The exhibition titled PARATOPIAS presents projects carried out at various times and contexts. The works are gathered around the word paratopia, a conceptual term defined by the linguist Dominique Maingueneau and used by Muntadas.
Dominique Maingueneau writes: “Art is an activity that can only be practiced at the cost of paratopia, the impossibility of belonging to a place, a community, a time or a language. To find one’s place in the paratopic space of Art, one must renounce the possibility of fully occupying any place whatsoever. This impossibility of belonging is not something imposed on artists: it’s something they work out through their creations. They must construct, in the same movement, their works and the paratopia that makes these works possible. They have no other way out than to devote themselves to an endless work in a life without place.” The exhibition presents a cross-section of Muntadas’ career from the 70’s to the present, with new works produced especially for this occasion. The show on view in the new gallery on carrer Méndez Núñez 14, will extend to the Poblenou space, Passatge Saladrigas 5, where 3 of Muntadas’ video projections / installations will be installed in a storage warehouse.
With this project, Muntadas continues his reflections about space, not only understood as physical space but also as a space of use. Through videos, photographs, archival material and sound installation, the artist is interested in topics such as belonging to a place, the occupation of public space, displacement or the mechanisms of power, among others.
