Centre d’Art Ca n’Oliver, in collaboration with Fundació Vila Casas, presents the exhibition Monstres (Monsters) by Joan Fontcuberta, which was first exhibited at Museu Can Framis from October 2021 to January 2022.
Monstres, in the author’s own words, invites us to venture “through a series of archaeologies of the image to propose the melancholic inventory of its still tangible remains. It speaks to us, after all, of the physical supports of memory, doomed to degradation by the action of time or violence, and to the transition from one world of things to another – digital – world of non-things”.
The exhibition is composed of four series: "Fahrenheit 451", "Deletrix", "Gastropod" and "Trauma". The first, "Fahrenheit 451", is conceived as a commemoration of the centenary of the birth of Ray Bradbury, author of the novel that goes by the same title, and deals with the assault on culture and the action of fire, both destructive and creative. "Deletrix" denounces the abominable, albeit painfully current, practice of censorship, delving into libraries to find the aftermath of the inquisitors who proscribe the freedom of thought. More ironically, "Gastropod" evokes the materiality of the images and the metabolism that makes them alive, even though living involves wounds and suffering. Finally, “Trauma” focuses on this aspect of sick and damaged photographs, that degrade and lose their connection to reality, and become amnesic. In short, Fontcuberta's work projects a critical eye on images without renouncing either their nostalgic poetics nor their disturbing beauty.