This edition of Culture Cue celebrates a music documentary festival, Barcelona Gallery Weekend, Positive Uncertainty, and the artistic legacy of one of Americas’s most famous 20th Century female artists.
33 Galleries Participating at Barcelona Gallery Weekend
The 7th Barcelona Gallery Weekend running from 15 to Sept. 19, will feature a record number of 33 galleries exhibiting work by more than 70 artists from 20 different countries. There are also complementary activities and exhibitions which will open doors to the general public, offering a complete program of events, guided visits, and family-oriented activities. Barcelona Gallery Weekend will also host 3D virtual tours of all participating galleries, with three-dimensional images of the spaces and the chance to observe the works up close. Through collaboration with the platform TheArtTalks, visitors can also watch live interviews with the artists and gallerists. And through Artland, the galleries will have the chance to promote and sell the work they exhibit.
Rehearsing the Future by H B Gelatt
The Overview’s editor-in-chief Eva Bolhoefer dedicates this Culture Cue to psychologist, futurist, and author H B Gelatt, who recently passed at 94. Unfortunately, she never met him in person, but he was so kind to agree to one of the very first interviews for The Y Circus during the lockdown in April 2020. Back then, Eva came across his blog “Positive Uncertainty,” and his words and theories resonated with her. Today, after 1,5 years of a global pandemic, it’s more important than ever to think about the future we want to create. In his final blog post titled “Rehearsing Tomorrow,” H B Gelatt writes: “The future hasn’t happened, and it never will. Once it arrives, it becomes the present and then the past. Your image of the future may be the most important factor in determining what your future will be. What you do makes a difference in your future. Doing nothing also makes a difference. What you do and don’t do counts, and it depends on what you believe. What you believe determines what you do. Believing is seeing is doing.” H B Gelatt always integrated on-point quotes in his blog posts. In Rehearsing the Future he cited John Schaar’s “The future is not someplace we are going to, but a place we are creating” or Henry Ford’s “If you think you can do a thing or think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.”
Retrospective of Georgia O’Keeffe at Centre Pompidou Paris
American artist Georgia O’Keeffe holds a unique place in modernism. She lived through all art movements of the twentieth century, but didn’t bother too much about any of them. An exception is the “hard edge” abstract painting movement of the 1960s. Its characteristics were clear geometric abstraction and the intense use of color. The style is closely related to Post-painterly abstraction and Color Field Painting. O’Keefe had an original perception of nature, portrayed in large-scale flower and landscape paintings. The Centre Pompidou now presents the artist’s first retrospective in France. It spans some hundred paintings, drawings, and photographs, a complete review of her artistic career. “While vegetal inspiration is a recurrent motif for the artist, the exhibition relocates her in a tradition that is rooted in the great feeling for nature inherited from historical Romanticism,” states Centre Pompidou on its website.
IN-EDIT Celebrates Music Documentaries in Cinemas Across Barcelona
With 18 editions behind it, IN-EDIT is the most successful European festival specializing in musical documentaries. Its creators bring together the best of the audiovisual and musical sectors. After a break due to the pandemic, the festival finally raises its curtains again this autumn, from Oct. 26 to Nov. 7. IN-EDIT showcases music documentaries featuring Rosalia, Moby, A-Ha, Billie Holiday. The film describes the tragic destinies of jazz icon Billie Holiday and journalist Linda Kuehl, who collected 200 hours of audiotapes from “Lady Day’s” friends and family. “The tapes reveal her pain and courage in the face of racism against Afro-Americans,” reads the description. If you are not based in Barcelona but other parts of Spain, or in Portugal and Mexico, you can still enjoy all films from the comfort of your sofa through the streaming service Filmin.
“The Card Counter” Presents a Pokerfacing Oscar Isaac
In The Card Counter, writer and director Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver, First Reformed) traces the story of William Tell (Oscar Isaac), a professional poker player traveling from casino to casino across the United States. His job is to keep his emotions in check and winning without a blink of an eye, with no facial expressions. Even after the game, the man remains a mystery. Then Schrader invites the viewer into William’s dark memories, serving as a prison guard and interrogator at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. “The Card Counter” opened in U.S. theaters on Sept. 10.