New publication: “Things Things Say” (2021) now available
Mon, Feb 28 2022
Photos: Latitudes
Texts by: Joana Hurtado Matheu, Latitudes and Eulàlia Rovira
Edited and coordinated by: Latitudes and Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani
Publisher: Ajuntament de Barcelona. Institut de Cultura de Barcelona / Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani
Graphic design: Bendita Gloria
Format: 16 x 11cm, hardcover, 180 pages
Language: Catalan with Spanish & English translations
ISBN: 978-84-9156-386-0
Date of Publication: December 2021
Price: 10 Euros
Availability: Llibreria Laie, Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani, Sala Ciutat of the Ajuntament de Barcelona and Diputació de Barcelona bookstore.
The publication of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’ is finally out! The show was curated by Latitudes at Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani between October 2020 and January 2021.
Designed by Bendita Gloria, the volume includes a preface by art centre director Joana Hurtado Matheu, new texts by exhibition curators, a text-based intervention by participating artist Eulàlia Rovira, and texts on each exhibited work.
Latitudes’ text “And Another Thing...” comprises a series of responses to the 33 questions that confronted visitors and took the place of the conventional introductory wall text. The responses variously take the form of quotations, historical references, anecdotes, and theoretical snippets that often do not provide direct answers but instead further expand on the research and imaginary of the exhibition.
(Above and two below) Stills from ‘A Knot Which is Not’ (2020–21) by Eulàlia Rovira. Video, 12'21''. Courtesy of the artist.
Rovira was also invited to produce new work in response to the exhibition. Resulting in the performance for the camera “A Knot Which is Not” (2020–21), the work summarises her research around the narratives and stories emerging from the industrial complex where the show took place, once dedicated to the manufacturing of cotton thread. “A Knot Which is Not” premiered online once the exhibition concluded and the exhibition galleries were empty. And finally, she contributed a text to the publication based on her research leading to the making of the film weaving its spoken words into the printed lines of the physical page.
(Above and below) View of the exhibition “Things Things Say” at Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, October 2020–January 2021. Photos: Eva Carasol.
“Coses que les coses diuen” [Things Things Say] accompanies the homonymous exhibition curated by Latitudes that took place at Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani between October 2020 and January 2021, presenting works by Adrià Julià, Annette Kelm, James N. Kienitz Wilkins, Sarah Ortmeyer, Eulàlia Rovira, Francesc Serra i Dimas, Stuart Whipps, Haegue Yang, as well as meaningful things from the Friends of Fabra i Coats archive.
→ RELATED CONTENT:
- ‘Things Things Say’ in social networks;
- Premiere del vídeo “A knot which is not” [Un nus que no ho és] (2020–21) de Eulàlia Rovira, 15 febrero 2021
- Reseñas: Exposición ‘Cosas que las cosas dicen’ en Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, 11 January 2021
- Trailer and photo documentation of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, 4 Nov 2020
- 6 de noviembre, 17:45h: Proyección ‘Popcorn’ [Palomita] (90', 2012) de Adrià Julià en el Zumzeig Cinema, 29 Oct 2020
- e-flux – Fall 2020 exhibitions and programs at Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Centre of Barcelona, 17 October 2020
- Exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona, 17 October 2020–17 January 2021, 9 Oct 2020
Latitudes’ "out of office": wrap up of the 2020-21 season
Mon, Aug 2 2021
‘Keep the faith’ banner hanging at the entrance of La Escocesa studio facilities. All photos by Latitudes (unless otherwise noted in the photo caption).
This end of the season post is the thirteenth of the series – see 2008-9, 2009-10, 2010-11, 2011-12, 2012–13, 2013–14, 2014–15, 2015–16, 2016–17, 2017–18, 2018–19, 2019–20 posts. Unlike past years, there was no clear beginning to the 2020–21 season. As many of us experienced, the pandemic put our work and life plans on hold, at worst cancelled. August is usually a strange month for freelancers (at least in our sector and in these southern latitudes), as nothing much happens work-wise. Yet it can be a blessing if one has other activities to push through, such as writing or research, as hardly any work e-mails come into the inbox – even e-flux’s periodicity is reduced!— but it’s also a fearful period for income.
We have been lucky to be able to work throughout this year on two group exhibitions: ‘Things Things Say’ at the Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona Fabra i Coats (October 2020–January 2021) and the forthcoming ‘Notes for an Eye Fire’ at Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) opening October 21, 2021, which has not only kept us afloat but also made it possible for us to work within our immediate context in times when travel has not been possible or even desired. Here's our 2020-21 from behind the scenes:
5 August 2020: Max’s (Contributing editor, frieze magazine since 2015) review of Daniel G. Andújar show at La Virreina coincided with the new launch of frieze redesigned website.
13 August 2020: Eulàlia Rovira sends us a view of the improvised recording studio she managed to set up at home in order to become the voice of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’. We are deeply thankful to her for her flexibility and endurance in recording our texts in three languages deep in the summer heat and in the small hours of the night to avoid neighbourhood noises. #ThingsThingsSay
31 August 2020: Between June and December 2020, Max was Editor of Season 01 of st_age and TBA21’s social media. Pictured a "new normality" Zoom with the TBA21 team across Madrid and Vienna offices, plus team members in Prague, London, Ibiza, Barcelona, etc.
7 September 2020: After months of communicating by phone and email with Pere Fernàndez Bori, president of the Friends of Fabra i Coats, we were finally able to meet IRL as he showed us around the association offices and archives. We are very thankful to Pere and the Friends of Fabra i Coats for their time and willingness to lend us materials for the exhibition at the Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona.
7 September 2020: First meeting with Rasmus Nilausen in the museum galleries. #PanoramaMACBA
15 September 2020: Conversation between Lola Lasurt and Rosa Maria Subirana Torrent, moderated by Ángel Calvo Ulloa, as part of Lasurt’s solo exhibition ‘Children's Games’ at La Capella. The conversation focused on Subirana’s meticulous inventory of the holdings of the first collections of contemporary art donated to the city as coordinator of Miró Year, which included the organisation of Joan Miró’s 1968 retrospective on the grounds of the former Hospital de la Santa Creu, the current venue of La Capella. Video here (Catalan and Spanish). Lasurt’s project was tutored by Latitudes as part of the 2020–21 season of Barcelona Producció.
23 September 2020: Self-timer selfie during our first studio visit with Marria Pratts in L’Hospitalet. #PanoramaMACBA
24 September 2020: As a culmination of Lasurt’s solo exhibition ‘Children’s Games’ at La Capella, and as part of Jordi Ferreiro’s mediation programme Exedra εξέδρα, Lasurt offered to paint a “transitional object” and to display it in a balcony of a neighbour of the Ciutat Vella district. In this case, the transitional object is a train from the cartoon series ‘A Little Engine That Could’ (1991) that Meritxell used to watch on VHS with her grandparents as a child.
Photos: Eva Carasol.
28 September 2020: New episode of Incidents (of Travel) from Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico went live! In the latest ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ dispatch from Cabo Rojo, in the southwestern corner of Puerto Rico, and on week 23 of lockdown, Sofía Gallisá and Marina Reyes begin a day together by driving to the Cabo Rojo Salt Flats where Sofía researched her film ‘Assimilate & Destroy I’ (2018).
Incidents (of Travel) is an online project produced by KADIST that explores different corners of the world through chartered day-long travel itineraries as a form of artistic encounters and an extended conversation between a curator and an artist. #IncidentsofTravel
29 September 2020: First video call with El Palomar (Mariokissme and R. Marcos Mota). #PanoramaMACBA
1 October 2020: Beginning of installation of ‘Things Things Say’. Arrival of the works by Stuart Whipps, Sarah Ortmeyer and Annette Kelm at Fabra i Coats. Arterri team transported the pieces from Berlin, Dunkerque and Birmingham to the art centre and were assisted by JBM Muntatges i produccions crew on-site to accommodate the works in the exhibition space.
