Discover Barcelona during the eighties at the MACBA
You can walk around Barcelona and admire the current atmosphere of the city or go to the MACBA (Museu d’Art Contemporani) and discover Barcelona in the eighties. ‘Barcelona, 1978-1997… Manolo Laguillo’ explores a large part of the work of photographer Manolo Laguillo (Madrid, 1953) and specifically the part that concentrates on representation of Barcelona. And it will do so from the hypothesis of the close relation between his work and the construction of an image of the city through photography in the crucial decade of the eighties.
Manolo Laguillo’s importance in the eighties was precisely to make up a reference work which departed from the advertising image of Barcelona with the new town planning, which brought the great transformation that culminated in the Olympic Games in 1992. At that time numerous photographic works appeared which focused their attention on that transformation, though in general they did so from a celebratory perspective, aligning themselves with the dominant discourse in the city. In this context, Laguillo’s work can be seen as a forerunner of works which, especially in the nineties, have tried to construct a more critical and complex image of the city, attempting to give shape to other realities that were left out of the pomp of the celebratory discourse.
The exhibition is divided in two areas. The first begins with Laguillo´s initial work between 1978 and 1983 and ends with a series done in the zone of the border of L`Hospitalet in 1997. A second room presents a new work, done with digital technology, which documents a series of photographic explorations of the present outskirts of the city beyond the natural boundaries of the metropolitan area, the Llobregat and Besos valleys as far as the rops of the Collserola sierra.
Useful Info
Macba ’Barcelona, 1978-1997 … Manolo Laguillo’ 2 March - 6 May 2007
Plaça dels Angels, 1
08001 Barcelona
Tel +34 93 412 08 10
Fax +34 93 412 46 02
