO GalleryWalks, a special project for children (BGW Familiar) and proposals for itineraries led by local curators that allow visitors to visit these spaces independently. For professionals (collectors, curators, art critics and representatives of institutions, both local and international), a specific programme has been designed that includes tailor-made tours and will foster their relationships; another Acquisitions Programme is aimed at foundations and private companies that commit to incorporating into their collections works exhibited in the galleries participating in Barcelona Gallery Weekend.
We know the exhibitions that these centres will host from the 19th: the German Jan Schüler presents paintings related to the society and politics of his country with a careful use of smooth areas of colour at 3 Punts; ADN Galería will bring together Julio Anaya and Eugenio Merino to pay homage to and demystify Picasso, Miró and Tàpies at the same time; at Ana Mas Projects, Michael Lawton will use abstraction to describe the prosaic or narrate historical episodes by speculating about them; and the Peruvian Lúa Coderch brings to Àngels Barcelona a sound and object investigation into our most immediately used narrative forms.
At Artur Ramón Art, Jordi Ortiz will show us a photographic project about the trees that populate the Barcelona district; Louis Porter will reflect on the notion of distance based on images taken from libraries, archives or flea markets at Chiquita Room; the Mallorcan Lara Fluxà will relate gesture and electricity in her pieces at Bombon Projects; and Beatriz Olabarrieta and Mario Santamaría will intervene in the space of Dilalica to test how its disarticulation can generate mental and even physical confusion.
In FUGA, Nieves Mingueza examines abuses against women committed on the Internet, in an installation composed of photomontages, assemblages, sculptural structures and text; Marc Domènech reviews two decades of painting by Esther Boix, whose death is a decade ago; Alegría will show seafaring still lifes by Jorge Diezma and ethall will present a pictorial, site-specific installation by Rasmus Nilausen.
Mexican artist Gino Rubert will offer lonely female portraits at the Senda Gallery; Carles Congost will hybridise photography, moving images, objects, painting and drawing in his unpublished compositions at House of Chappaz; the Uxval Gochez Gallery will host Yeonsu Lim’s projects to envelop Barcelona, inspired by Christo; and at Valid Foto we will be able to enjoy ambrotypes, unique pieces and gelatin silver editions by Masao Yamamoto, the great Japanese photographer of small things.
L21 brings us representations of domestic environments, everyday objects and humanised animals by the Frenchman Fabio Viscogliosi, the Argentinian Catalina León shows pieces in fabric, plaster, wood, textiles, embroidery and leaves from Barcelona at Mayoral in which the support is part of the message; and in that same room, a group show awaits us that will praise the artistic panorama in Barcelona in the eighties based on works by Miquel Barceló, Tom Carr, Ramiro Fernández, Ferran García Sevilla, Joan Gelabert, Francesca Llopis, José Pérez Ocaña, Ramon Puiggené, Perejaume, Martina Pla, Jaume Plensa, Josep Uclés and Marcel lí Antúnez Roca.
Sito Múgica opens the season at Pigment Gallery, with his paintings constructed from digital images; Prats Nogueras Blanchard exhibits Richard Wentworth’s manipulations of everyday objects and in the Sala Parés we will see images by Tony Catany and Michael Kenna inspired by Venice. Black and white and analogue photography, aimed at capturing natural phenomena, is the bet of ProjecteSD, led by Jochen Lempert; Rocio Santa Cruz will present the first solo exhibition in Spain by Lionel Sabatté, who works in all kinds of media with discarded materials; and the young Italian Gianluca Ladema delves into the links between construction, deconstruction and memory in SUBURBIA.
Zielinsky gives us the opportunity to discover the work of the Brazilian Claudio Goulart, who died in 2005 and who moved between performance, video, photography and mail art; Lluis Lleó brings his recent creations, which are both pictorial and sculptural, to Taché Art Gallery; and finally, at Víctor Lope Arte Contemporáneo, Beate Höing will show ornamental ceramic figurines and objects that are halfway between nostalgia and awareness of current overproduction.
Later, from September 27 to October 4, LAVAC, the Association of Contemporary Art Galleries of the Valencian Community, will launch Abierto Valencia 2024, a second edition. The joint opening of its exhibitions will be completed with guided tours, round tables, ARCO GalleryWalks or the Cervezas Alhambra Art Routes, by Turiart. The public’s favourite exhibition could win the Cervezas Alhambra Abierto Valencia Award and all participating venues, as a novelty, will participate in the organisation of a collective exhibition of their artists in Ferreres-Goerlich, open until October 6. The Ministry of Culture and the City Council will make their acquisitions.
Regarding the Nit de l’Art in Palma de Mallorca, it will take place on September 21 from 6:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m., although some activities will be brought forward to that date. A dozen centres are joining in: ABA ART LAB, BARÓ, CCA Andratx, Galería Fermay, Galería Fran Reus, KEWENIG Palma, LA BIBI, L21, Maior Pollença, Galeria Pelaires, Pep Llabrés Art Contemporani, Galería Xavier Fiol and The Tube Gallery, which is making its debut.