A socially distant download of Stuart Whipps's car.
JBM Muntatges i produccions crew constructing walls.
Painting by J. Roscolor.
(↑↓ Above and two below) Wall texts and vinyl production by DPR Producció i Exposicions.
17 October 2020: New restrictions against the spread of COVID-19 begin – bars and restaurants would end up closing for a month. The exhibition doors opened with little fanfare at Fabra i Coats although we were grateful that some familiar faces come to join us on this sunny autumn day.
With curators Veronica Valentini, Andrea Rodriguez and Anna Manubens (curator of Wendelien van Oldenborgh's exhibition on the first and second floor).
19 October 2021: Max’s (Contributing editor, frieze magazine since 2015) review of Eulàlia Rovira’s exhibition ‘Esmorteir l'esmorteït’ at EtHALL, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona) publishes on frieze online.
21 October 2020: 365 days left to open Panorama at MACBA. Co-curators are already in sync! #PanoramaMACBA
Hiuwai and Mariana taking a break after two Zoom conversations.
26 October 2020: Video call with Laia Estruch and MACBA’s Eva Font, Hiuwai Chu. #PanoramaMACBA
30 October 2020: New restrictions apply in Catalonia against the spread of COVID-19 provoking the cancellation of all the activities programmed for ‘Things Things Say’, most importantly the one-time screening of Adrià Julià’s ‘Popcorn’ (2012) at Zumzeig Cinema on November 6 – finally able to be rescheduled and screened on January 8, 2021. Guided tours planned for La Nit dels Museus on November 14 (as well as tours planned for November 25, rescheduled for December 9), all have been cancelled, as well as the weekend free tours of the exhibitions at Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Centre of Barcelona.
Adrià Julià, ‘Popcorn’ [Palomita], (2012). Vídeo HD, color, sonido. 90 min. Cortesía del artista.
13 November 2020: Continuing with online conversation-studio visits, this time with Arash Fayez. #PanoramaMACBA
23 November 2020: Site visit of Laia Estruch to MACBA to discuss options for her sculptural intervention for Panorama 21. #PanoramaMACBA
24 November 2020: Second round of photo documentation of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’ / ‘Cosas que las cosas dicen’ / ‘Coses que les coses diuen’ at Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, with photographer Eva Carasol.
→ Photo documentation of the show.
26 November–8 December 2020: One more year, we collaborate with DART Festival 2020 as jury members awarding the best national and international documentary: ‘Tierras construídas’ by Arturo Dueñas (España, 2019. 81 min. Castellano) and ‘The Proposal’ by Jill Magid (México, 2019. 82 min. Inglés). We are accompanied by film critic Quim Casas, and visual artist Jordi Colomer.
1 December 2020: Visiting Stella Rahola’s studio at Piramidón, with fantastic views over the city. #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Eulàlia Rovira.
7 December 2020: Follow-up meeting with Arash Fayez at the museum. #PanoramaMACBA
10 December 2020: Recording a guided visit of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’ on view at Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona as a proxy to the three cancelled guided visits of the show.
Photo: Mónica López.
21 December 2020: Meeting with Toni Hervàs to discuss his ongoing research around Paral·lel. #PanoramaMACBA
22 December 2020: New episode of Incidents (of Travel) from Singapore, following a tour set up by artists Fyerool Darma and Nurul Huda Rashid, and a report by curator Kathleen Ditzig. Incidents (of Travel) is an online project produced by KADIST that explores different corners of the world through chartered day-long travel itineraries as a form of artistic encounters and an extended conversation between a curator and an artist.
Read → incidents.kadist.org
2 January 2021: Always great to visit Rasmus Nilausen’s studio in L’Hospitalet and smell fresh oil paint.
#PanoramaMACBA
8 January 2021: Screening and Q&A of Adrià Julià’s feature film ‘Popcorn’ (2012 90') at cinema Zumzeig, part of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’ ending on January 17, 2021.
9 January 2021: Catching up with Hiuwai in the metro on our way back from Fabra i Coats Centre d’Art Contemporani. #PanoramaMACBA
17 January 2021: ‘Things Things Say’ ends today. Lots of Instagram stories over the last week from visitors. Check social networks archive. Weeks after we learn that 1926 people visited the exhibition over the past three months which, considering pandemic restrictions, is great news. #ThingsThingsSay
18 January 2021: Dismantling of ‘Things Things Say’ exhibition. Always sad to say goodbye to works that have been so present in our minds over the last months. It is unavoidable to think about what remains of a show once it’s gone. In times of COVID-19, this feeling is intensified as fewer people might have had the opportunity to visit, regardless of the circumstances. #ThingsThingsSay
JBM Muntatges i produccions crew and Bea Montoliu (conservation) wrapping up the furniture loaned to form Haegue Yang's piece ‘VIP’s Union’ (2001-2020).
Lifting up the protective glass on Stuart Whipps’s table.
19 January 2021: Videoconference with Antoni Hervàs to talk about his contribution to Panorama 21. #PanoramaMACBA
21 January 2021: Video call with Rosa Tharrats to discuss details of her forthcoming installation at the museum. Around this date, Gabriel Ventura and the editorial Documents Documenta, kindly agreed to give us permission to borrow the title of their latest publication for the Panorama series: ‘Notes for an Eye Fire’, for which we are very grateful. #PanoramaMACBA
22 January 2021: Ruta de Autor tell us to meet nearby the Torre de les Aigües del Besòs, a water deposit built in 1882 by Pere Falqués and offering stunning panoramic views over the city – and a Blinky Palermo piece Himmelsrichtungen in the entrance space. The tower is the headquarters of the Arxiu Històric de Poblenou. #PanoramaMACBA
25 January 2021: Visiting the Centre d’Estudis i Documentació (CED) with Eulàlia Rovira, looking at maps, project proposals and photos of how MACBA was envisioned and ultimately built in the late 80s and early 90s. #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu
Suitable photo albums from the former Panorama photo lab around town.
26 January 2021: Site visit with Claudia Pagès to MACBA to discuss her forthcoming participation in ‘Panorama 21: Apunts per a un incendi dels ulls’ (Notes for an Eye Fire). #PanoramaMACBA
27 January 2021: Once ‘Things Things Say’ is over and the galleries are empty once again. Eulàlia Rovira films ‘A Knot Which is Knot’ (2020-21), her contribution to the recently closed exhibition based on research done throughout the exhibition period, which will premiered a few days later, on February 15.
Photo: Eulàlia Rovira
29 January 2021: Online meeting with Bendita Gloria to go through the materials of the forthcoming publication of ‘Things Things Say’, the exhibition that just ended a few days ago at Fabra i Coats.
1 February 2021: Consecutive meetings with Toni Hervàs, Aleix Plademunt and Marria Pratts to discuss their projects on-site, alongside Eva Font (architecture department) and Berta Cervantes (Exhibition, Project Assistant). #PanoramaMACBA
9 February 2021: Live streamed press conference announcing the 2021–22 season of the Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA). ‘Panorama 21. Apunts per a un incendi dels ulls’ is finally public. #PanoramaMACBA
→ Archive of social media posts.
12 February 2021: Panorama 21 “wefie” after a meeting with Rasmus Nilausen in Gràcia. #PanoramaMACBA
15 February 2021: Eulàlia Rovira’s video ‘A Knot Which is Knot’, 2020 (video, 12min 21 sec, audio in Catalan) is premièred on Fabra i Coats’ YouTube channel. ‘A Knot Which is Knot’ is the result of an investigation that began with the opening ‘Things Things Say’ (Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona, 17 October 2020-17 January 2021), an exhibition curated by Latitudes, which is made public once it has closed and the exhibition galleries are once again empty.
