We find ourselves in an old cork factory from the early 20th century, originally part of the architectural factory complex of the Miquel & Vincke cork company. Today it is the contemporary sculpture museum of the Fundació Vila Casas, and is found at Can Mario Square, where we can also find the art nouveau Water Tower and the Cork Museum.
The exhibition structure of our Foundation is comprised of three other spaces as well: the Museu Palau Solterra for contemporary photography, in Torroella de Montgrí (in a 15th century palace which is exemplary of civil Gothic architecture), and in Barcelona at the Museu Can Framis for contemporary painting (in a former textile factory) and the Espais Volart (in a former knitwear and fabric warehouse used by the Volart family at the end of the 19th century).
Rooms 1, 2 & 3
ANDREA TORRES BALAGUER
— INSIDE THE UNKNOWN
Andrea Torres Balaguer (Barcelona, 1990) has a degree in Fine Arts from the University of Barcelona, and since 2012 her creative activity has been centred on photography.
She has been a finalist for the Fundació Vila Casas Photography Prize on two occasions: in 2014, with the photograph Étienne, which the Foundation purchased, and in 2017, with the work Moon Ritual. Both these images are currently being shown in this exhibition.
With the goal of making more visible the work of younger artists of the Fundació Vila Casas collection, who became known through our own calls and prizes, the initiative of the exhibition Inside the Unknown came about. The exhibition, curated by Glòria Bosch and Mercè Vila, brings together some forty works of art, structured around six series produced from 2013 to 2019.
We begin with the oldest series, “Hypnagogia”, a word that defines the state between wakefulness and sleep. It is comprised of some ten black and white works, where the artist narrates stories related to the shift between consciousness and unconsciousness, scrutinising reasons and recreating scenarios.
The female figure and these gazes directed rawly at the viewer come to the fore, together with male characters, whether adults or children. Torres Balaguer emphasises texture here, as we focus on the rough exterior of the gourd in Étienne or the sensations expressed by natural features—the lightness of the rising bamboo, the dryness of the arid land, the water’s transparency in a reflection.
The objects we see express a wide range of perceptions: the fragility of a broken egg, the filmy quality of a white garment, the delicacy of a knitted shirt, a damp strand of hair soaked by rainwater. Each setting, with a certain air of surrealist compositions, is found in environments that are both warm and delicate, while at the same time mysterious and intriguing.
The series “Mesmerize” (referring to hypnosis) leaves black and white to venture into chromatic compositions where the female figure appears alone, front and centre. The gaze directed at the viewer as seen in the previous series vanishes, as here what happens is that visual contact is avoided, in settings that are greatly simplified, seemingly aspiring to explicit minimalism.
The subjects transmit subtle and even sensual textures, like a nape of the neck or a naked back, only partially draped by a delicate, drop-waist gauze dress. Or aromas, like that flower bouquet covering the face of what just might be a bride, though vanquished it would seem, dressed in black. Symbolism as well: referring to the origin of life, materialised in a perfect egg; or the small orange fish. They even evoke sounds, such as the sea, with the snail embracing a young girl’s ear, or the foam gathering amongst the rocks beneath the gaze of a woman in red.
“Moon / Moon Ritual”, for its part, is a series referring to the lunar cycle and the intrinsic symbolism of the moon in relation to femininity. Having observed “Mesmerize”, here we can appreciate her evolution towards a more greatly matured aesthetic. We pay particular attention to how the artist makes use of light, to how she has pared back and focused down on the structure, to the point of allowing the images to breathe the atmosphere of the Dutch or Spanish Baroque.
The three following series, “The Unknown”, “Hivernacle” and “Eclipses”, enrich her artistic language with painterly interventions, such as brushstrokes and collage, done over the surfaces of the photographs, converting them into unique one-off pieces. In terms of narrative, a main figure holds down the centre of the composition; a woman whose face has been altered (it is Andrea Torres herself, photographer and model at once). Here she raises the question of feminine identity by using her own body and artistic experience.
“The Unknown” is the series where the artist first began to conceal the model’s identity applying to her photographs thick brushstrokes in strong colour tones or the traditional gold leaf.
“Hivernacle” is the result of two influences: the German sculptor and photographer Karl Blossfeldt, who in 1928 published a work that enhanced the sculptural virtues of certain plants; and her greatest influence in photography, Annie Leibovitz, who worked with the same analogical camera that Torres Balaguer acquired expressly to make this series, once again in black and white. Here female bodies represent volumetric features of certain plants.
The exhibition ends with “Eclipses”, the most recent work of the artist, where she reflects on the universal debate of identity, again camouflaging faces. We no longer see brushstrokes or gold leaf, but rather collage techniques applied so expertly that they could be confused with digital interventions. This final series is still in its gestation period, yet to be fully defined, so that we do not know where it might lead.