Benet Rossell, in Front of and Behind the Camera is not intended to be a retrospective or an anthological program – this would be a difficult undertaking given that more than a dozen sessions would be required to show all of the artist’s film and video output. Instead, it is conceived as an extension of the exhibition Parallel Benet Rossell, which is being presented at the MACBA from June 11, 2010 to January 23, 2011. The basic intention is to bring to light much of the unreleased work filmed by Benet Rossell (Àger, Lleida, 1937) mostly between the late sixties and the mid seventies, and also to introduce audiences to the unclassifiable ensemble of his most recent video work, which has rarely been shown.

The five sessions programmed mirror the infinite sides of the polyfacetic artist Benet Rossell: as a solo director or in the company of others, behind or in front of the camera, in stand-alone films or as an extension of some of his art works or actions, on film or video… Some of these different facets have a technically polished «finish», while others are shown in a more «unfinished» state, full of raw edges, but still very powerful. All the pieces compiled here are permeated with the countless interests that drive Rossell’s creative quest, and with his artistic sensibilities inscribed in his films and videos. This program also reveals the artist’s immense capacity for renewal and for adopting new audiovisual techniques, such as the real-time graphic palette techniques in the pioneering 1000 a Miró (1993), the use of infography techniques in several of his videos (Mandorla Ignis, for example), and his use of 3D in the pieces he is currently making.

MACBA, Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona.

In collaboration with the ICIC-Filmoteca de Catalunya.