→ Ver vídeo (12' 21'', audio in Catalan)
16 February 2021: First tech checks in the exhibition galleries with Rafa Marcos of El Palomar and MACBA’s A/V technician Miquel Giner, followed by a group meeting with Claudia Pagès to go catch up on her project.
#PanoramaMACBA
19 February 2021: Opening of Lara Almarcegui’s exhibition ‘Graves’ (Gravel) at the Centre d'Art La Panera in Lleida (on view until 30 May 2021). As part of the opening day events, Lara invited visitors to experience the quarry operated by Sorigué in La Plana del Corb, which stopped its operations for a day.
Latitudes contributed a text on her new installation and on March 18 at 6:30pm, participated in a round table online discussion with the artist and Juan Guardiola. Due to mobility restrictions between municipalities, we couldn’t attend the opening.
View of Lara Almarcegui’s exhibition ‘Graves’ (Gravel) at the Centre d'Art La Panera in Lleida. Photo: Jordi V. Pou.
22 February 2021: Video call catch-up with Adrian Schindler (currently in residency at Casa Velázquez in Madrid until June 2021) to discuss his production for Panorama 21, followed by an in-person studio visit with Arash Fayez in Raval. #PanoramaMACBA
Trying to figure out the volume of works in the exhibition space.
2 March 2021: Running some tests of Aleix Plademunt’s work in the exhibition space while it’s empty between shows. #PanoramaMACBA
3 March 2021: Check-in meeting with Eulàlia Rovira on her ongoing research for her Panorama 21 contribution followed by a site visit by Stella Rahola to check natural light. #PanoramaMACBA
8 Març 2021: Laia Estruch visit to discuss the production of her work in the middle of the installation of Felix Gonzalez-Torres show. #PanoramaMACBA
13 March 2021: First trip outside the city in exactly a year (tomorrow is the first anniversary of the declaration of the first state of alarm in Spain). Invited by the Centre d’Art La Panera in Lleida, we were able to attend the opening of David Bestué’s ‘Pastoral’ solo exhibition and Lara Almarcegui’s ‘Graves’ (for which we recently contributed the text of the exhibition). Forthcoming a frieze review of the exhibition by Max in the September 2021 issue.
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| (Above and below) Lara Almarcegui, ‘Gravera’ (2021), vídeo, 10 min. Cámara: Daniel Lacasa; y ‘Rocas y materiales de la Cordillera de los Pirineos’ (2021). Cortesía de la artista. |
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| (Above and below) Installation view of David Bestué’s ‘Pastoral’ at the Centre d'Art la Panera, Lleida. |
18 March 2021: Online conversation with Lara Almarcegui and Juan Guardiola on the occasion of Almarcegui’s solo show ‘Graves’ at Centre d’Art La Panera in Lleida.
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| During the conversation with Lara Almarcegui. 23 March 2021: Catch up with a provider for Laia Estruch’s installation and discussion of Panorama’s identity with graphic designer and ‘Panorama 21’ participant, Ana Domínguez. #PanoramaMACBA   29 March 2021: Morning meeting with Rasmus Nilausen and pm meeting with Gabriel Ventura and Rosa Tharrats to discuss the progress of their respective contributions for Panorama 21, titled after Gabriel’s latest book poem ‘Apunts per a un incendi dels ulls’ (Notes for an Eye Fire). #PanoramaMACBA   7, 14, 21 and 28 April 2021: Four reading groups are programmed this month as part of Adrian Schindler’s project to be presented as part of MACBA's inaugural Panorama exhibition in October 2021. These open-format groups constituted the last step before the production of his film Tetuan, Tetuán, تطوان , the first chapter of which will be shot in Barcelona in late Spring 2021. The reading group “A quienes la inspiraron y no la leerán: Goytisolo, Marruecos y el Otro” (To those who inspired it and will not read it: Goytisolo, Morocco and the Other) proposes a critical approach to the theoretical and fictional work of Spanish writer Juan Goytisolo (1931–2017), influenced by Morocco. Contrasting his ambition to deconstruct the islamophobic literary tradition with the fantasies that inhabit his novels, we will address issues such as the construction of the image of the Other in Spain, the ghosts of the colonial project and the tensions inherent to decolonial works developed by white cultural agents. Participants read excerpts from the novels Reivindicación del conde Don Julián (1970), Juan sin tierra (1975) and Makbara (1980), as well as from the essay collection Crónicas Sarracinas (1981). The sessions were carried out with Salma Amzian, Núria Gómez Gabriel and iki yos piña narváez funes, who contributed to examining Goytisolo’s contradictions and potentialities through other literatures and epistemologies. The meetings took place in the Parc de la Ciutadella, near a colonial monument and an orientalist sculpture. #PanoramaMACBA   2 April 2021: Video call with Claudia Pagès to check in the development of her project while at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. #PanoramaMACBA  7 April 2021: MACBA’s 2021-22 exhibition programme is up. Just over 6 months to the opening. #PanoramaMACBA  9 Abril 2021: Catch up meetings with Ruta de Autor and Nyamnyam (from Montpellier). #PanoramaMACBA   12 April 2021: Publications meeting with Ana Domínguez. #PanoramaMACBA  13 April 2021: Meeting with Adrian Schindler at the museum’s offices to discuss the production of his work for MACBA’s ‘Panorama’. #PanoramaMACBA  15 April 2021: Monthly catch-up with the communication department with dazzling spreadsheets, followed by a visit to Stella Rahola Matutes's project at the Mies van der Rohe Pavilion. Curators’ outfits merging – too many hours together ;-) #PanoramaMACBA   22 April 2021: Design briefing with MACBA’s communication team, Marta Reus and Carla Ventosa, and Panorama 21 designers Ana Domínguez and Lara Coromina, about the exhibition. #PanoramaMACBA  |
30 April 2021: Meet with Arash Fayez and walk through the museum galleries with Ana Domínguez and Lara Coromina, designers of the first edition of MACBA’s Panorama.
#PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu
7 May 2021: Balcony break in between meetings with Eulàlia Rovira and Ruta de Autor. #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu
8 May 2021: Presentation of Agustín Ortiz Herrera’s research ‘To name, to own. Critique of taxonomic practice’ project and publication at the Gabinet Salvador (Institut Botànic de Barcelona), one of the best-preserved examples of a cabinet of curiosities. Agustín’s research is one of the three projects Latitudes mentored throughout 2019–20 as part of the Barcelona Producció season at La Capella.
Representation of the cabinet of curiosities by the Danish naturalist and antiquarian Ole Worm in 1655. Salvador Library, Botanical Institute of Barcelona.
11 May 2021: Recording the teaser to be launched with the announcement of the participants in the inaugural Panorama exhibition. #PanoramaMACBA
12 May 2021: Review of David Bestué’s exhibition ‘Pastoral’ at the Centre d’Art la Panera, Lleida, published online at frieze.com
12 May 2021: Visiting Ana Dominguez studio and lunch with her and Lara Coromina to discuss the elements of the exhibition graphics. #PanoramaMACBA
Some artist portraits for the exhibition website.
17 May 2021: Jitsi catch up with nyamnyam (Iñaki Álvarez and Ariadna Rodríguez) and Pedro Pineda. #PanoramaMACBA
20 May 2021: Catch up with Eulàlia Rovira at the museum. #PanoramaMACBA
22 May 2021: Laia Estruch rehearsing at El Graner. #PanoramaMACBA
Foto: Hiuwai Chu.
