Les maletes de Walter Benjamin

Download the iformation: Exhibition Walter Benjamin's Suitcases

This exhibition originates from a collaboration between several Fine Arts schools: Berlin’s Weißensee Kunsthochschule (Visuelle Kommunikation Digitale Medien), Bordeaux’s École des Beaux-Arts, Barcelona’s l’Escola Llotja d’Arts i Disseny and Madrid’s Casa de Velázquez.

Students and artists in residence developed a series of imagined suitcases based on the Theses on the Philosophy of History, by Walter Benjamin (Berlin 1892 – Portbou 1940). Benjamin is thought to have had these texts with him in a suitcase, while fleeing into exile. He committed suicide in Portbou on the 26th of September 1940, after being arrested by the Gestapo, as he found out he was to be deported. The suitcases created by the students revolve around the notions of history, memory and the current European identity. Both Portbou, in its role as border and passage to exile, and the current situation of the refugees in Europe, lie at the centre of these works.

Benjamin’s concept of history remains utterly current. His influence in today’s art practice causes students to research and interpret the notion of history shown in Benjamin’s work/suitcases. History, memory and exile have left a mark on Portbou. Places like the international railway station, the crossing point for thousands of refugees in the past, are an example of this.

The exhibition is housed in the station customs hall, the place where, up until the creation of the Shengen Treaty, traveller’s suitcases were opened and inspected. Nowadays, this hall is used less and less; however, it has been given a new cultural role and is now an attraction to visitors as they discover the town. This exhibitions aims at becoming a meeting point for youngsters, and to promote public interest, as well as social and economical development.

The exhibition connects a series of geographic points relevant to Benjamin: Berlin, the city where he was born, Bourdeaux, a major city in France, a country where he was welcomed as a German refugee, and Portbou, on the Spanish border, the town where he decided to put an end to his life.

The exhibition will be on tour, visiting the Casa de Velázquez in Madrid, in March 2017, and will be shown at Arts Santa Mònica in Barcelona in 2017.

Pilar Parcerisas
Exhibition Curator

Place and dates:
Portbou. Internacional railway station. Customs hall.
24 September - 23 October 2016.
Open:
Monday-Friday: 4:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Saturday: 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. and
4:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Sunday: 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m

info@passatgescultura.org 

Thanks to: Subdirección de Estaciones de Viajeros Noreste de Adif; Sr. Josep-Lluís Salas i Mallol, Major of Portbou; Sr. Toni Sánchez, Adjoint to the Major of Portbou; Sr. Trino Hernández,Councillor of Portbou; Sr. Sergi Aranda, Councillor of Portbou; Sr. Ferran Roquer, President of the Consell Comarcal de l’Alt Empordà; Sr. Joan Centelles, Portbou; Sr. Jaume Reus, director Arts Santa Mònica; Sra. Fina Duran, Head of exhibitions, Arts Santa Mònica; Sr. Xavi Roca, Arts Santa Mònica; Sr. Xavier Baudoin, Casa de Velázquez, Madrid; Sra. Rachel Helvadjian, École des Beaux-Arts Bordeaux; Sra. Nora Ancarola, Escola Llotja, Barcelona; Sra. Anna Comellas, Escola Llotja, Barcelona; Sr. Hannes Brunner, Weißensee Kunsthochshule Berlin; Sra. Irene Cussó, Associació Passatges, Portbou; Sr. Adolf Alcañiz, Consell Nacional de la Cultura i de les Arts (CoNCA); Pablo Antolín, Railsider.

Display: Abdó Martí

Graphic designer: Manel Gràvalos Olivella