[spectre] Antirrealismos: Spanish Photomedia Now

[EAF Director]

Antirrealismos: Spanish Photomedia Now
EXPERIMENTAL ART FOUNDATION
Opening 6pm Thursday 27 January to 19 February 2005

In the exhibition Antirrealismos: Spanish 
Photomedia Now, independent Madrid-based writer 
and curator Paco Barragán brings together the 
work of 16 contemporary Spanish photomedia 
artists.
The Spanish photography scene has for many years 
remained firmly rooted in the traditional 
photographic forms of documentary, 
photojournalism, travel photography and 
portraiture. Antirrealismos escapes this 
unadorned reality by addressing the more 
wide-ranging approach adopted by a group of young 
artists whose work displays a new vitality and 
power of expression emerging in Spanish 
photographic practice today. Indeed, one could 
say that these new photo-artists represent a 
specifically anti-documentary tendency.
In Spain, as elsewhere in the world today, the 
boundaries between photography, sculpture, 
painting, video, the graphic arts and fashion are 
dissolving to reveal a rich and idiosyncratic 
photographic vision, in tune with broader 
cultural evolution. The photographic artists in 
the exhibition reflect collectively on the 
diffusion and confusion of reality and fiction. 
They do so by many means: through the use of 
digital manipulation; through the 
cross-referencing of painting and photography; 
through re-readings of traditional genres such as 
still life, portraiture and landscape 
photography; by exploiting the ongoing 
possibilities of staged photography and its 
performative nature; through creative 
experimentation with the traditional forms of 
documentary photography and reportage; through an 
exploration of the legacies of surrealism, 
constructivism and photomontage; through a 
celebration of subcultures; and through an 
increasingly popular use of narrative in their 
work.

ARTISTS
Olga Adelantado, Lara Almárcegui, César Alvárez, 
Sergio Belinchón, Mira Bernabeu, Chus 
García-Fraile, Miguel Ángel Gaüeca, Adrià Julià, 
Cristina Lucas, Enrique Marty, Joan Morey, Aitor 
Ortiz, El Perro, Ixone Sádaba, Fernando 
Sánchez-Castillo, Jesús Segura

Antirrealismos: Spanish Photomedia Now is an 
Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney, 
Touring Exhibition presented with the generous 
support of the INJUVE (Spanish Institute for the 
Youth) and Centro Párraga, Murcia. Special thanks 
to the artists and gallerists, and to Jorge Diez, 
Head of the INJUVE's Service of Culture, Juan 
Antonio Álvarez Reyes, Director of the 
Contemporary Art Space Centro Párraga,and Paul 
Greenaway of Greenaway Art Gallery, Adelaide.
-- 
EXPERIMENTAL ART FOUNDATION curates its 
exhibition program to represent new work that 
expands current debates and ideas in contemporary 
visual art. The EAF incorporates a gallery space, 
bookshop and artists studios.

Lion Arts Centre North Terrace at Morphett Street Adelaide
PO Box 8091 Station Arcade South Australia 5000
Tel: +618 8211 7505  Fax +618 8211 7323
email: eaf at eaf.asn.au  bookshop email: 
eafbooks at eaf.asn.au web: http://www.eaf.asn.au
Director: Melentie Pandilovski  Administrator: Julie Lawton
Program Manager: Michael Grimm Bookshop Manager: Ken Bolton

The Experimental Art Foundation is assisted by 
the Commonwealth Government through the Australia 
Council, it arts funding and advisory body, by 
the South Australian Government through Arts SA, 
and through the Visual Arts and Craft Strategy, 
an initiative of the Australian, State and 
Territory Governments. The EAF is proudly 
smoke-free.