28 May 2021: Catch up with Ruta de Autor at the museum. #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu.
1 June 2021: Work meeting at Rasmus Nilausen’s studio in L’Hospitalet. #PanoramaMACBA
4 June 2021: Final presentation of the graphic image of Panorama 21 by Studio Ana Dominguez. #PanoramaMACBA
7 June 2021: Meeting at TMDC in La Verneda with Pedro Pineda and nyamnyam (Ariadna Rodríguez & Iñaki Álvarez). #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu.
8 June 2021: Visiting Rosa Tharrats and Gabriel Ventura in Cadaqués and visit Rosa’s two-person exhibition in the Museu de l’Empordà, Figueres. #PanoramaMACBA
View of the two-person exhibition ‘Tura Sanglas/ Rosa Tharrats: Un diàleg artistic. Subjectivitat de la material, poètica de l’objecte’, curated by Laura Cornejo at Museu de l’Empordà.
‘Les babes de la molsa’ (2020) by Rosa Tharrats.
‘Els ancestres de les anênomes’ (2020) by Rosa Tharrats.
Photo: Ivo Wald.
Photo: Ivo Wald.
Meetings by the shore.
10 June 2021: Visiting Marria Pratts’ studio L’Hospitalet. #PanoramaMACBA
18 June 2021: Round of meetings with nyamnyam followed by Ruta de Autor and Stella Rahola at the museum. #PanoramaMACBA
22 June 2021: Adrian Schindler filming Tetuan, Tetuán, تطوان at Plaça Tetuan. Schindler's project will be presented as part of MACBA’s inaugural Panorama exhibition in October 2021. #PanoramaMACBA
1 July 2021: Announcement of ‘Notes for an Eye Fire’ participants, launch of the web with the graphic image of the Panorama exhibition series: Ana Domínguez, El Palomar (Mariokissme & R. Marcos Mota), Laia Estruch, Arash Fayez, Antoni Hervàs, Rasmus Nilausen, nyamnyam (Ariadna Rodríguez & Iñaki Álvarez) with Pedro Pineda, Claudia Pagès, Aleix Plademunt, Marria Pratts, Stella Rahola Matutes, Eulàlia Rovira, Ruta de autor (Aymara Arreaza R. & Lorena Bou Linhares), Adrian Schindler, Rosa Tharrats, Gabriel Ventura, and Marc Vives. #PanoramaMACBA
6 July 2021: Online catch-up with public programmes Tonina Cerdà and Alicia Escobio. #PanoramaMACBA
Carlos Cruz-Diez at Galería Cayón, Maó.
17 July 2021: Rough cut screening of Adrian Schindler’s filmTetuan, Tetuán, تطوان to be premiered as part of MACBA’s inaugural Panorama exhibition in October 2021. #PanoramaMACBA
Photo: Hiuwai Chu.
26 July 2021: Visiting Toni Hervàs at La Escocesa alongside MACBA’s team Alex Castro, Eva Font and Berta Cervantes (conservation, architecture and coordination). #PanoramaMACBA
→ RELATED CONTENTS:
- Latitudes’ "out of office" 2019–20 season, 3 August 2020
- Latitudes’ "out of office" 2018–19 season, 1 August 2019
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2017–18 season, 2 August 2018
- Latitudes "out of office" 2016–17 season, 1 August 2017
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2015–16 season, 1 August 2016
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2014–15 season, 7 August 2015
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2013–14 season, 31 July 2014
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2012–13 season, 31 July 2013
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2011–12 season, 31 July 2012
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2010–11 season, 1 August 2011
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2009–10 season, 30 July 2010
- Latitudes' "out of office" 2008–9 season, 30 July 2009
Estreno del vídeo “A knot which is not” [Un nus que no ho és] (2020–21) de Eulàlia Rovira
Mon, Feb 15 2021(📷 ↑↓) Eulàlia Rovira, “A knot which is not” [Un nudo que no lo es], 2020–21. Vídeo, 12:21min. Audio en catalán. Cortesía de la artista.
[CAT]
Avui a les 18h (CET) s'estrena el nou vídeo d'Eulàlia Rovira “A knot which is not” [Un nus que no ho és] (2020-21), al canal Youtube de Fabra i Coats.
El vídeo és fruit d’una recerca que l'artista va iniciar amb la inauguració de l’exposició “Coses que les coses diuen” (17 d’octubre de 2020 – 17 de gener de 2021), comissariada per Latitudes a Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Centre of Barcelona, i que es fa pública un cop s’ha clausurat i les sales del centre d'art són novament buides. El vídeo podrà veure's en qualsevol moment després de l'emissió en directe.
“Si bé la línia recta és còmplice de l’abaratiment i l’estandardització de molts productes, a on ens du la corba, o encara millor, el nus? Donant girs a les històries de la mateixa fàbrica tèxtil de la Fabra i Coats i als objectes que en sortien, la llengua que ens parla exercita paraules que les mans semblen haver deixat de reconèixer.” – Eulàlia Rovira
[ES]
El vídeo es fruto de una investigación que la artista inició con la inauguración de “Cosas que las cosas dicen” (17 de octubre de 2020–17 de enero de 2021), la exposición comisariada por Latitudes en Fabra i Coats: Centre d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona, y que se hace pública una vez ha finalizado y las salas expositivas están nuevamente vacías. El vídeo podrá verse en cualquier momento después de la emisión en directo.
“Si bien la línea recta es cómplice del abaratamiento y la estandaritzación de muchos productos, ¿adónde nos lleva la curva, o aún mejor, el nudo? Dando giros a las historias de la propia fábrica textil de la Fabra i Coats y a los objetos que de ella salían, la lengua que nos habla ejercita palabras que las manos parecen haber dejado de reconocer.” – Eulàlia Rovira
[UK]
Today at 6pm (CET) Eulàlia Rovira's new video “A Knot which is Not” [Un nudo que no lo es] (2020-21) is premiered on the YouTube channel of Fabra i Coats.
“Whilst the straight line is complicit in the price decrease and standardisation of many products, where does the curve, or better still, the knot, lead us? Putting a new spin on the stories of the Fabra i Coats textile factory and the objects found there, the language they speak to us uses words that our hands seem to have stopped recognising.” – Eulàlia Rovira
→ CONTENIDO RELACIONADO:
- ‘Things Things Say’ en las redes sociales
- Reseñas: Exposición ‘Cosas que las cosas dicen’ en Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, 11 January 2021
- Trailer and photo documentation of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, 4 Nov 2020
- 6 de noviembre, 17:45h: Proyección ‘Popcorn’ [Palomita] (90', 2012) de Adrià Julià en el Zumzeig Cinema, 29 Oct 2020
- Exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona, 17 October 2020–17 January 2021, 9 Oct 2020
Reseñas: Exposición ‘Cosas que las cosas dicen’ en Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona
Mon, Jan 11 2021
Anuncio en e-flux de la nueva temporada de exposiciones en Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, 17 octubre 2020.
Clàudia Rius, “4 novetats de la Fabra i Coats”, Núvol.com, 19 octubre 2020.
Teresa Sesé, ‘Los objetos hablan: ¡escúchalos!’, La Vanguardia, 20 octubre 2020.
Montse Frisach, “Coses que les coses diuen”, catorze.cat, 21 octubre 2020.
Ramon Casalé Soler, El Temps de les Arts, 27 octubre 2020.
Cabe aclarar que, tal y como publicamos en Twitter el pasado 27 de octubre, ‘Cosas que las cosas dicen’ no se presentó anteriormente en el CAPC musée d'art contemporain de Bordeaux como menciona el articulista, sino que la exposición ha sido un encargo y una producción de Fabra i Coats: Centre d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona.
