Exhibitions
Four artists against the silence of social expectations at Roca Umbert
Social expectations, femininity and everyday violence in the exhibition by Montse Morcate, Mireia Plans, Raquel Luaces and Rebeca Pardo.
What is not named: between expectations and suffering starts from the idea that imposed social expectations operate as a mechanism for sustaining the established order, often at the cost of silence, invisibility and individual suffering. Historically, femininity has been linked to the obligation to please, not to inconvenience and to preserve an apparent harmony; a construction that has demanded silence and not to point out the violences —often subtle but deeply structural— that cross bodies, relationships and everyday experiences. Naming what has been silenced thus becomes a political gesture that forces us to face an uncomfortable reality, to recognize it and to assume its complexity.
Photo: Toni Torrillas - Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts.
The exhibition in Granollers brings together the work of Montse Morcate, Mireia Plans, Raquel Luaces and Rebeca Pardo, partially developed during their artistic residency at Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts and within the framework of the research project Contemporary Representations of Grief and Suffering: Visibility, Agency and Social Transformation through Image (Generación del Conocimiento 2022 – Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación). From diverse practices in both languages and methodologies, the artists explore how suffering is produced, administered and often delegitimized within contemporary social structures.
Through formats such as installation, photography or photobook, the works address everyday but deeply structural violence linked to motherhood, mental health, aesthetic pressure, technology and mechanisms of social recognition and validation. Far from offering univocal readings, the works open spaces of tension, resistance and reflection, putting dominant imaginaries in crisis and inviting us to rethink possible forms of visibility, agency and social transformation.
Photo: Toni Torrillas - Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts.
The works that make up Allò que non s'nomen (That which is not called) are based on a shared attention to what is usually left out of the picture: minimal gestures, fragile images and experiences that make visible an often silenced suffering. As in life itself, these practices are not defined so much by what they show as by what they reveal: they bring to light what remains hidden and, at the same time, they displace its appearance, hiding it by the very proximity with which they approach.
With a close gesture and an honest formalization, the works of Pardo, Luaces, Plans and Morcate invite us to go beyond the first glance. Through the reverse, the nuance and the transparency, the artists propose a careful look towards what is hidden behind the image and the word, opening a space of reading that requires time, listening and a willingness to be affected.
Photo: Toni Torrillas - Roca Umbert Fàbrica de les Arts.
The exhibition can be visited at the Espai d'Arts de Roca Umbert, with the support of the Granollers City Council, until March 15. The program will continue with An image that swallows, that sucks, curated by Caterina Almirall, with the artists Marta Cardellach, Òscar Moya Villanueva, Mercis Rossetti and Laia Solé, which will take place from April 16 to June 7.
