“There are two ways to live,” Pere Portabella once told his daughter, when she was a teenager: “Without taking risks, or by taking them. The first is calmer, and the second is harder, because you might find yourself alone. Both ways are valid, but if at the end of your life you could have lived the same number of years, the person who took risks would have lived twice as much.” We heard Carol Portabella say this yesterday at the Filmoteca de Catalunya, where Acció Portabella was presented—a series of events taking place worldwide to celebrate the legacy of the film director and producer, who is approaching his centenary. We attendees left thinking that events like this are rare these days. Not only because of the international reach the Action will have, but also because figures with such broad appeal (the same appeal that unanimously made him the organizer of the massive welcome for President Tarradellas in 1977) are becoming increasingly rare.

It seems to show Jordi Balló explaining the Portabella Action, a worldwide proposal to celebrate the centenary of Pere Portabella (Figueres, 1927) which will begin in 2026 and have its main course in 2027. Behind it, on the screen of the Filmoteca's Laia room, unfolds a constellation of names and arrows. Among many others, there are the MoMA in New York, the CCCB and the CaixaForum; the Toronto, Buenos Aires and Jeonju Film Festivals; the Amsterdam, Brussels and Prague film archives; the Tàpies Museum, the Miró Foundation, the Reina Sofía Museum and the Vila Casas Foundation; the Autonomous University of Barcelona and the University of Girona; the CIDOB and Òmnium Cultural; the Dom Omladine Cultural Center in Belgrade and the Catalan Federation of Film Clubs.

Àngel Jové (1940-2023) was a great and multifaceted artist: one of the authors of the first video art work in the State, First death, He collaborated with Bigas Luna on films such as Bilbao and Poodle and He designed objects such as the lamp BabelIn addition, he created dozens of covers for the publishers Lumen and, above all, Anagrama. Jové could have lived off his earnings, but he continued writing and creating tirelessly in his studio. His fans and those who are yet to discover him are in luck: two years after his death, the Tàpies Museum The museum will showcase his legacy in a major exhibition curated by the renowned art historian Maria Josep Balsach, a partner of the artist. It will be one of the highlights of the museum's 2026 program and one of the year's most important exhibitions in Barcelona. "Àngel Jové was a very powerful artist, but also very sensitive," says Imma Prieto, director of the Museu Tàpies. "He held a few very specific exhibitions, often out of friendship, but the art world didn't interest him; he found it disrupted his concentration. When he had to choose between the art world and creating, he chose to create."