Eduardo de Vicente, ‘Historias explicadas por objetos’, el periódico, 16 diciembre 2020.
c/ Sant Adrià, 20
08030 Barcelona
#CosesQueLesCosesDiuen
#CosasQueLasCosasDicen
#ThingsThingsSay
📽Tráiler
(CAST) https://youtu.be/XI5ftjWUjVo
🗺Guía
Narrada por la artista Eulàlia Rovira (click y escoge idioma)
→ CONTENIDO RELACIONADO:
- ‘Things Things Say’ en las redes sociales
- 6 de noviembre, 17:45h: Proyección ‘Popcorn’ [Palomita] (90', 2012) de Adrià Julià en el Zumzeig Cinema, 29 Oct 2020
- Exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona, 17 October 2020–17 January 2021, 9 Oct 2020
2020 in 11 monthly Cover Stories
Mon, Dec 28 2020Since Spring 2015, Latitudes has published a monthly cover story on its homepage www.lttds.org featuring past, present or forthcoming projects, as well as ongoing research, texts, artworks, exhibitions, films, objects or travel related to our curatorial practice. Here's how 2020 looked like on our homepage.
#Latitudes15Years, 2020, art-agenda, Barcelona Producció, cover story, Incidents of Travel, latitudes, looking back, Projects, things things say, writing
Episode #14 of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Kathleen Ditzig with Fyerool Darma and Nurul Huda Rashid from Singapore
Mon, Dec 21 2020
In the 14th dispatch, Singapore-based curator Kathleen Ditzig joins artists Fyerool Darma and Nurul Huda Rashid nearby ‘Safe Entry‘ (2020), a mural presented at the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) by the artist Heman Chong that repeats a single, enlarged QR code, “the new digital skin of the city”, as Nurul points out. From there, they head towards the boardwalk connecting Harbourfront with Sentosa Island, the pleasure island home to many tourist attractions. Fyerool and Nurul weave in stories of past pirates and deities against the backdrop of the glass-green waters that stage the “blue aesthetics against the imported sands [from Indonesia] of reclaimed lands.”
Incidents (of Travel) site presents one continuous immersive read interwoven with images and short videos in a mobile-friendly format.
📲 TAP, SCROLL and SWIPE!
Incidents (of Travel) was conceived in 2012 when Latitudes commissioned 5 day-long artist-led tours around Mexico City in the framework of a short residency at Casa del Lago. The project had sequels in 2013 in Hong Kong with online dispatches published live via social media, including soundscapes (archived on Soundcloud), and in 2015 in San Francisco with daily posts as part of Kadist's Instagram take over “Artist Not In The Studio Curator Not At The Office”.
A year later, KADIST and Latitudes partnered in a new ‘distributed’ phase of Incidents (of Travel) extending the invitation to curators and artists working around the world and publishing their dispatches as part of KADIST's Online Projects.
Since 2016, fourteen conversations have taken place in Singapore (Singapore), Cabo Rojo (Puerto Rico), Tbilisi (Georgia), Panama City (Panama), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Reykjavík (Iceland), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Hobart (Tasmania), Yerevan (Armenia), Terengganu (Malaysia), Lisbon (Portugal), Suzhou (China), Jinja (Uganda) and Chicago (US).
The second dispatch came from Jinja in Uganda, where curator Moses Serubiri invited photographer Mohsen Taha to explore Jinja's Indian architectural legacy and Idi Amin's notorious expulsion of Uganda's Asian minority in 1972.
The third episode took place while curator Yu Ji and poet Xiao Kaiyu hiked on Dong Shan (East Mountain), 130 km west of Shanghai, on a peninsula stretching into Tai Hu lake near the city of Suzhou, China.
The fourth dispatch came from Lisbon, where Galician curator Pedro de Llano visited key locations that marked the life and work of Luisa Cunha.
The fifth episode took place in April 2016, when curator Simon Soon and artist chi too visited the Malaysian North Eastern state of Terengganu, where chi spent some time in 2013, surrounded by “men and women who work(ed) multiple jobs as fishermen, housebuilders, boat builders, farmers, coconut pickers, food producers, and everything else that matters.”
The sixth episode narrates a walking itinerary conducted by curator Marianna Hovhannisyan with Vardan Kilichyan, Gohar Hosyan, and Anaida Verdyan in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, documenting the transformed, disappeared, or permanently-closed art institutions in the city centre.
The seventh episode comes from Hobart, capital of Tasmania. It is narrated by curator Camila Marambio, following an itinerary devised by artist Lucy Bleach. They spent the day "encircling the outer limits of human understanding by visiting the histories, both past, and present, of attempts to reach beyond our sensory capacities through governance, technology, and reverie", and ended the day cooking at Lucy's home-sharing their mutual love for quinces.
In the eighth 'Incidents (of Travel)' dispatch Móvil co-founder and curator Alejandra Aguado followed the itinerary devised by the artist Diego Bianchi around Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Their exploration took them from the self-regulated community Velatropa to the buzzing commercial area of Once, identifying human and non-human flows and interactions. This became an entry point for discussing Bianchi's interests in how, as consumers, we define a particular zeitgeist and appropriate trends that enable us to affirm our identities.
In the ninth dispatch, Canadian curator Becky Forsythe and Icelandic artist Þorgerður Ólafsdóttir navigate Reykjavík's surroundings considering Þorgerður's “current interest in Icelandic Spar (a form of transparent calcite), its double refraction and light-polarizing properties. In a race with daylight, they travel between sites collecting moments and considering the ways in which geologic time surfaces in the context of human time.”
The tenth dispatch begins with an itinerary proposed by Barcelona-born, Rio de Janeiro-based artist Daniel Steegmann Mangrané and is followed by images and videos recording a day roaming Rio's natural and artistic landscapes with Bogotá-born, Mexico City-based curator Catalina Lozano, who narrates their day spent together.
In the 11th episode, Swiss curator Sandino Scheidegger (Random Institute) visits Panama City in preparation for a solo exhibition by Donna Conlon and Jonathan Harker at Casa Santa Ana in 2021. Conlon and Harker collaboration since 2006 (while also pursuing their own individual art practices) has resulted in seventeen video works to date. The places Sandino, Donna and Jonathan visited together pointed to the origin of some of their video works, the ideas behind them, or simply served as stages in their pieces, turning into “an exercise in sneaking through fences to reach former recycling plants, imagining how things looked before the skyscrapers took over, and navigating the complex social fabric of Panama City — all while getting a taste of local food between every stop.”
The 12th episode from Tbilisi, Georgia, set a different tone in the online series as it was programmed to take place in late May 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. The itinerary set by Tbilisi-based artist Nino Kvrivishvili to lead Melbourne-based Associate Professor Tara McDowell became a WhatsApp video tour/conversation around Nino's artistic practice and the Georgian silk industry — a production that began in Tbilisi in the 5th century and continued until the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s.
In the 13th dispatch, and on week 23 of lockdown, Sofía Gallisá and Marina Reyes begin their day together driving to the Cabo Rojo Salt Flats where Sofía researched her 2018 film ‘Assimilate & Destroy I’. They later end up in Poblado de Boquerón, the queer capital of Puerto Rico's south where a large public beach and a usually busy street still show traces of 2017’s devastating Hurricane Maria.
