Barcelona is experiencing a boom in galleries and exhibition centers, and more and more spaces dedicated to contemporary art can be found. In this context, the Eixample will feature the new contemporary art gallery Seltz, which will open its doors on April 24 with a monographic exhibition by photographer Cristina García Rodero, recognized with the National Photography Award in 1996, which will occupy the almost 400 square meters of exhibition space available to the gallery. As a preview to its official opening, the gallery will open the day before, on Sant Jordi, when García Rodero will sign copies of her book España Oculta, originally published in 1989 and recently reissued.
Directed by Lorena Pizarro, a professional with more than 25 years of experience in the contemporary art market, the gallery will be open to all artistic languages and registers, from painting to digital art or urban art. The new center will also have the artistic advice of art critic and curator José Luis Pérez Pont, former director of the Centro del Carme Cultura Contemporánea (CCCC) in València.
The first exhibition of this new gallery will be dedicated to the photographer from La Mancha, Cristina García Rodero, the first Spanish member of the prestigious Magnum agency. In total, 77 snapshots from her series Con la boca abierta will be exhibited, where the artist explores the different connotations of the natural gesture of opening the mouth, from the cry of life at the moment of birth to surprise or indignation.
This exhibition, which includes more than seventy large-format photographs, is the photographer's first monographic exhibition in the Catalan city. Through the snapshots, Cristina García Rodero's artistic career of more than 40 years is reviewed, which stands out for her ability to capture intimate and sentimental moments such as the everyday gesture, voluntary or not, of opening the mouth.
"Seltz is born as an open, dynamic and welcoming space, designed for both long-time collectors and those who want to slowly get started in this exciting world," its director emphasized. In addition to exhibitions, the gallery will also have an extensive innovative program with the aim of making the space "a meeting point and a place for dialogue," and for contemporary art to reach new audiences.
Thus, Seltz's program will feature local and international artists such as Madrid conceptual artist Mateo Maté, Alicante photographer Cristina de Middel, and Tarragona multidisciplinary artist Ivan Forcadell, who has created paintings, sculptures, and even video art. A range of heterogeneous artists that seeks to reflect the different trends and vehicles of artistic expression in contemporary art.