International Symposium “Primitive Images, Modern Dreams: Tàpies and Post-War Visual Culture”

As part of the exhibition Antoni Tàpies: The Imagination of the World, the Museu Tàpies is organising an international symposium to explore the study of the image on the basis of its collection. This initiative is part of the museum’s ongoing line of research and aims to rethink the visual narratives that shape our collective imagination, paying special attention to the symbolic, aesthetic world view surrounding Antoni Tàpies’ work.

The symposium sets out from the body of work on exhibition, made up of works by Tàpies from the forties and fifties, prior to his material period; pieces belonging to the artist’s private collection from non-Western cultures or by other artists in his context, and archive material—both belonging to the museum and acquired by it specifically to prepare this exhibition—related to the popular imagination of the day.

On the basis of these materials, the symposium concentrates on three subject areas that can be followed throughout the exhibition: primitivism, psychoanalysis and popular culture. These areas allow us to place Tàpies’ artistic output in the context of a post-war Barcelona deeply marked by social, political and cultural changes, and to connect it with international avant-garde movements. At the same time, this encounter sets out to explore other aspects, such as the way Tàpies approached vernacular traditions and ancestral practices, the impact of psychoanalytic thought on his work as a tool for addressing psychological concerns typical of an era, and the dialogue between academic art and popular knowledge as forms of resistance and radical expression.

The symposium stands out for its interdisciplinary approach, incorporating philosophy and psychoanalysis to address images not only as aesthetic forms but also as instruments of thought and symbolic construction. Its ultimate goal is to offer an updated, critical reading of Tàpies’ work, opening up spaces for discussion of the image, the historical narrative and cultural memory.

Programme of the symposium

Wednesday, 3 December 2025

· 6 pm. Welcome and presentation by the Museu Tàpies

· 6.10 pm. Talk: ‘The Material Imagination’, by Emmanuel Alloa

· 6.50 pm. Talk: ‘A Visionary Context: Spiritualism, Clairvoyance and the Unconscious’, by Andrea Graus Ferrer

· 7.30 pm. Break

· 7.40 pm. Talk: ‘The Origin and Context of primitivism in Antoni Tàpies’, by Estela Ocampo

· 8.20 pm. Round table and debate moderated by the Museu Tàpies

· 9 pm. Closing

Thursday, 4 December 2025

· 6 pm. Welcome and presentation by the Museu Tàpies

· 6.10 pm. Talk: ‘Imagination, imagined, imaginary’, by Chiara Boticci (online)

· 6.50 pm. Talk: ‘Club 49, a Window on the World’, by Muriel Gómez

· 7.30 pm Break

· 7.40 pm Talk: ‘Swing and Modernity: Jazz in postwar Barcelona’ by Jordi Pujol Baulenas

· 8.20 pm. Round table and debate moderated by the Museu Tàpies

· 9 pm. Close with ‘Echoes of Club 49’, by the Carlos Falanga Trio