→ RELATED CONTENT:
Episode #13 of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Marina Reyes and Sofía Gallisá from Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, 27 Sep 2020
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=7159211982397983135/episode-12-of-incidents-of-travel
Episode #11 of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Sandino Scheidegger and Donna Conlon & Jonathan Harker from Panama City, 9 April 2020
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=4425215029591365006/11-episode-of-incidents-of-travel
Tenth episode of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Catalina Lozano and Daniel Steegmann Mangrané from Rio de Janeiro,
29 January 2020
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=144735152408473327/tenth-episode-of-incidents-of-travel
The ninth episode of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Becky Forsythe and Þorgerður Ólafsdóttir, 8 February 2019
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=6371927610418460689
The eighth episode of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Alejandra Aguado and Diego Bianchi, 6 September 2019
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=8721104601538735691
Seventh episode of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Camila Marambio and Lucy Bleach from Hobart, Tasmania, 28 June 2018
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=1055853895543348027
The sixth episode of ‘Incidents (of Travel)’ – Dispatch by Marianna Hovhannisyan and students from the National Center of Aesthetics from Yerevan, Armenia, 1 March 2018
http://www.lttds.org/blog/blog.php?id=5887133486742947361
The fifth episode of 'Incidents (of Travel)' – Dispatch by Simon Soon and chi too from Terengganu, Malaysia, 26 April 2017
http://www.lttds.org/blog/blog.php?id=4083951540089486920
The fourth episode of 'Incidents (of Travel)' – Dispatch by Pedro de Llano and Luisa Cunha from Lisbon, Portugal, 2 March 2017
http://www.lttds.org/blog/blog.php?id=4185860148466062617
The third episode of 'Incidents (of Travel)' – Dispatch by Yu JI and Xiao Kaiyu reporting from Suzhou, China, 6 September 2016
http://www.lttds.org/blog/blog.php?id=1437935620149738144
Second 'Incidents (of Travel)' dispatch by Moses Serubiri and Mohsen Taha reporting from Jinja, Uganda, 30 June 2016
https://www.lttds.org/longitudes/index.php?id=2504250800654900933
Kadist and Latitudes present 'Incidents (Of Travel)' online, 31 May 2016
http://www.lttds.org/blog/blog.php?id=1076947282278624159
Cover Story—December 2020: ‘Things Things Say’: ‘This Action Lies’
Tue, Dec 1 2020
Latitudes' homepage www.lttds.org
“One Taste and You’ll Understand. That was Dunkin’ Donuts slogan in 2001. A year earlier: Loosen Up a Little. Then a bit later: Just the Thing. 2002–2004. Bring Yourself Back. 2004–2006. Now it’s America Runs on Dunkin’, but you get the point.”
→ Continue reading
→ After December 2020 this story will be archived here.
Cover Stories' are published on a monthly basis on Latitudes' homepage featuring past, present or forthcoming projects, research, texts, artworks, exhibitions, films, objects or field trips related to our curatorial projects and activities.
→ RELATED CONTENTS:
→ After December 2020 this story will be archived here.
Cover Stories' are published on a monthly basis on Latitudes' homepage featuring past, present or forthcoming projects, research, texts, artworks, exhibitions, films, objects or field trips related to our curatorial projects and activities.
→ RELATED CONTENTS:
- Archive of Monthly Cover Stories
- Cover Story—November 2020: ‘Things Things Say’: Stuart Whipps’, 1 Nov 2020
- Cover Story—October 2020: Incidents (of Travel) Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, 2 Oct 2020
- Cover Story—September 2020: States of emergency—Lola Lasurt’s ‘Children’s Game’, 1 Sept 2020
- Cover Story—August 2020: ‘Màquina possible’: going viral at Can Balaguer, 1 Aug 2020
- Cover Story—July 2020: Nino Kvrivishvili’s silk roads: Incidents (of Travel), Tbilisi, 1 Jul 2020
- Cover Story—June 2020: Mataró Chauffeur Service, since 2010, 1 June 2020
- Cover Story—May 2020: Panama, back through the lens, 4 May 2020
- Cover Story—March-April 2020: The Bolós Cabinet, 3 March 2020
- Cover Story—February 2020: Carioca Incidents, 3 February 2020
- Cover Story—January 2020: Safeguarding Gestures, 2 January 2020
Trailer and photo documentation of the exhibition ‘Things Things Say’
Wed, Nov 4 2020→ Exhibition trailer 📽
(CAST) https://youtu.be/XI5ftjWUjVo
→ Exhibition Guide 🗺
‘Things Things Say’ is an exhibition at Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Centre of Barcelona (17 October 2020–17 January 2021) presenting sculpture, photography, films, text and voice by Adrià Julià, Annette Kelm, James N. Kienitz Wilkins, Sarah Ortmeyer, Eulàlia Rovira, Francesc Serra i Dimas, Stuart Whipps, Haegue Yang, as well as meaningful things from the Friends of Fabra i Coats archive.
The exhibition springs from the past of Fabra i Coats—an industrial complex once dedicated to the manufacturing of cotton thread. Taking on the genre of the ‘it-narrative’ in 18th century English literature—as well as the approaches of object journalism and microhistory—the exhibition tacks back-and-forth between “exceptionally normal” things and the extraordinary global narratives of labour, obsolescence, and the industrialisation of nature, that they trigger.
Curated by Latitudes
#CosesQueLesCosesDiuen
#CosasQueLasCosasDicen
#ThingsThingsSay
c/ Sant Adrià, 20
08030 Barcelona, Spain
⏰ Tuesday to Saturday 12–8pm, Sunday 11am–3pm
→ RELATED CONTENT:
- ‘Things Things Say’ in social networks
- 6 de noviembre, 17:45h: Proyección ‘Popcorn’ [Palomita] (90', 2012) de Adrià Julià en el Zumzeig Cinema, 29 Oct 2020
- Exhibition ‘Things Things Say’, Fabra i Coats: Contemporary Art Center of Barcelona, 17 October 2020–17 January 2021, 9 Oct 2020
Cover Story—November 2020: ‘Things Things Say’: Stuart Whipps’
Sun, Nov 1 2020“Another car strike. Marvellous, isn’t it? The taxpayers pay ’em millions each year, they get the money, go on strike. It’s called socialism. If they don’t like making cars, why don’t they get themselves another bloody job—designing cathedrals or composing violin concertos. The British Leyland Concerto—in four movements, all of them slow, with a four-hour tea-break in between...”
→ Continue reading
→ After November 2020 this story will be archived here.
Cover Stories' are published on a monthly basis on Latitudes' homepage featuring past, present or forthcoming projects, research, texts, artworks, exhibitions, films, objects or field trips related to our curatorial projects and activities.
→ RELATED CONTENTS:
→ After November 2020 this story will be archived here.
Cover Stories' are published on a monthly basis on Latitudes' homepage featuring past, present or forthcoming projects, research, texts, artworks, exhibitions, films, objects or field trips related to our curatorial projects and activities.
→ RELATED CONTENTS:
- Archive of Monthly Cover Stories
- Cover Story—October 2020: Incidents (of Travel) Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, 2 Oct 2020
- Cover Story—September 2020: States of emergency—Lola Lasurt’s ‘Children’s Game’, 1 Sept 2020
- Cover Story—August 2020: ‘Màquina possible’: going viral at Can Balaguer, 1 Aug 2020
- Cover Story—July 2020: Nino Kvrivishvili’s silk roads: Incidents (of Travel), Tbilisi, 1 Jul 2020
- Cover Story—June 2020: Mataró Chauffeur Service, since 2010, 1 June 2020
- Cover Story—May 2020: Panama, back through the lens, 4 May 2020
- Cover Story—March-April 2020: The Bolós Cabinet, 3 March 2020
- Cover Story—February 2020: Carioca Incidents, 3 February 2020
- Cover Story—January 2020: Safeguarding Gestures, 2 January 2020
Research project ‘Naming, possessing Critique of taxonomic practice’ by Agustín Ortiz Herrera, Barcelona Producció 2019–2020
Wed, Oct 21 2020
Photo: Agustín Ortiz Herrera
As part of Agustín Ortiz Herrera's research project ‘Naming, possessing Critique of taxonomic practice’, awarded the grant Barcelona Producció 2019-2020 from La Capella (and one of the three projects mentored by Latitudes throughout the 2019–20 season), and organised in collaboration with Hangar's Fictions of Dis-order programme, Ortiz Herrera presents a series of guided tours and reading sessions where queer strategies will be questioning the narratives agreed upon by the modern scientific construct, introducing a decolonial narrative, and thus unveiling the secrets of plant species such as Sparrmannia, Washingtonia or Tulbaghia.
