Exhibitions
Cristóbal Hara: Childhood that reinvents photography
In Palma, the Juan March Foundation opens a window to memory and imagination with Cristóbal Hara: 15 Instant Tales , an exhibition on view until May 2nd that pulsates between photography and words. The exhibition recovers a historical portfolio in which fifteen images of schoolchildren from Cuenca converse with the stories those same children wrote, allowing the childlike perspective to transform reality into a realm of fiction and poetry.
The project began in 1971 when the Spanish Museum of Abstract Art, under the brilliant direction of Fernando Zóbel, decided to transform photography into a space for play and discovery through its Graphic Arts Department. Brothers Jaume and Jordi Blassi shaped the design of that original portfolio, meticulously attending to every detail as if it were a storybook where image and word intertwine.
Cristóbal Hara (originally published under the name Cristóbal Melián), 'Con, Can and Quin' in 15 instant stories, 1971. Design: Jaume and Jordi Blassi. Juan March Foundation Collection, Madrid.
Cristóbal Hara (Madrid, 1946), a key figure in Spanish documentary photography, has built a body of work marked by childhood, intuition, and the search for his own visual language. After abandoning law to dedicate himself entirely to photography, he transitioned from black and white to color as if crossing a threshold: from recording to wonder. In this exhibition, his photographs don't explain the world, they suggest it; and the children's texts don't describe it, they reinvent it.
Each image is accompanied by the story that inspired it, creating a small universe where memory, imagination, and perception merge. The visitor not only contemplates but also reads, listens, and completes the story with their own sensitivity. Thus, 15 Instant Stories becomes an invitation to see again like a child: with curiosity, with freedom, and with the certainty that reality can always be told in a different way.
