Documenta is the most important contemporary art event in the world. The Institut Ramon Llull and the Institut Català de les Industries Culturals (ICEC) are collaborating with it in order to internationalize Catalan culture and to promote its artists. This year’s edition features the work of Roger Bernat and Daniel G. Andújar, which was presented in Athens on 8th April.
The Documenta exhibition was founded in 1955 with the aim of revitalizing culture – especially in the field of the visual arts – after the decline and the dark years of the Second World War. Since then it has been held every five years in Kassel, a city virtually destroyed by allied bombs.
This year, though, the series of exhibitions has been enlarged and it is also present for the first time in another city: Athens. With the slogan ‘Learning from Athens’, the director of 'documenta 14', Adam Szymczyk, wishes to shine the spotlight on German-Greek relations after the financial and refugee crises. In this way he seeks to reflect the current situation in Europe through art and to highlight the tensions between ‘north’ and ‘south’. The main exhibition in Athens is on in the National Museum of Contemporary Art, although the 160 artists in it are taking part in numerous events in other parts of the city, including cinemas, bookshops and public institutions.
Roger Bernat presents “The Place of the Thing” (2017). It is a project written by Roberto Fratini and different groups in Athens and the Balkans. The work traces the route of a rock that travels from Athens to Kassel, passing through, among other places, Budapest and Bratislava. It is the ‘oath stone’, before which the trial of Socrates began in 399 BC and which was sent to the city of Kassel.
Roger Bernat (Barcelona, 1968) became interested in the theatre during his studies to be an architect. He studied Direction and Playwriting at the Institut del Teatre in Barcelona, where he graduated in 1996. A year later he founded General Elèctrica with Tomàs Aragay, a centre with a ground-breaking spirit devoted to theatrical creativity and dance which closed down in 2001. Since then he has directed and created projects such as 10.000 kg, Confort Domèstic, Àlbum, Trilogia 70, Bones Intencions and Tot és perfecte.
Daniel García Andújar exhibits ‘The Disasters of War, Metics Akademia’ (2017)
Andújar sets out to analyse how the classicist style has been used by nationalism and racism. He does so with 3-D printed statues, like for example a figure of Hercules or Púgil en repòs, which create a network of Greek emblems.
Daniel García Andújar (Almoradí, 1966) is one of the chief exponents of so-called Net Art, a type of art created by and for the Internet. Andújar is a founding member of irational.org and has directed many workshops for artists and groups from different countries. The artist has always been interested in inequality in information societies. This is why he created Technologies To The People with the aim of showing the possible deception by the media in order to maintain control, disguised as supposed transparency.
Since its creation, the 'Documenta' exhibition has become a cultural gathering of the utmost international importance. The last edition, in 2012, attended by, among others, Albert Serra, Dora Garcia and Enrique Vila-Matas, had 750,000 visitors from all over the world. Other Catalan artists that have been invited to take part in Documenta are Ferran Adrià (2007), Miquel Barceló (1982) and Susana Solano (1987 and 1992).
