Albert Gironès, winner of the first edition of the Ezequiel Torroella Art Biennial

The Vallenc artist Albert Gironès is the winner of the first edition of the Ezequiel Torroella Art Biennial, which Palamós City Council has launched this year, with the aim of promoting artistic creation in the field of visual arts, give impetus to the work of young creators and perpetuate the memory of the Palamos painter Ezequiel Torroella, who died in 1998.

The prize, endowed with €5,000, was for the artistic project entitled "The Miracle of the Sun", through which Albert Gironès highlights, through drawing, video and historical documentation, all of them articulated in the same installation lation, a dialogue and a debate in contemporary thought between art, religion and science. It is about representing the unrepresentable, the miracle, through a rational vision that does not want to end up being so, since in mysticism, alchemy and ritual, art always has a common and shared vocabulary.

This work was chosen by the Artistic commission of the prize, made up of Elvira Dyangani Ose, director of the MACBA; Pepe Serra, director of the National Art Museum of Catalonia; Maria Recasens, professor of the Art History Degree at the University of Girona; Marta Negre, artist and head of studies of the Fine Arts Degree at the University of Barcelona; Natàlia Chocarro, presidential art advisor of the Vila-Casas Foundation; Marga Viza, director of the Cultural Area of the Catalunya La Pedrera Foundation; and Ricard Planas, director of Bonart cultural and director of the Lluís Coromina Foundation.

Catalog and exhibition
The Artistic Commission of the Ezequiel Torroella Art Biennale met on June 1 in Barcelona to assess the nine participating projects (of the 16 presented in the preliminary phase) and reach a verdict. The nine candidates have been able to work during these last weeks on their respective proposals, together with the curators who have advised them and helped them prepare the project. Last Thursday, each of the candidates was/were able to explain and defend the work presented at the Biennale, before the Artistic Commission.

Once all the information was compiled, the jury agreed to award the prize to the artist Albert Gironès, also awarding two entries. The three chosen artistic creations will be presented with a catalog that will be published next year, as provided for in the Biennale's rules, and on the other hand, the winning proposal will also be shown in a temporary and individual exhibition, which at the end of the month of September this year, it will host the Palamos artistic and heritage space of the Capella del Carmen.

This artistic call has a biennial frequency and is aimed at all young artists up to 35 years old resident in Spain. Each edition has a reference theme, which starts from a conceptual framework linked to the life philosophy and artistic interests of the Palamos painter Ezequiel Torroella.

For this first edition the theme chosen was: The landscape and the search for paradise, the paradise found in the landscape. The real landscape and the landscape as a creation of the artist.