Throughout his career, Xavier Ribas has used photography as a method of documentation to expand his research, and also as the final outcome that brings an aesthetic resolution to his themes. His studies in social anthropology and documentary photography (at the University of Barcelona and the Newport School of Art and Design respectively) laid the foundations for the various photo series he has been producing since the 1990s. In work such as Domingos [Sundays], the series to which these two untitled pieces belong, he clearly separates his research on the matter and the formal aspect of the works. The pieces generally consist of medium or large photographs, depicting particular situations taken from generic examples.
In his projects, Ribas gradually felt the need to turn his documentary sources into exhibition material, as the flip side of the resulting images and as an extension of the field of analysis. One example is Nitrate (2010-2014), a monumental series on the exploitation of natural resources in Chile. The series depicts relationships, games and other interests, in a socio-political reference to colonialism, the environment and the drive by art to branch into new fields with which it was not usually associated. Rarely is the link between the visual and the anthropological expressed so efficiently; any competition between the two languages is intended only to draw out the best of each.
Throughout his career, Xavier Ribas has used photography as a method of documentation to expand his research, and also as the final outcome that brings an aesthetic resolution to his themes. His studies in social anthropology and documentary photography (at the University of Barcelona and the Newport School of Art and Design respectively) laid the foundations for the various photo series he has been producing since the 1990s. In work such as Domingos [Sundays], the series to which these two untitled pieces belong, he clearly separates his research on the matter and the formal aspect of the works. The pieces generally consist of medium or large photographs, depicting particular situations taken from generic examples.
In his projects, Ribas gradually felt the need to turn his documentary sources into exhibition material, as the flip side of the resulting images and as an extension of the field of analysis. One example is Nitrate (2010-2014), a monumental series on the exploitation of natural resources in Chile. The series depicts relationships, games and other interests, in a socio-political reference to colonialism, the environment and the drive by art to branch into new fields with which it was not usually associated. Rarely is the link between the visual and the anthropological expressed so efficiently; any competition between the two languages is intended only to draw out the best of each.