‘The colonial garden. Deconstructing the narratives of modern taxonomy’
Agustín Ortiz Herrera
To Name, To Own. Critique of Taxonomic Practice
Research Project
1 Linnaeus was the first to use it consistently throughout his book, although the system now known as binomial nomenclature was partially developed by the brothers Gaspard and Johann Bauhin 200 years earlier.
2 Linnaeus published 12 editions of Systema Naturae during his lifetime. The 10th edition from 1758 is considered the starting point of zoological nomenclature.
3 Sir James Edward Smith purchased Linnaeus’s botanical, zoological and library collections for 1,000 guineas to found The Linnean Society of London in 1788. It was at a meeting of the Society in 1858 that papers from Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace outlining the theory of evolution by natural selection were first presented. https://www.linnean.org
4 The Salvador family were a dynasty of apothecaries and naturalists from Barcelona that between the 17th and 19th centuries collected over 14,000 specimens. The Gabinet Salvador is the most important example of a Cabinet of Curiosities or wunderkammer in the country, a presentation format which predates the invention of the modern museum and the separation between the sciences and the humanities. https://museuciencies.cat/es/area-cientifica/colecciones/coleccion-salvador/
5 With its origins in the 17th century, the Gabinet Salvador includes the oldest known herbarium in Spain, as well as books, documents, collections of molluscs, fossils, and stuffed animals. The Zoology Museum of Barcelona was located in the Modernista building known as the ‘Castle of the Three Dragons’ between 1920 and 2010 when it was relocated and changed its name to Museu de Ciències Naturals de Barcelona (Museum of Natural Sciences of Barcelona, aka the ‘Museu Blau’).
6 Teresa Castro, The Mediated Plant, e-flux Journal #102, September 2019, https://www.e-flux.com/journal/102/283819/the-mediated-plant/
7 Emanuele Coccia, The Life of Plants: A Metaphysics of Mixture, Polity Press, 2018.
‘The colonial garden. Deconstructing the narratives of modern taxonomy’
Activity: Urban Route around the streets of Poblenou
Date: Friday 23 October 2020, 6–7:30 pm
Ortiz Herrera invites us to join him on a tour that aims to bring to light forgotten episodes in the development of botanical knowledge during the modern project while experimenting with queer/cuir confrontation strategies.
Meeting place to be confirmed. Participants will be notified.
Capacity: 20 people.
Date: Friday 23 October 2020, 6–7:30 pm
Ortiz Herrera invites us to join him on a tour that aims to bring to light forgotten episodes in the development of botanical knowledge during the modern project while experimenting with queer/cuir confrontation strategies.
Meeting place to be confirmed. Participants will be notified.
Capacity: 20 people.
Booking essential: lacapella@bcn.cat
Activity: Guided tour of the Barcelona Botanical Gardens
Date: Saturday 24 October 2020,11.30–13:30 am
During this second dérive, historical events will be explained using a methodology of situated knowledge that exposes the scale of the strategy of the cabinet of curiosities in botanical gardens.
Meeting place to be confirmed. Participants will be notified.
Capacity: 20 people.
Activity: Guided tour of the Barcelona Botanical Gardens
Date: Saturday 24 October 2020,11.30–13:30 am
During this second dérive, historical events will be explained using a methodology of situated knowledge that exposes the scale of the strategy of the cabinet of curiosities in botanical gardens.
Meeting place to be confirmed. Participants will be notified.
Capacity: 20 people.
Booking essential: lacapella@bcn.cat
Activity: Modern Nature: a tribute to Derek Jarman
Date: Thursday 5 November 2020, 6–8 pm
Activity: Modern Nature: a tribute to Derek Jarman
Date: Thursday 5 November 2020, 6–8 pm
Location: Hangar (Sala Ricson)
Reading group and discussion around Derek Jarman’s book Modern Nature. We will also be talking about Jarman’s film The Garden (1990) and his design for his garden at Prospect Cottage in the south-east of England.
Capacity: 40 people.
Reading group and discussion around Derek Jarman’s book Modern Nature. We will also be talking about Jarman’s film The Garden (1990) and his design for his garden at Prospect Cottage in the south-east of England.
Capacity: 40 people.
Booking essential: https://forms.gle/4MQQXy72SwBxpV6V7
Organised by Hangar. With the support of Caja Negra Editorial.
Organised by Hangar. With the support of Caja Negra Editorial.
Agustín Ortiz Herrera (Barcelona, 1970) works between moving image and performance. He studied Fine Arts at the University of Barcelona (1998), film-making in New York (2003) and obtained an MA in Fine Arts at the Konstfack College of Arts, Stockholm (2016). Recent exhibitions include Oblivion at K.R.O.P.P., Uppsala Konsert & Kongress, Uppsala (2019), Konst tar plats at Österbybruk, Sweden (2018), Potenciación a largo plazo at Paratext 24, Hangar, Barcelona (2017) and El umbral de primavera, Madrid (2018). He is currently resident at Hangar – Visual Arts Production and Research Centre in Barcelona.
Co-produced in the context of the “Fictions of Dis-order” programme of Hangar's Research and Transfer of Knowledges activities.
Co-produced in the context of the “Fictions of Dis-order” programme of Hangar's Research and Transfer of Knowledges activities.
Agustín Ortiz Herrera, Laboratori de Natura, Museu de Ciències Naturals de Barcelona, Video Still, 2020.
To Name, To Own. Critique of Taxonomic Practice
Research Project
Barcelona Producció 2019–2020
→ Download this text as a pdf
Agustín Ortiz Herrera’s research project To Name, To Own. Critique of Taxonomic Practice focuses on taxonomy and the modern classification system for natural species developed by Swedish botanist, zoologist, and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778). Linnaeus’s most notable contribution to science was his invention of a system of binomial nomenclature for naming organisms. For example, the two-term name Homo sapiens describes the only living species of the genus Homo: humans. This convention became universally accepted and the nested hierarchy became quickly consolidated as the dominant cognitive basis of the Western worldview of nature.[1] Linnaeus’s 1735 volume Systema Naturae not only classified the natural world, it also gendered it and thereby conditioned an understanding of natural history as a highly patriarchal structure. This condition has transcended science and come to dominate other fields of culture and knowledge.[2]
Ortiz has carried out his research in botanical collections, academic centres, and libraries specialising in Linnaeus’s scientific work located in Uppsala, Sweden (where Linnaeus ultimately became rector of the city’s university) and London (where the world’s oldest active biological society, The Linnean Society of London, was established in 1788).[3] Honouring the Society’s motto “Naturae Discere Mores” (To Learn the Ways of Nature), Ortiz furthermore connects Linnaeus’s legacy with two key nodes of research in Spain: the Gabinet Salvador at the Botanical Institute of Barcelona and the former Museum of Zoology in Barcelona’s Ciutadella Park.[4] In doing so he aims to bring taxonomic paradigms into the present and to critique them against recent and emerging post-human, queer, feminist and decolonial theories.[5]
Taking up Teresa Castro’s call for “queering nature” and “queering botanics”, Ortiz’s research refuses the anthropocentric and dualistic conception that has separated humans from non-humans in order to go beyond the constraints of Western exceptionalism and its colonising grip.[6] Castro has identified a “plant turn” in current fields of knowledge and creation, where philosophers including Emanuele Coccia are inviting us to think about and with vegetation or fungi and to consider herbivorous or fungal relations and non-hierarchical modes of being. Such an approach chimes with the Brazilian anthropologist Eduardo Viveiros de Castro’s call for “decolonising thought” and to contest the hierarchical relationships between “our” thoughts and those of others.[7]
Another important point of Ortiz’s research has been foregrounding the scientific work of Lynn Margulis (1938–2011), the unorthodox scientist whose theories around evolution and symbiosis were often mocked and ignored by the male establishment for appearing to contradict Charles Darwin’s dogma of natural selection. As a proponent of the endosymbiotic theory, Margulis posited that simple life forms merged, forming cell organelles, like mitochondria. Life, she believed, is a symbiotic and cooperative union that allows those who associate to succeed, a theory that later has been widely accepted and substantiated.
