'What is not written': past, present and future

On the occasion of the 175th anniversary of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Telmo, the Málaga Municipal Heritage Museum (MUPAM) is hosting a unique, experimental and critically-charged exhibition under the title 'Lo que no está escrito ante la imagen, before time XX-XXI century'. This exhibition, which brings together 67 works by 32 artists, offers a tour of Spanish contemporary art of the 20th and 21st centuries and can be visited until January.

The set of works and the way in which they unfold avoid a conventional narrative presentation. Instead, it opts for a visual staging that reveals the discontinuities of the present time in each of the sequences of the story, creating an interaction between past and present, beyond the traditional museum logic and challenging the perspectives more traditional about art and the creative process. As expressed by the curators, the exhibition aims to depart from the usual commemorative approach to create a space for critical reflection and to explore the multiple interpretations of art.

The collection brings together works by great figures of contemporary Málaga art such as Enrique Brinkmann, Barbadillo, Francisco Peinado, José Guevara, Eugenio Chicano, Pepe Bornoy, Miguel Berrocal, Gabriel Alberca, Suso de Marcos, Elena Laverón, Cristóbal Toral, Torres Mata, Chema Cobo, Paco Aguilar, Revello de Toro and other influential names in the cultural scene.

'Monumento pequeño', Miguel Berrocal (1976)

The curators, with an almost archaeological vision, reveal what is hidden and intentionally hidden, offering a tour that questions the limits of the creative process. This exploration does not only focus on the artworks themselves, but extends to the exhibition's environment and scenography . Here, cardboard and packaging play a symbolic and practical role in equal measure. Instead of traditional museum walls, this exhibition uses cardboard structures as a support to display the works, thus evoking the common use of cardboard in artists' careers, where it has often served as a support for sketches, models and other preliminary work

Symbolically, this simple material is presented as a protector and custodian of art, a kind of safeguard for the works. The presence of the cardboard is a visual metaphor for time and the preservation process, as just as the cardboard physically protects, it also encapsulates the memory and meaning of these works.

'Retrato de muchacha', Elena Laverón (1974). © MUPAM

The celebration of the anniversary of the Academy of Fine Arts of San Telmo, an institution founded in 1849 by Royal Decree, is an important occasion for Málaga, a city that has made culture one of its fundamental axes of development. In this context, the exhibition 'Lo que no está escrito' is also presented as a reflection on the role that art academies should play in the 21st century. The variety of works – sculptures, engravings, installations, drawings and paintings – brings together productions from the Academy as well as from other public and private collections, including holdings of institutions and pieces loaned by the same artists who they had never been exposed to the public scene.

'Lo que no está escrito ante la imagen, ante el tiempo. Siglo XX-XXI' al MUPAM. © MUPAM