An exhibition at the Cultural Center of Spain addresses the meanings of images over time.

▲ Men playing a game, 1958. Photo ©Fernando Gordillo and ©Gérard Castello-Lopes

Alondra Flores Soto

La Jornada Newspaper, Friday, July 18, 2025, p. 5

Photography has no permanent meaning, says Carles Guerra, curator of the exhibition "Icon, Nation, and Citizenship," which offers a glimpse into the history of the Iberian Peninsula through 144 images from three generations of artists from the 1950s to the present.

We explore these changes of meaning or the possibility that the same photograph can mean very different things over time , he describes in an interview about this exhibition from the Foto Colectania Collection, from Barcelona, which will be hosted by the Cultural Center of Spain in Mexico (CCEMX) starting tomorrow.

Guerra, former director of the Antoni Tàpies Foundation, states that objectively, the way of photographing is not very different from that of the 1950s and 1960s . The aesthetic resource may have changed somewhat; what's important is the paradigm shift from a photography that looked, observed, and stole to one that chooses to place itself on the same level of struggle as the people being photographed .

The changing nature of photography's meaning is the reflection convened by the Foto Colectania Foundation, one of the most important international exhibitions, which brings together some 3,000 photographs by Catalan, Spanish, and Portuguese authors. The exhibition brings 144 images to the venue located in the heart of the Historic Center, where they have been grouped into blocks in which the relationships between them generate new meanings and concepts .

For example, one important block, according to Guerra, houses the prints of Joan Colom, who some 70 years ago photographed Chinatown, what is now known as El Raval in Barcelona, whose streets were occupied by sex workers.

Seeing these photographs today is very different from how they were initially perceived, when they were close to the picturesque and randomness of the street. Instead, we now see exactly how photography allied itself with an extractive gaze, which typically sought out women's bodies on the street and operated with almost the same power relations as in normal gender relations.

▲ Lisbon, 1956. Photo ©Fernando Gordillo and ©Gérard Castello-Lopes

The curator and art critic points out: the important thing is not to remain fascinated by that capture of the instant, of the spontaneous, but to see what type of citizenship corresponds to that photograph , he points out.

“What has changed radically is the way we understand the photographic apparatus. I'm not just referring to the camera, but to the entire relationship that photography constructs. That's why I say the change is very peculiar, because, while we've moved beyond that extractive idea, which since the 19th century has been allied with the idea of colonial empires, taking something from one place to another, even if it's only encapsulated on paper on an aesthetic scale.

Photography no longer serves to tear out pieces of the world and reach us, but rather to help establish empathy and solidarity; this implies that the person photographing and the person being photographed must understand each other and maintain some kind of relationship.

Carles Guerra believes that Mexico has a street experience, which isn't so different from what it was in Barcelona. In the 1950s, photography was conceived as capturing spontaneous moments. This is also part of Mexico's tradition .

Icon, Nation, and Citizenship arrives at CCEMX after being exhibited in Miami; it opened alongside the Art Basel fair, where it was wonderfully received . It includes photographers from three generations: the oldest, Joan Colom, Xavier Miserachs, and Ricard Terré; it continues with an intermediate generation, such as Manel Armengol, Colita, and Pilar Aymerich; and finally, the youngest, Roger Guaus and Xavier Ribas.

Icon, Nation, and Citizenship: Spanish Photography in the Foto Colectania Collection closes on October 12 at the CCEMX (Guatemala 18, Historic Center). The opening is tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. and will feature a talk by Carles Guerra.