What To Desire. Fundació ”la Caixa” Contemporary Art Collection. CaixaForum Barcelona

Is art necessary for living? ”la Caixa” Foundation sets out to offer multiple responses to this question with the exhibition cycle entitled What to think, What to desire, What to do. Fundació ”la Caixa” Contemporary Art Collection. Comprising three consecutive displays at CaixaForum Barcelona, the cycle explores the role art may play in a contemporary economic, social and moral system immersed in a deep crisis.

The aim of the exhibitions is to invite the public to reflect upon the reality surrounding them on the basis of works by socially engaged creators, most of which form part of the organisation's contemporary art collection. The shows will include fundamental pieces from this Collection, alongside recent acquisitions, works never before seen in Barcelona or which have been expressly produced for this project, as well as a few that have been loaned with a view to helping complete the discourse proposed by Rosa Martínez.

This cycle represents the return to Barcelona and the re-encounter with ”la Caixa” Foundation of one of the most significant independent art critics and curators on the international scene today. In What to desire, the curator takes Duchamp's masterpiece La mariée mise à nu par ses célibataires, même (reproduced at full-scale in the exhibition) as her reference point to talk about desire as a space for the projection of fantasies and a driving force for the will. The artists included in this second exhibition in the cycle are Miquel Barceló, Helena Cabello and Ana Carceller, Pepe Espaliú, Dora García, Liu Jianhua, Anish Kapoor, Sherrie Levine and Rivane Neuenschwander.

What to desire can be accessed at CaixaForum Barcelona from 8 February to 28 April 2013.     More information in the PDF press release