A special look at Spanish life and culture in Latvia

RIGA - Spain is bullfights, nice beaches, lovely sun and a lot of outdoor parties during the summer. People around the world know this image of the distant Mediterranean country. But, obviously, Spain is much more than this first impression, and this territory keeps inside other realities about its culture, its manners and life. Sometimes it is possible to estimate these details with just one look; sometimes we need some minutes more for this.

Riga Congress Hall hosts a photography exhibition about contemporary Spain and some of its themes, costumes and characteristics. The exhibition, called “Aqui y Ahora: Fotografia Documental de la Espana Contemporanea” (“Here and Now: Documentary Photography of Contemporary Spain”) is composed of a total of 80 photographs.
The installation is a collective work done by one group of young Spanish photographers, called “Nophoto.” Photographers wanted to show Spain, but in a personal, different and reflexive way. For this reason, “Aqui y Ahora” is a summary of 14 individual projects on various topics, but with Spain as a point of union.

The exhibition, which is presented in Latvia thanks to the Embassy of Spain, was inaugurated in Riga on Oct. 4 by one of the Nophoto members, Jonas Bel, in front of a representation of the Spanish Embassy and about 75 people more.
During the event, the commissary and photographer Jonas Bel introduced this exhibition as “the intersection of a moment in the history of Spain through the eyes of 14 different photographers gathered one day to walk together.”

The ambassador of Spain in Latvia, Consuelo Femenia, welcomed the assistants and said that it is the result of “an effort for bringing to Latvia the samples of art, lesser-known and less related to the topics.”
With all sorts of sizes and formats, artists have given attention to bulls, the dramatic Spanish drought, some religious events, the current model of family and of traffic accidents, by reinterpreting the meaning. “Our photography represents one reality, filtered and interpreted,” said Bel.

The commissary explained to The Baltic Times that “this is another way of showing Spain right now, where there is a great interest about Spanish things.” In Bel’s opinion, “there are private schools teaching Spanish; people come to Spain on holidays, so the desire to meet Spain does exist. We are an attractive country for the Baltic States,” he insisted.
On the previous day, before the opening of the exhibition, Bel held a presentation at the Latvian Art Academy. Despite the rainy weather, around 40 people, most of them students, participated in this open-class.

During this presentation Bel summarized the trajectory of the “Nophoto” group, which was created in 2005, and showed some images and videos of the most important works of the collective. In this context, the photographer showed another project, realized previously by the group, like “Cercanias” (2004/2005), about the terrible terrorist attack that happened in Madrid in 2004, and “Vegaviana, memoria colonizada” (“Vegaviana, colonized memory”), about a small town on the west side of Spain where people were moved 50 years ago just to cultivate its fields. “Vegaviana is right now a very famous place. The town was created under the dictatorship of Francisco Franco, and it has nice places but, before our arrival, people always took photos of the town, but not of the people who live there every day,” explained Bel.
His intention in this, and other, works is very clear: “Maybe members of ‘Nophoto’ are not very original, but we try to make our work with a personal touch.”

Commensurate with this logic and point of view, the author explained to The Baltic Times that each photographer of “Nophoto” is free to take their own pictures, but normally all of them are looking for “taking a picture which has worth” and “tell something more about the history.” The Spanish ambassador, Consuelo Femenia, told The Baltic Times that this type of artistic expression complements the image of Spain, which is already well-known in the Baltic area thanks to competitions like EuroBasket, or film directors such as Pedro Almodovar.
“The plurality and contrast of these 80 photographs is a good example of the dynamism of the current Spanish photography,” she added.

This traveling exhibition has toured most European countries and other parts of the world, including China and Turkey, and concludes its tour in the Latvian capital.

The exhibition will be open till Oct. 23. Admission is free of charge.