KBr opens its doors

Back to Barcelona. Uncertainty has come to form part of our lives with COVID-19. We are therefore very proud to open the doors of our KBr photography center to all the admirers of this artistic discipline. This new space allows us provided continuity to the exhibition developed so far, and also allows us to promote unpublished initiatives within our activity related to photography.

A lot is going to happen at KBr. We are going to develop a permanent educational program focused on training future generations in the comprehension of the photographic language and its artistic dimension. We will also program meetings and conference cycles, always paying attention to the limitations due to the current health crisis, and to complement these activities and exhibitions, we will create an international photography prize.

Located in one of the most representative buildings of contemporary Barcelona: the Torre MAPFRE, the center has a total of 1,400 m² and has two exhibition halls, a space for educational activities, an auditorium and a bookstore.

The two exhibitions we are opening this center with are a sample of the path we want to take:

The exhibition Bill Brandt (Hamburg, 1904-London, 1983), is the first retrospective in Spain of one of the most influential British photographers of the 20^th century. Curated by Ramon Esparza, it brings together 186 photographs developed by Bill Brandt himself, who over almost five decades addressed the main genres of the photographic discipline: social report, portrait, nude and landscape, as pointed out by his biographer Paul Delany in Bill Brandt. A Life (2004).

The journey, divided into six sections, aims to show how all these aspects – in which identity and the concept of “the sinister” become the main figures – converge in the work of this eclectic artist who was considered, above all, a flâneur. A “stroller” in similar terms to his admired Eugène Atget, who he always considered one of his masters. One hundred and eighty-six photographs are complemented by writings, some of his cameras and various documents, including an interview he gave at the end of his life to the British television channel BBC in 1983, as well as illustrated publications of the time. All thanks to the courtesy of the Bill Brandt Archive in London and the Edwynn Houk Gallery in New York.

With Paul Strand, curated by Juan Naranjo, the Foundation begins a program of exhibitions from its collection. For the first time, Paul Strand’s photograph collection will be exhibited individually, the largest collection of pieces by this exceptional photographer preserved outside the United States.

During his long career as a photographer, Paul Strand (1890-1976) played a fundamental role in the dignification of photography as a discipline comparable to other artistic expressions and as a means through which to see the world and understand our place in it.

The sample, made up of more than 110 works takes you on a complete journey of the career of one of the most important photographers of the 21^st century, essential to understand the birth and the evolution of modern photography. The journey around Paul Strand’s work is divided into four sections, geometries, landscapes, portraits and countries, which stem from the artist’s way of working and his way of understanding the world.

Both exhibitions are part of the official section of PHotoESPAÑA.

And just as we launched KBr in Barcelona, we also launched on social networks. We open profiles in Instagram and in Twitter, to reach ever further.