Touring ARCO

Fifty nine works from some of Spain’s most celebrated photographers will sally forth to Beijing, Shanghai and Tokyo between April and June this year. The theme: 25 years of ARCOmadrid, its evolution for over two decades.

This is no doubt a valuable artistic document pieced together from different looks by the artists themselves (Alberto Garcia Alix, Cristina Garcia Rodero, Humberto Rivas, Ouka Leele, Joan Fontcuberta and Sergio Belinchon, among others). Touring ARCO: 25 years of Photography in Spain was commissioned by ARTIUM and organized in collaboration with the Cervantes Institute in Beijing, as well as with the help of the fair’s Organizing Committee that promoted the participation of Chinese photographer Fa Man, editor-in-chief of Lens Magazine, in the project. Thus, the exhibition is not only a way of looking back at how Spanish photography has captured the fair through all these years, but also a complement to a different view. 

The exhibit will be a part of the CaochangdiPhotoSring 2012-Arles fair in Beijing, that organized by The Three Shadows Photography Art Centre, Thinking Hands and the Les Recontres d’ Arles festival, receives roughly 30,000 visitors.

The virtual tour around ARCO came into being in 1988 under an initiative spearheaded by the ARCO Friends Association. It currently boasts over 400 pictures from 87 authors. Since the year 2004, the collection is preserved and exposed at the ARTIUM Museum Center in Vitoria-Gasteiz.

Since 2006, the Cervantes Institute in Beijing is the only non-profitable public organization run by the Spanish government devoted to the promotion of the Spanish language and the culture of Spain and Hispanic America in the People’s Republic of China.

Source: Press release