The Ellas Crean Festival takes place throughout the month of March and until April 7th. A proposal that combines dance, theatre, music, literature and visual arts in an attempt to reflect on the active and producer role of women in the cultural sector.

One week ago the International Women's Day was celebrated all over the world, and our country was an example of the ability to call one of the largest social mobilisations that wanted to question the pre-established gender roles and claim social equality which still is a historical debt.

“Óyeme con los ojos”. María Pagés Company

Around this milestone, many contributions have been generated from the world of the arts, among which "Ellas Crean" stands out. This festival is an initiative of the Institute for Women and Equal Opportunities and the Conde Duque Cultural Centre, which has had the collaboration of more than thirty institutions of the capital to build a solid program where women are the protagonists. The project obeys to a collective clamour that has been growing and increasing in adherents in recent years. According to the Minister of Culture of France "the cultural sector has the duty to be exemplary in terms of equality between men and women", and to this aim, the festival responds, which is now in its 14th edition.

Ana Dévora

From March 1st to April 7th, activities in all disciplines are concentrated and offer a wide range of possibilities for all tastes and trends. In addition to institutional support, the contributions of many national museums to the program stand out and help to enrich the exhibition content with samples that deal with the figure of relevant women and the role of women in the arts from different perspectives, both social and historical.

“Sin ellas no hay futuro” ©Patrick Farrell

In a more contemporary level, the proposals of plastic arts are completed with two photography exhibitions in Conde Duque: "Sur la route", by Ana Dévora, a landscape image that invites to meet again with nature, and "Sin ellas no hay futuro", which portrays the harsh reality that women suffer in contexts of humanitarian crisis, organized by Doctors Without Borders. In addition, the "Tres en suma" initiative, which celebrates its 7th anniversary within the festival, brings together exhibition, performance and poetry in the first two weeks of April.

In the year 2020 in the heart of Barcelona a wandering gallery was born, the same one that in February 2021 would debut at Art Madrid with an exhibition proposal focused on contemporary portraits; with this subject matter it would manage to create a powerful dialogue between artwork and audience and make the seal Inéditad remain in the history of the event that contained it.

Jean Carlos Puerto. Protección. Oil and copper leaf on wood. 60 x 48. 2021. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Since that first time and until today, the wandering gallery has managed to build projects on otherness, has repositioned in the spotlight the discourses on the LGTBIQ+ collective, has consolidated a group of artists who share its principles of resilience and empathy and the best thing is that it continues to bet from the professionalism and commitment to give voice to the difference.

Claudio Petit-Laurent.. El Joven de la Perla. Oil on wood. 30 x 30 cm. 2023. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Inéditad Gallery, thanks to its founder Luis López, its collaborators and the infinite possibilities manifested in the works of the artists it represents, is a gallery that has demonstrated its capacity and courage to stimulate the sensibility of the public through art and seduce a generation that moves between the glass window and the analogical story. Inéditad is a nomadic gallery that has gathered around it a community of artists and has moved the context with exhibition projects that think about LGTBIQ+ art without prejudices.

Pepa Salas Vilar. Las marcas del arcoiris. Oil on canvas. 40 x 50 cm. 2022. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Pride and Prejudice was inaugurated. An exhibition that brings together the works of sixteen artists: Abel Carrillo, Alex Domènech, Carlos Enfedaque, Silvia Flechoso, Jamalajama, Daniel Jaén, Claudio Petit-Laurent, Jean Carlos Puerto, Fernando Romero, Pablo Rodríguez, Pepa Salas Vilar, Jack Smith, Pablo Sola, Bran Sólo, Elia Tomás and Utürüo. Painting, illustration, photography and digital art are the manifestations that bring into dialogue around fifty neatly threaded pieces, in a discursive line that discusses such a latent phenomenon as discrimination. To achieve this, the artists invited to the exhibition question themselves whether: Does discrimination exist within the LGTBIQ+ collective?

Pride and Prejudice Official Poster. Image courtesy of the gallery.

With approaches on and from the body, the proposal invites to celebrate diversity, proposes to question and self-question the prejudices and attitudes of society against the collective. Pride and Prejudice is a space for dialogue about the constructs imposed on us by society. It is also an oasis in which to deconstruct with tolerance and respect the subjectivities that sometimes prevent us from approaching the production of the participating artists, simply because "the beautiful" does not fit in an androgynous body. The subjugation of stereotypes are pressed with determination to find the beauty of diversity in other palpable facets of reality.

Pablo Sola. All men are dogs. Photography. 2014. Image courtesy of the gallery.

Throughout these three years Inéditad has stimulated the vindictive projection towards bad practices, has questioned estates around the LGTBIQ+ body and the most admirable thing, is that these capacities have resurfaced around the dialogue and the visual narrative of the stories that are told from the visual: Artworks that are people, art that is, per se, humanity. Overcome impositions and accept what is different in order to continue fighting against homophobia, biphobia, lesbophobia or transphobia and defend the equal rights that all the acronyms of the collective deserve in our community.

That's Pride and Prejudice: One creature, the happiest in the world. And maybe other projects and other people have said it - or felt it - before, but none so fairly.

Silvia Flechoso. Hola, soy maricón. Oil on canvas. 73 x 54 cm. 2023. Image courtesy of the gallery.

From June 8th until June 22nd you can visit Pride and Prejudice. Carrer de Palau núm. 4. Canal Gallery space. Barcelona.