The GAC awards of the gallerists award the National Collection and Galería Alegría

BarcelonaCatalan art dealers celebrated the annual awards gala this Tuesday at Macba. The nineteenth Night of Gallerism recognized the diversity and scope of art galleries and collecting. The honorary awards went to artist Francesc Torres and the Mayoral gallery. Likewise, Lluís Bassat and Carmen Orellana received the second award for the promotion of visual arts, "for their central role in the conservation, study, and dissemination of art".

The award for collecting went to the National Collection of the Generalitat, for "its commitment to contemporary art, photography, comics, and historical memory, consolidated as a true asset for the country". In the art criticism category, the winner is critic and curator Ricard Mas, for "a career of more than three decades as one of the most unique and incisive voices in the historiography and art criticism in Catalonia". And in the media category, cultural manager Carmen Corbera won for the podcast El mundo del arte, for "excellence in cultural communication and her competence in adapting art criticism to new digital languages".

Regarding the curatorship award, the winner was Nekane Aramburu, for the exhibition Le cercle lumineux. Entre Cocteau i Fenosa (1920-1960), presented at the Apel·les Fenosa Museum. According to the jury, this exhibition stands out for "the excellent research work that has allowed the reconstruction of the intense intellectual and friendly relationship between Jean Cocteau and Apel·les Fenosa, as well as generating a project of international scope; and the curatorship sheds light on a fundamental link of 20th-century European culture". Among the historical exhibitions, the winner was Galeria Joan Gaspar for Clavé en escena, to reclaim "Antoni Clavé's facet as a set designer and costume designer". "The gallery's success in focusing on the artist's relationship with the performing arts (ballet, theater, and opera) and highlighting how his work for the stage was a laboratory of experimentation that directly influenced his painting and sculpture" prevails, says the jury. And regarding the annual programming, Galería Alegria won, for "its consolidation as one of the freest, most coherent, and stimulating spaces in the Catalan artistic scene". The jury highlights "its independence of criteria, its artistic rigor, and its exercise of cultural resistance".

In the category of award for best exhibition by a consolidated artist, the award goes to Galeria Antoni Pinyol, for Eclipsi, by the artist Carles Pujol. For the jury, the exhibition proposes "an interdisciplinary dialogue that explores the intersection between visual image and sound, recovering the creative complicity between Pujol and the electroacoustic musician Eduardo Polonio". It also highlights "the technical rigor in the use of materials and the coherence of Piñol's trajectory". It also underlines the work of Galeria Antoni Pinyol as a benchmark for contemporary art "outside the major metropolitan centers", fundamental for maintaining the richness and plurality of the Catalan artistic ecosystem.

In the category for best exhibition by a mid-career artist, Galeria Rocío Santa Cruz has won for the exhibition La campana còsmica i el llac que respira, by Dionís Escorça, for "its creative daring that invites us to rethink our place in the cosmos, integrating cultural and scientific references". Finally, Galeria Sorondo Projects has won in the category of best exhibition by an emerging artist for Un puñal en un pañuelo, by the artist Luis Renteria, for "the ability to turn the symbol into an aesthetic experience, as well as to articulate a visual discourse that investigates the tension between fragility and hardness, constructing a metaphor about human vulnerability, pain and protection".