Every now and then I think of this Edward Keating photograph of the dust settling on objects after the towers fell on September 11th. I remember seeing it in the New York Times on my parent's kitchen table, and thinking it was so much more striking than the photos of the crashes themselves or the people jumping (which, luckily, I have never seen).
I mean to say nothing more than that I think about it. It's a beautiful photo, I wish I could find a better image of it.
The first of a collection of found pieces representing nature, painted in grays and whites to isolate them from their intended decorative properties and reveal their actual essence (or lack thereof).
One one of the last days of 2008, happily on vacation in Barcelona, I stopped in at the Museu D'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA). In addition to the permanent collection there was an exhibit up entitled Universal Archive: The Condition of the Document and the Modern Photographic Utopia. Traveling with four others who all saw the exhibit at different times, we all felt at least one thing about it: it was in need of a good editor.
The first problem that presents itself is the layout of the show. The museum lacks a flow from room to room, which doesn't disrupt the diverse permanent collection but makes for an interrupted thought process when viewing one exhibit. The entrances to rooms were often blocked off with wall text, causing a distracting traffic jam at the start of each room. Funneling into one of the rooms, visitors are greeted by an astounding amount of photography. In the introductory essay in the companion book all visitors are given when entering, Jorge Ribalta writes that, "[t]he exhibition provides a historiographic prototype, not a visualization of a single linear account of the history of photography, but a constellation of accounts of the genealogy and trajectory of certain discourses. To this end, the different parts are articulated as specific, temporal, interconnected points of reference, making clear continuities as well as discontinuities."
This "constellation of accounts" is organized as divisively as possible; individual rooms are filled with "Politics of the Victim", "Public Photographic Spaces", "Comparative Photography", "Topographics", "The Photographic Construction of Barcelona in the 20th Century" and "2007 - Metropolitan Images of the New Barcelona". Indeed, the last two themes alone fill the second floor of the exhibit. The entire history of photography for the rest of the world has it's own (equally sized) floor, which visitors pass through first. The first few rooms are devoted to the "Politics of the Victim" and feature documentation of worker's struggles, child labor, Weimar-era Germany and America around the start of World War II. There is an interesting newsreel from America entitled, "The Plow that broke the Plains" which could just have easily been included in the propaganda section. The "Victim" rooms were my favorites, but I suspect this is at least in part because the sheer amount of energy required to sort through all the photographs in this show was a drain on my enthusiasm. By the time I reached the Barcelona floor, which is much less broad in scope, narrative in style, and (in a word) relavent, I was honestly worn out.
The problem that arises in Universal Archives is not the works themselves, but the "show" itself. The Propaganda section is an interesting exception, displaying fascist propaganda in the way it was shown in it's day, all black and red backdrops and powerful displays. There is also an interesting moving picture (forgive the pun) showing footage of Steichen's Family of Man exhibit at the time of it's world tour. Even the Barcelona section, startlingly narrow in it's worldview as compared to the first floor, has interesting pieces, although not as many. The problem is that there is just too much of everything. The "constellation" of photography starts to feel more like a galaxy as you walk past hundreds and hundreds of documents. And the organization of these photographs into specific places in both time and space (often interpreted as 'nation') does more to highlight the disconnections between cultures than the connections of photography. A bit of shaking up and a bit of paring down would have done Universal Archive a world of good.
Nothing needs to be said here about the architecture of the museum, of which much as already been written. The permanent collection is quite unique, casting an eye not only to Europe but other Spanish-speaking countries in the Western Hemisphere. A few personal favorites include David Goldblatt's prints of South African Apartheid-era advertisements, (an example can be seen here), Öyvind Falhström's Second Feast on Edlund drawing, an strange composition in reds and blacks, and Vito Acconci's "Open Book" video, in which the artist reads from a text about openness without closing his mouth, which takes up most of the frame. Oddly enough, I found that video on YouTube:
Also an exciting (and long overdue) discovery on my part was the work of Marcel Broodthaers, whose thought process and meands and methods of expression could not be a more timely discovery for me.
I feel as though I should write about Barcelona a bit, though this really isn't meant to be a travel blog. I have put some photos up on my flickr site, but none of the Holga shots have been developed yet. These are just tourist photos.
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I'm not lucky enough to say, "generally, when I travel" with any meaning behind it, because most of the trips I've been on have been arranged or at least paid for by someone else, whether it's been studying/traveling abroad or accompanying generous friends in their travels. However, generally when I travel I like to know a bit about the country, know at least enough of the language to show some respect for it, and have a good idea of a few things that I don't want to miss. Arriving in a country which you are more or less arbitrarily visiting to tag along with a friend involves nearly none of those things. In truth (like hopefully most Americans) I know at least enough Spanish to order food or ask for directions. (Understanding those directions, however...) A language that I do not speak, and did not even know existed, is Catalan.
* I should backtrack. Being the sort of person I am, I tend to base the places I want to go on their arts and culture. I am not denying that Spain is rich in culture and history and centuries of fine art, and indeed found all the museums I visited fascinating, probably because of my lack of knowledge. But I've never 'liked' it as much as others, in that most simple gut-reaction-i-must-see-more-of-this kind of way. As a result, I delved more into Northern Europe and Italy, Egypt and a bit of Asia as far as my cultural investigations went. Back to Catalan.
Catalunya (Catalonia to us anglophones) is a semi-autonomous region in Spain. If you are anything like me, you didn't know Spain had semi-autonomous regions. This is a good general basis for understanding how completely unprepared I (and I think we all) were for the specifics of this trip. Yes, they speak Spanish, but as a sort of second language, with the result than in some museums the English text is limited to the entry wall. We saw lots of museums and historical sites, rode a cable car up a small mountain to a castle, ate a great deal of food, filled my socks with sand from the Mediterranean, and generally walked around and explored what I could. I went to a flea market, a food market or two, second-hand shops, grocery stores-- trying to get a taste of what it might be like to live here and not just look at it from your hotel window. El Raval is an interesting neighborhood, though I am sad to say I was too busy eating felafel to have a beloved döner kebab. The terrible events happening in Gaza began while we were abroad, and I have to be honest and say I nearly didn't know. I wasn't keeping up with the news in America and couldn't really understand the news I was hearing, when I came in contact with it. After a few days, though, even I figured it out when the students began protesting. They seemed to have taken over the student hall at a university, and a few days later I saw many young people chained to an Embassy, chanting and being dragged out by policemen, who seemed strangely uninterested in them. I came into contact with this protest on our last full day; a day I had planned to spend purchasing a few last trinkets for folks at home and generally walking about, drinking coffee and enjoying myself. I was immediately shamed and felt a typical shallow, consuming American. The "I'm on vacation" excuse seemed weak.
I found many of the museums to be interesting, both in their content and the way in which that content was presented. I am working on writing more about this and will spare you any additions to this already too lengthy post. One of my New Year's Resolutions, if you want to call them that, is to hone my critical thinking and writing skills which I have let grow a bit too dull. I will be writing about gallery shows and museum shows in Chicago, too. At least until (if) I leave it.
