French philosopher Georges Didi-Huberman wins the Museu Tàpies essay prize

BarcelonaAntoni Tàpies is one of the artists that the French philosopher and art historian Georges Didi-Huberman (Saint-Étienne, 1953) has included in some of his exhibitions. In one of the most recent, "In the stirred air..." Image, emotion, utopiawhich could be seen at the CCCB; the model of the Cloud and chair that crowns the Tapies Museum, a Face from the 1960s and White diptych with crackle effect, The latter is a painting to which Didi-Huberman gave a corporeal dimension. The trajectories of Tàpies and Didi-Huberman share many common elements related to the body, the relationship between art and politics, and the transformative power of art, so it was only a matter of time before their paths crossed: Didi-Huberman is the winner of the second edition of the Gest d'Ahi International Essay Prize and the Tàpies Chair at Pompeu Fabra University, as announced this Wednesday by the museum's director, Imma Prieto. According to the award's advisory committee, which unanimously selected him, "his research into the relationship between painting and the body, the transhistorical presence of symbols and archetypes, the visual memory of trauma, the materiality of the image, and gesture and political imagination has radically transformed the history of art." As he himself has stated, he plans to delve deeper into the ideas of violence and walls in Tàpies' work, and he expects to have a completed essay on these topics between the end of 2026 and the first months of 2027.

As in the first edition with the Argentinian sociologist Rita Segato, the museum's objective with this award is to move beyond the usual interpretations of Tàpies's legacy and invoke new voices. "We are interested in multifaceted perspectives and those from the periphery," says Imma Prieto. "We want to move beyond certain art historiographies that may seem obvious and explore psychology, sociology, and image theory," explains the director. Didi-Huberman is a professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris. Among his notable works areImages in spite of everything: a visual history of the Holocaust(Paidós, 2004), When the images take position(Antonio Machado Books, 2008) andTo get through, no matter the cost(Shangrila, 2018), the result of a collaboration with the Greek poet Niki Giannari. Also included are the two parts of To want to disobey (Abada Publishers), and The Factory of disjointed emotions(Les Éditions de Minuit, 2024). "Capitalism, propaganda, and advertising are what put so many images on a screen so that in the end you see nothing," the author lamented in an interview with ARA. "We end up thinking that everything is in the present, and yet one of the freedoms we have is the ability to look to the past to create a new desire for the future. History is the most important discipline. We must study history," he warned. As an exhibition curator, Didi-Huberman is known for shows such asUprisingsat the Jeu de Paume in Paris (2016), which could be seen the following year at the National Art Museum of Catalonia under the titleInsurrections; Atlas, at the Reina Sofía Museum (2010).

Rita Segato's essay on Tapia, entitled Tàpies and I. A reciprocal exegesis, Didi-Huberman's forthcoming essay is part of a renewed editorial line of the museum with three collections: a first one with the winners of the essay prize and other authors, a second one with the six essays of Tàpies himself, because many of them were out of print; and a third one with books by various authors with texts resulting from seminars and conferences.