Joan Fontcuberta is a major reference point for contemporary photography, an essayist, a teacher and an exhibition curator. He graduated in Information Science from the Autonomous University of Barcelona in 1977. From that time on he took an interest in photography, mainly as a means of conveying information, influenced by the photographic school of Kassel and in particular by the works of Floris Michael Neusüss and his use of photograms. Since the late 1970s Fontcuberta has been continually calling into question the intrinsic qualities of the medium through his works, based on conceptual presumptions. He argues against modernist parameters from an indicial concept of photography, its documentary and illusionary nature, and even against post-modernist use of images via digital alteration and the contextual conditions for their reading and interpretation. Stand-out works include the series Herbarium (1982), in which he looks at the parameters of the photography of the German New Objectivity movement through deceit and documentary fiction. These ideas are further developed in Fauna (1987). In Frottogrames (1987-1990) and Palimpsests (1989-1993) he again questions the epistemological certainties of photography. His series from the end of the 20th century and the turn of the 21st such as Sputnik (1997) and Googlegrams (2005) deal with the importance of context in interpreting images in the mass media.
In the course of his long career he has staged stand-out solo exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (New York, 1988), the Santa Mònica Art Centre (Barcelona, 1990 & 2001), the Art Institute of Chicago (USA, 1990), the Institute of Modern Art of Valencia (1992), the National Art Museum of Catalonia (Barcelona, 1999), the Élysée Museum (Lausanne, France, 1999), the Telefónica Foundation (Madrid, 2001), the Australian Center of Photography (Sidney, 2007), the Pilar i Joan Miró Foundation (Palma, 2007), the Palais des Beaux- Arts (Lille, France, 2010), the Hasselblad Center (Gothenburg, Sweden, 2013), the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris, 2014), the Science Museum (London, 2014), Cosmocaixa (Barcelona, 2015), the Banco de la República Art Museum (Bogotá, 2016) and the Domus Artium (Salamanca, 2017). He has received numerous distinctions, including the David Octavius Hill Medal, the Fotografisches Akademie GDL from Germany (1988), the Spanish National Photography Award (1998), the Plastic Arts Award of the Regional Government of Catalonia (2012), the Hasselblad international photography award (2013) and the Award for Culture (Photography Subsection) of the Regional Community of Madrid (2015).
Joan Fontcuberta is a major reference point for contemporary photography, an essayist, a teacher and an exhibition curator. He graduated in Information Science from the Autonomous University of Barcelona in 1977. From that time on he took an interest in photography, mainly as a means of conveying information, influenced by the photographic school of Kassel and in particular by the works of Floris Michael Neusüss and his use of photograms. Since the late 1970s Fontcuberta has been continually calling into question the intrinsic qualities of the medium through his works, based on conceptual presumptions. He argues against modernist parameters from an indicial concept of photography, its documentary and illusionary nature, and even against post-modernist use of images via digital alteration and the contextual conditions for their reading and interpretation. Stand-out works include the series Herbarium (1982), in which he looks at the parameters of the photography of the German New Objectivity movement through deceit and documentary fiction. These ideas are further developed in Fauna (1987). In Frottogrames (1987-1990) and Palimpsests (1989-1993) he again questions the epistemological certainties of photography. His series from the end of the 20th century and the turn of the 21st such as Sputnik (1997) and Googlegrams (2005) deal with the importance of context in interpreting images in the mass media.
In the course of his long career he has staged stand-out solo exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (New York, 1988), the Santa Mònica Art Centre (Barcelona, 1990 & 2001), the Art Institute of Chicago (USA, 1990), the Institute of Modern Art of Valencia (1992), the National Art Museum of Catalonia (Barcelona, 1999), the Élysée Museum (Lausanne, France, 1999), the Telefónica Foundation (Madrid, 2001), the Australian Center of Photography (Sidney, 2007), the Pilar i Joan Miró Foundation (Palma, 2007), the Palais des Beaux- Arts (Lille, France, 2010), the Hasselblad Center (Gothenburg, Sweden, 2013), the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris, 2014), the Science Museum (London, 2014), Cosmocaixa (Barcelona, 2015), the Banco de la República Art Museum (Bogotá, 2016) and the Domus Artium (Salamanca, 2017). He has received numerous distinctions, including the David Octavius Hill Medal, the Fotografisches Akademie GDL from Germany (1988), the Spanish National Photography Award (1998), the Plastic Arts Award of the Regional Government of Catalonia (2012), the Hasselblad international photography award (2013) and the Award for Culture (Photography Subsection) of the Regional Community of Madrid (2015).