Vanessa Winship
May 30–August 31, 2014
Bárbara de Braganza Exhibition Hall
Calle Bárbara De Braganza, 13
28004 Madrid
Spain
www.fundacionmapfre.org
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FUNDACIÓN MAPFRE is opening a new exhibition space in the heart of the city, alongside Madrid’s main cultural institutions. Located at Calle Bárbara de Braganza 13 (on the corner of Paseo de Recoletos), opposite the National Library, the space boasts 868 square meters spread over two floors and will provide us with a city-center venue in which to host the photography exhibitions we have been organizing for several years.
In 2007 FUNDACIÓN MAPFRE decided to make photography a key theme of its arts program and acquired the complete “Brown Sisters” series by Nicholas Nixon, marking the beginning of an incipient photography collection. This acquisition also lay the foundations for a new focus in our exhibition program, launched at our Azca gallery in January 2009, based simultaneously on the work of the grand masters and on contemporary photographers who had earned international acclaim but had never held a major retrospective of their work. Walker Evans was the subject of our first exhibition, and he has been followed by Fazal Sheikh, Graciela Iturbide, Lisette Model and others. All in all, we have hosted 18 exhibitions since that first experience, making us the only institution in Madrid that offers a regular program of four photography exhibitions a year.
In addition to organizing this program for our own galleries, we have capitalized on the effort involved in bringing each exhibition to fruition by touring them after their stint in Madrid to other cities in Spain, Europe and, most of all, Latin America. Consequently, we not only show the work of these artists in our own country but help to disseminate it much further afield. This has led us to collaborate and forge close ties with other institutions that have been active in the field of photography for many years, including venues such as the Winterthur Fotomuseum, the Huis Marseille Museum voor Photographie in Amsterdam, the Jeu de Paume in Paris, the Fotomuseum in Rotterdam, the George Eastman House in Rochester and the International Center for Photography in New York. At the same time, we have been able to offer audiences in countries like Brazil, Mexico and Colombia the chance to admire the work of artists such as Walker Evans, Fazal Sheikh, Dayanita Singh, Gottard Schuh and Graciala Iturbide.
The new venue reflects the determination of FUNDACIÓN MAPFRE to reinforce its commitment to the dissemination of photography in this country.
