An Exhibition by Fernando Sánchez
10.24.17 – 11.15.17
MSE Library Q Level
Opening Reception:
Thursday, October 24th @ 6:00pm
Featuring a talk by the artist
Hor d’oeuvres & refreshments
Fernando Sánchez is one of the leading photojournalists in Spain. He began his photographic work for the newspaper Público in 2008 and, since 2012, has worked for the newspaper La Marea. He was a finalist for the FOTOCAM award in 2012 and 2014 for his work documenting the effects of Spain’s economic crisis.
The present exhibition, Madrid, Urban Poetry, focuses on the effects of the Great Recession on Spain’s capital. The Great Recession reached its height in Spain in 2012, when overall unemployment rates reached over 25% and youth unemployment rates surpassed 55%. Today, the country is still recovering from an unemployment crisis and subsequent austerity measures that crushed the lives of people between the ages of 16-35 who have come to be known as la generación perdida (“the lost generation”).
Madrid, Urban Poetry shows the Spanish capital’s many faces, of all shapes and sizes and expressions. Covering the past seven years, the exhibition captures how the city, through portraits of everyday life, has been shaped by the passing of time amidst the Great Recession. It also showcases the economic divide between center and periphery at the heart of Spain’s largest metropolitan area, and registers the fissures that even the tourist areas of downtown Madrid can’t entirely cover up.
Madrid, Urban Poetry is Fernando’s most personal of his exhibitions, which have been shown across Spain—Madrid, Barcelona, and elsewhere—and, most recently, at Princeton University. For anyone interested in the visual arts, contemporary Europe, or the state of journalism, this exhibition will invite you to rethink the relationship between the economics, politics, and visual representation of “crisis.”
Artist’s website: www.fernandosanchezphoto.com