Jorge Ribalta

Flamenco (and other) sketches

On photography as a cultural critique

Curated by William Guerrieri

In collaboration with the Municipality of Rubiera and IBC, Bologna

The series Wild Laocoön, (the prickly pear, from a famous poem by Federico García Lorca), made up of over 200 photographs, constitutes a photographic documentation project of key places in Flamenco culture, featuring the historical, economic, social, administrative and political structure of the institutional/popular culture of Flamenco in Spain.

The historical-political reading of Flamenco, in the eyes of Jorge Ribalta, is based on the recognition and analysis of the two faces expressed by this form of dance, midway between a hegemonic national culture and historical popular culture.

The exhibition also presents two other short series of photographs: A Small History of Photography, taken from the work of the photographer Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard, who in 1851 invented one of the first photo albums, and Atomium, a homage to the artist Marcel Broodthaers, who in 1958 created a photo reportage on the construction of the renowned and symbolic structure of the Atomium.

The exhibition intends to contribute to the defence of the documentary method in the critical analysis of cultural phenomena and the artistic products linked to these phenomena, which have a decisive role to play in the construction of national and supranational identities.

BIO

Jorge Ribalta (Barcellona, 1963)  is an artist, researcher and independent curator. As an artist, he has held solo shows in galleries such as Zabriskie (New York and Paris), Casa sin Fin (Madrid) and Angelsbarcelona (Barcelona).

A solo show of his work, Monument Machine, was presented 2015 at the Museo Guerrero (Granada) and at the Fundación Helga de Alvear (Cáceres), and in 2016 at the Württembergischer Kunstverein (Stuttgart).