Camera and City. CaixaForum Barcelona

"Hold still / Keep going", said the recently deceased Robert Frank, one of the photographers who has best reflected the urban landscape through his camera. Frank was referring to the rhythm between stillness and movement, between the photographic and the cinematographic gaze.

The Camera and city exhibition sets out to show this rhythm through the intense relationship photographers and filmmakers have with cities and their inhabitants. Our collective imaginary of the city is formed through the eyes of these artists, who see its streets as an immense stage.

Rather than a simple journey through the history of how photographers and filmmakers view the metropolis, Camera and city is above all a visual essay in which the history of photography and the moving image interweaves with the social and political history of the city, its euphorias, solitudes, rebellions and struggles.

This exhibition is the first result of the agreement signed recently between ”la Caixa” and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. It features 244 works by 80 creators and comprises photographs, films, videos and prints from the Centre's archives, in dialogue with some of the most outstanding collections of Spanish photography.

Among the famous international names included in Camera and city are Henri Cartier-Bresson, Paul Strand, Man Ray, László Moholy-Nagy, William Klein, Diane Arbus, Brassaï and Robert Doisneau; while Joan Colom, Manel Armengol, Pilar Aymerich, Francesc Català-Roca, Leopoldo Pomés and Carlos Pérez de Rozas form part of the contribution from Spain.

Camera and City. Place: CaixaForum Barcelona (Av. de Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia , 6-8). Dates: From 31 October 2019 to 8 March 2020.