There will be those who have set foot in Sant Adrià del Besòs for the first time thanks to Manifesta, a nomadic biennial of contemporary art that has managed to revive an icon that had been left to die, like the Tres Xemeneies. One only had to take a look at the massive attendance at this abandoned factory, no matter the day, with social media buzzing with the postcards gifted by its artistic program, especially Asad Raza's white fabrics in the old turbine hall, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg's green stained glass, and Niel Albers' wooden labyrinth. All this, without forgetting that it took an international event to make a hidden civic memory, nestled between pollution and black dust, massive, recovering the exquisite work of the Jara de la Mina school's photographic workshop.
The Tres Xemeneies have been the great protagonists of a cultural event that has attracted a total of 291,336 visitors from early September until last Sunday, but there has been much more. "Manifesta has shown that the general visitor (not the general public of the art world) has been willing to leave their city to explore the metropolitan region," defends the organization, this edition being the most extensive in geographical terms of all those held since 1996. All this, with the Barcelona headquarters, Editorial Gustavo Gili, going quite unnoticed.
Under the direction of Hedwig Fijen, a total of 16 venues have been filled with artistic works that have focused on current conflicts such as gender inequality, racism, memory, and the climate emergency. It is there where Casa Gomis, the headquarters in El Prat de Llobregat, has undoubtedly centered the debate, with planes landing at the airport incessantly rumbling its interior, invading everything. An oasis in danger if the infrastructure's expansion goes ahead, which, if only for a few months, has been able to assert its existence. The next Manifesta, in 2026, will be held in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.