The Girona History Museum opens this Sunday an exhibition about the old exhibition space ESPAIS

Wednesday, May 8, 2024

About 130 works by artists who were active and exhibited in the gallery such as Torres Monsó, Enric Ansesa, Carme Sanglas, Pep Admetlla or Francesca Llopis, among many others, are on display.

The History Museum of Girona will inaugurate this Sunday, May 12, at 12 noon, an exhibition on the background of the old exhibition space ESPAIS that the Girona City Council acquired 7 years ago. The exhibition is entitled “SPACES, an artistic phenomenon. A journey through contemporary art in Catalonia (1987-2010)" and is curated by Glòria Picazo. It will be possible to see a selection of works of art and part of the archives of the ESPAIS Foundation, as well as an audiovisual collection of the performances presented, the collection of Papers d'Art magazines with the screen prints of their covers and also the award-winning sculptures from the different editions of the ESPAIS Award for art criticism.

In addition, given the continued dedication that ESPAIS showed to performance and live arts, dance, experimental poetry or sound art, a selection of its audiovisual archive is exhibited in the context of this exhibition. It is clear the relevance that creators such as Carles H. Mor, Esther Xargay, Joan Casellas, Lluís Alabern, Borja Zabala, José Manuel Berenguer, Clara Garí and so many others had in the creative transversal view that their promoters defended.

In 2017, Girona City Council closed the acquisition of the ESPAIS Foundation's legacy after a few years of guarding it, since the gallery stopped functioning in 2010. Today the archives, the documentary fund, catalogs, books, magazines and this significant collection of works of art are part of the council's art heritage fund. Based on the exhibition that is now being presented at the Girona History Museum, and the work done to document, organize and preserve this legacy, this heritage fund will be made available to the public.

At the same time, the patrimonial fund paves the way in order to make known both the importance that the ESPAIS Foundation had in the dissemination of contemporary art and the artistic and intellectual legacy that from now on also remains in disposition of historians and art critics. In addition, coinciding with this exhibition, Girona City Council has digitized all issues of the magazines to disseminate them universally, which will be effective from the day of the inauguration in the digitized press section of the website the Municipal Archive.


[Press release]