FIAP EXHIBITION CENTRE REUS – BEYOND THE ORGANISATION OF EXHIBITIONS
Since the opening of our FIAP Exhibition Centre in Reus, our priority has been not only to organise the exhibitions we regularly present, but also to collaborate with other FIAP Exhibition Centres by lending our exhibitions, and likewise with other photography festivals to which we have frequently contributed works. Whenever we contact an author to offer them the opportunity to exhibit at our FIAP EC, we also inform them that their exhibition will not be limited to our centre alone; it can easily be shown in five or six additional venues. On this particular occasion, however, the collaboration has been with the Pere Anguera Library in Reus, which is celebrating its tenth anniversary. They asked whether we could organise a photography exhibition for them. Given that for many years we have also been organising the International Biennial of Sports Photography, FOTOSPORT, we offered them a selection of prize-winning photographs from various editions, with the special feature that we chose works dedicated to women’s sport – one of the themes we have included in the FOTOSPORT call for entries in recent years. The exhibition we presented was therefore entitled:
FOTOSPORT, CULTURE AND SPORT WITH A FEMININE EMPHASIS
Although it may not seem obvious at first glance, there are many parallels between the books housed in a library and the photographs preserved in a photo library. In both cases – books and photographs – they can reflect everyday reality, history, the world around us, but also fiction, creative invention and even science fiction.
Both disciplines require observation of everyday reality or the study of our past (evident in reportage or historical photographs, or, in the case of books, in literary essays analysing any aspect of contemporary life or historical studies), or they may be the fruit of human creative imagination: novels that create imaginary worlds or unreal fictions in the realm of science fiction – something equally applicable to creative photography, ranging from photomontage and collage to the emerging world of artificial intelligence applied to image-making.
In the physical space where we now stand, this convergence of concepts becomes even more evident. From this temple of culture filled with books, we can glimpse in the distance another temple, this time dedicated to the image: the Mas Iglesias Image Centre (CIMIR), whose Photo library preserves thousands of images – historical and creative – of the present and the past.
This exhibition, a small retrospective of Fotosport – the International Biennials of Sports Photography founded in 1970, aims to highlight a connection, stronger or weaker as the case may be, between the library and today’s society (of which we are all part) through photography – in this instance, sports photography, which is also very much present in our society. By deliberately selecting photographs of women’s sport, we wish to emphasise that, fortunately, the practice of sport by women is becoming ever more widespread, more normalised and, ultimately, more equal.
I would not wish to conclude without paying tribute to the person to whom this library is so deservedly dedicated: Pere Anguera – a friend, a colleague in various organisations and, above all, an outstanding worker for culture, history and the national progress of our country. An irreplaceable figure who left us far too soon.
Josep M. Casanoves Dolcet, AFIAP, EsFIAP
Chairman of the Fotosport Biennials, Europa Photo Circuit and Intercontinental Circuit
Director of the FIAP Exhibition Centre at CIMIR Reus