Carolina Grau /Curator
VII BIENNIAL: LIBERTAS Joana Bastos, François Bonnet, Tony Chakar, John Deneuve, Enric Farrés Duran, Diane Guyot of St Michel, Ciprian Homorodean, Lluís Hortalà, Asunción Molinos Gordo, Levi Orta, Amalia Pica, Àngels Ribé, Juan Ugalde, Pep Vidal and James Webb.
Libertad: (From Latin libertas) 1. f. Man’s capacity to act in one way or another, and not to act, being responsible for his actions. [Real Academia Española]
Freedom is one of the words most frequently used in the rhetoric of European democracies. Since its origins as legal status in Roman law, freedom has been the most valued right a human being can possess yet also the most costly to obtain and preserve.
In order to organise community life, democracies establish rules condi- tioned by the economic, political and religious needs of society. For this reason freedom becomes an abstract object marked off by the historical context in which it develops. The inequality of conditions in different countries and regions is noticeable by the level of freedom granted to its citizens. Today, in an attempt to improve national order and security, it is the same legal systems that reduce the rights of the
individual. A clear barometer of this is internet access.
Freedom is a complex concept which can be analysed from different perspectives. At a philosophical, sociological, anthropological, psychologi- cal and political level although perhaps the aspect which continues to be able to activate and represent the act and execution of freedom the most effectively is through artistic creation. Capable of taking a stance against any sort of censorship, artistic expression continues to be the most power- ful vehicle with which to manifest, defend and promote an opinion. It is the job of visual artists, writers, musicians and creative intellectuals to use the ideas and emotions of a community and transform the signals of freedom into cultural acceptance. In the seventh edition of the Jafre Biennial, artists are invited to explore, question and celebrate the meaning of freedom in society today.
Àngels Ribé (Barcelona, 1943) Began her artistic career in 1969 in Paris making sculpture, from which she gradually evolved into conceptual installations. Between 1972–1979, she lived in Chicago and in New York where she joined the group of pioneers of new art movements (land art, performance, body art, installations). In 1980 she returned to Barcelona where she lives and works.
François Bonnet (Limoges, France, 1981) Kassel Jaeger is the project of François Bonnet a Franco-Swiss composer and electroacoustic musician. Based in Paris, he is a member of INA-GRM where he works as curator. In his fifth record, Deltas, Jaeger explores geological associations with sound, a theme he expanded in an installation for the exhibition Multinatural Histories at the Harvard Museum of Natural History. He used eight channels in the mineral room to make mineral resonances audible.