Ortiz’s research introduces queer epistemologies through a series of gatherings, an urban walking tour and a collective reading. The first will be a two-hour guided tour around Poblenou to identify and discuss plant taxonomy and its colonial provenance. A similar tour will take place the following day in Montjuïc’s Botanical Garden, where Agustín will lead a discussion within the framework of a man-made “natural” environment.
A third activity, developed in collaboration with Hangar – Visual Arts Production and Research Centre in Barcelona as part of its Fictions of Dis-order programme, will consist of a collective reading of Derek Jarman’s Modern Nature. Published in 1991, this biography is a diary of the British film-maker, artist and activist on his late years at Prospect Cottage, on the arid Kent coast in south-east England. Jarman purchased this fisherman’s house in Dungeness in 1986 shortly after being diagnosed as HIV positive, with the aim of withdrawing in the years before his death (in 1994). The now-iconic black timber cottage with yolk yellow window frames is overlooked by the imposing Dungeness nuclear power station and surrounded by a vast shingle beach and a noteworthy garden, the boundaries of which he described as the horizon.
— Latitudes
Agustín Ortiz Herrera’s research project To Name, To Own. Critique of Taxonomic Practice focuses on taxonomy and the modern classification system for natural species developed by Swedish botanist, zoologist, and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778). Linnaeus’s most notable contribution to science was his invention of a system of binomial nomenclature for naming organisms. For example, the two-term name Homo sapiens describes the only living species of the genus Homo: humans. This convention became universally accepted and the nested hierarchy became quickly consolidated as the dominant cognitive basis of the Western worldview of nature.[1] Linnaeus’s 1735 volume Systema Naturae not only classified the natural world, it also gendered it and thereby conditioned an understanding of natural history as a highly patriarchal structure. This condition has transcended science and come to dominate other fields of culture and knowledge.[2]
Ortiz has carried out his research in botanical collections, academic centres, and libraries specialising in Linnaeus’s scientific work located in Uppsala, Sweden (where Linnaeus ultimately became rector of the city’s university) and London (where the world’s oldest active biological society, The Linnean Society of London, was established in 1788).[3] Honouring the Society’s motto “Naturae Discere Mores” (To Learn the Ways of Nature), Ortiz furthermore connects Linnaeus’s legacy with two key nodes of research in Spain: the Gabinet Salvador at the Botanical Institute of Barcelona and the former Museum of Zoology in Barcelona’s Ciutadella Park.[4] In doing so he aims to bring taxonomic paradigms into the present and to critique them against recent and emerging post-human, queer, feminist and decolonial theories.[5]
Taking up Teresa Castro’s call for “queering nature” and “queering botanics”, Ortiz’s research refuses the anthropocentric and dualistic conception that has separated humans from non-humans in order to go beyond the constraints of Western exceptionalism and its colonising grip.[6] Castro has identified a “plant turn” in current fields of knowledge and creation, where philosophers including Emanuele Coccia are inviting us to think about and with vegetation or fungi and to consider herbivorous or fungal relations and non-hierarchical modes of being. Such an approach chimes with the Brazilian anthropologist Eduardo Viveiros de Castro’s call for “decolonising thought” and to contest the hierarchical relationships between “our” thoughts and those of others.[7]
Another important point of Ortiz’s research has been foregrounding the scientific work of Lynn Margulis (1938–2011), the unorthodox scientist whose theories around evolution and symbiosis were often mocked and ignored by the male establishment for appearing to contradict Charles Darwin’s dogma of natural selection. As a proponent of the endosymbiotic theory, Margulis posited that simple life forms merged, forming cell organelles, like mitochondria. Life, she believed, is a symbiotic and cooperative union that allows those who associate to succeed, a theory that later has been widely accepted and substantiated.
Ortiz’s research introduces queer epistemologies through a series of gatherings, an urban walking tour and a collective reading. The first will be a two-hour guided tour around Poblenou to identify and discuss plant taxonomy and its colonial provenance. A similar tour will take place the following day in Montjuïc’s Botanical Garden, where Agustín will lead a discussion within the framework of a man-made “natural” environment.
A third activity, developed in collaboration with Hangar – Visual Arts Production and Research Centre in Barcelona as part of its Fictions of Dis-order programme, will consist of a collective reading of Derek Jarman’s Modern Nature. Published in 1991, this biography is a diary of the British film-maker, artist and activist on his late years at Prospect Cottage, on the arid Kent coast in south-east England. Jarman purchased this fisherman’s house in Dungeness in 1986 shortly after being diagnosed as HIV positive, with the aim of withdrawing in the years before his death (in 1994). The now-iconic black timber cottage with yolk yellow window frames is overlooked by the imposing Dungeness nuclear power station and surrounded by a vast shingle beach and a noteworthy garden, the boundaries of which he described as the horizon.
— Latitudes
1 Linnaeus was the first to use it consistently throughout his book, although the system now known as binomial nomenclature was partially developed by the brothers Gaspard and Johann Bauhin 200 years earlier.
2 Linnaeus published 12 editions of Systema Naturae during his lifetime. The 10th edition from 1758 is considered the starting point of zoological nomenclature.
3 Sir James Edward Smith purchased Linnaeus’s botanical, zoological and library collections for 1,000 guineas to found The Linnean Society of London in 1788. It was at a meeting of the Society in 1858 that papers from Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace outlining the theory of evolution by natural selection were first presented. https://www.linnean.org
4 The Salvador family were a dynasty of apothecaries and naturalists from Barcelona that between the 17th and 19th centuries collected over 14,000 specimens. The Gabinet Salvador is the most important example of a Cabinet of Curiosities or wunderkammer in the country, a presentation format which predates the invention of the modern museum and the separation between the sciences and the humanities. https://museuciencies.cat/es/area-cientifica/colecciones/coleccion-salvador/
5 With its origins in the 17th century, the Gabinet Salvador includes the oldest known herbarium in Spain, as well as books, documents, collections of molluscs, fossils, and stuffed animals. The Zoology Museum of Barcelona was located in the Modernista building known as the ‘Castle of the Three Dragons’ between 1920 and 2010 when it was relocated and changed its name to Museu de Ciències Naturals de Barcelona (Museum of Natural Sciences of Barcelona, aka the ‘Museu Blau’).
6 Teresa Castro, The Mediated Plant, e-flux Journal #102, September 2019, https://www.e-flux.com/journal/102/283819/the-mediated-plant/
7 Emanuele Coccia, The Life of Plants: A Metaphysics of Mixture, Polity Press, 2018.
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