On the idea of the museum of the future
In the economic and scientific worlds, Barcelona is considered a city with a tremendous capacity for innovation, yet it struggles to capitalize and consolidate its business projects. This maxim also holds true in the cultural world. Major festivals and some influential cultural enterprises, initiatives that emerged during a period of great creativity at the beginning of this century, are controlled by external investment funds, although their founders remain in management positions.
Since the order of factors does alter the perception of things, the reading is more positive if you turn it around: there are no large companies, but the city remains an active laboratory of ideas. And correcting the former doesn't mean stopping work to enhance the latter.
In the field of museums, a certain parallel can be drawn with the previous statement. Barcelona has important and promising museums, but no matter how hard they try, they will never be able to compete—in terms of permanent collections and major exhibitions—with the major institutions of cities that were once capitals of empires.
On the other hand, these same Barcelona museums are part of a cultural ecosystem in which avant-garde initiatives have emerged over time. The CCCB, MACBA, and Fundació Miró have all been models to emulate elsewhere.
Barcelona offers a confluence of art, science, technology, social movements, and political activism that isn't found in other cities. There's an experimental dimension that's already integrated into the city's brand, and it's reasonable to embrace it.
Daniel G. Andújar shows the rotten soul of AI and Palacín that Montjuïc is a peripheryThe exhibition "Fabulous Landscapes" (Fabular Landscapes) is part of this line of work, presented by the virtual Museu Habitat in the Victòria Eugènia Pavilion on Montjuïc until October 5. The project, commissioned by the Generalitat (Catalan government) to Manuel Borja-Villel and featuring contemporary art, suggests a roadmap for Barcelona to lead the debate on how museums should adapt to ongoing social, technological, and climate change. The invited artists have in common their efforts to make visible what is not apparent.
Daniel G. Andújar (if we remove the filters we see that AI has a rotten soul), Domènec (welcome to the era of the panopticon or the surveillance society), Mabel Palacín (we want Montjuïc to be a park but it has always been a suburb) or Lola Lasurt ( danes kill the most defenseless people) are some of the creators who have supported this cause.
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With the help of these excellent artists, Borja-Villel and his team elegantly trace the lines of a new museum culture that—despite the reactionary winds blowing from the US and some European capitals—cannot abandon its vocation to foster dialogue between cultures, disciplines, and generations based on movements such as feminism, anti-colonialism, climate activism, and social justice.
These are paths that the city's museums, with varying degrees of intensity, have been following for years. But the synthesis achieved with this exhibition, preceded by the publication of a revealing and provocative monograph (" No more museums, the city is a museum "), is highly recommended reading. It is dedicated to the experiment that was the Museu Social de Barcelona, which lasted from 1909 to 1920.
The 'Fabular Paisatges' exhibition, in Montjuïc
Llibert TeixidóWhen the Fabular paisatges exhibition closes, the old exhibition hall will begin to be adapted to accommodate the expansion of the MNAC, a museum that is barely surviving, crammed into a building, the Palau Nacional, which has much less exhibition space than it appears.
In line with what was stated at the beginning, it seems as necessary to break the time capsule to anticipate what's to come as it is to encourage existing museums to renew their collections and their narrative. The city must be able to continue telling its story, while still thinking about how it wants to tell its story tomorrow.
Goodbye to Café CentralCafé Central is a unique venue. It combines the soul of an old-fashioned coffee shop with that of a good jazz club. For many, it's one of the most expendable venues in Madrid's music scene. Now it's facing closure because the owners of the establishment won't renew the lease. The capital, which has entered the vortex of mass tourism and investment fever, is headed toward the same standardization that other cities, like Barcelona, are already experiencing. But the café hasn't closed yet. As long as there's life, there's hope.
The most Catalan PicassoHe was born in Málaga, spent his childhood in A Coruña, studied for a few years in Madrid, and established himself in Paris, but his years in Barcelona were key to his artistic and personal development. The revelation that opens this section today—the black models in Les Demoiselles d'Avignon were inspired by Romanesque art, not African art, as previously thought—reinforces the idea that his time in Catalonia had a profound influence on some of his most significant works.
Refik Anadol's Barcelona inspirationTurkish artist Refik Anadol is finding his connection with Barcelona very fruitful. The sale of his digital work inspired by Leo Messi's favorite goal—his prodigious header in the Champions League title won by Barça in 2009—for €1.8 million (which will go to charity) follows the success of his intervention on Gaudí's façade at Casa Batlló. The corresponding NFT sold for €1.3 million, part of which also went to charity.
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