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The Walter Benjamin Awards are born to recognize critical thinking and European memory
The Angelus Novus Foundation awards eight awards to intellectual work dedicated to the dissemination of Walter Benjamin's thought.
The Virreina Image Center hosted the first edition of the Walter Benjamin Awards,
promoted by the Angelus Novus Foundation. These awards were created with the aim of highlighting and supporting intellectual initiatives that contribute to strengthening contemporary European critical thought, promoting the dissemination of Walter Benjamin's legacy and fostering creativity in the artistic and historical memory fields.
In this first call, eight awards were given in various categories that cover a wide range of disciplines. The awards valued proposals in areas such as academic research, the dissemination of critical thinking, translation, philosophical reflection, authorial essays, literary or essayistic creation focused on memory and exile, as well as an outstanding editorial line in aesthetics and contemporary thought. An artistic proposal and a consolidated career within these lines of work were also awarded.
Art, thought and memory are the axes that articulate a series of awards that were created with the desire to disseminate and preserve the intellectual legacy of Walter Benjamin. Beyond the homage to the thinker and writer, the Walter Benjamin Awards aim to recognize and highlight recent initiatives and publications —published during the last three years— in the fields of research, interpretation, dissemination and translation of his work. At the same time, the awards embrace proposals that contribute to contemporary critical thinking and reflection on historical memory, in a multilingual framework and with a European perspective.
Georg Wiesing-Brandes won the research prize for having contributed with his essay, interpretation or research on the figure and/or work of Walter Benjamin to a new look at this intellectual. The diffusion prize goes to Claudia Kalász - Detlef Jesgarz, for having created a radio program to disseminate the figure and work of Walter Benjamin to all audiences, with rigor and from a radio platform, a medium that Benjamin himself used to propagate his stories for children and adolescents between 1929 and 1932, as a new medium of mass culture through the technical reproducibility of the voice.
The Translation award goes to Pilar Esterlrich Arce who has translated works by Walter Benjamin, Ingeborg Bachmann, Bertolt Brecht, Günter Grass, Hermann Hesse, among others, into Catalan and also into Spanish. One of her latest translations is the essay Kafka (1934), by Walter Benjamin, Editorial Flâneur, 2022.
Fina Birulés won Philosophy, aesthetics and contemporary thought for her book Hannah Arendt. The world at stake and facilitate access to Hannah Arendt's thought, clarify concepts and introduce new horizons that illuminate later horizons. Editorial line in philosophy, aesthetics and contemporary thought is for Edicions Enoanda de Sabadell to promote an editorial catalog of philosophy in Catalan from the classics of the history of philosophy: Socrates, Plato, Kant, Hegel, to the 20th century, with new visions on Marx, Heisenberg, Habermas, Walter Benjamin and the recovery of the pioneering philosopher Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793).
In the category dedicated to memory and exile, the award went to Rafael Escudero Alday, author of Cuando Antígona encontrar a Benjamin , a work that contributes significantly to the preservation and reflection on historical memory. The Lifetime Achievement Award recognized the figure of the philosopher Manuel Reyes Mate, for his sustained contribution to critical thinking. Finally, in the field of artistic creation, the award went to the director and composer Antoni Ros Marbà, in recognition of a work marked by sensitivity and cultural commitment.
