iCCCB – Centre de Cultura Contemporània de BarcelonaRaval
The Atomic Age
20th- and 21st-century art responding to the atom and the bomb, from early physics and mysticism to nuclear protest. Adapted from the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris show.
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Preview: written before the show opened
The CCCB's picture for this show is a summer afternoon by the Seine. A man in swim shorts dozes in a deckchair beside his fishing rods while two cooling towers of the Nogent-sur-Seine nuclear plant steam behind the trees. Jürgen Nefzger took it in 2003 for his series Fluffy Clouds.
Close to 250 works and documents follow the atom from 1890s physics through the 1945 bomb, 1970s protests, and Chernobyl and Fukushima, with artists from Hilma af Klint and Marcel Duchamp to Yoko Ono. You also get a section new to Barcelona: Spain's own nuclear story, from Franco-era power stations to today's phase-out debate.
The show first ran at the Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris in 2024. Reviewing it for Aperture, Aaron Peck said it "starts out strong", with Duchamp beside Becquerel's early notes, but that "the documents at times feel supplementary" and Bruce Conner's Bombhead risked being "reduced to spectacle". Becquerel and Conner are in Barcelona too. Tickets are €8 online or €10 at the desk.
Editor's pick
Close to 250 works follow the atom from 1890s physics to Fukushima, with art from Hilma af Klint to Yoko Ono, plus a section on Spain's nuclear plants. Aperture found it "starts out strong", though the documents "at times feel supplementary".
Look for
Nogent-sur-Seine, Jürgen Nefzger
A man naps in a deckchair beside his fishing rods while a nuclear plant's two cooling towers steam above the trees.
Spain's nuclear history
A section added for Barcelona, running from the first power stations built under Franco to the current debate over phasing nuclear power out.
Good for
- Cheap Culture
- Nerding Out
Also at CCCB – Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona
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Image credits
9
- The Atomic AgeJürgen Nefzger
- Anna Moreno. The Third TwistCourtesy of Anna Moreno and Bernardo Zanotta / MACBA
- Spiral of Time – Plaça dels Àngels – MACBAMACBA
- Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme. Prisoners of Love: Until the Sun of FreedomCourtesy of the artists / MACBA
- CCCB – Centre de Cultura Contemporània de BarcelonaFred Romero / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
- MACBA – Museu d'Art Contemporani de BarcelonaZarateman / Wikimedia Commons, CC0
- Museu Frederic MarèsEnfo / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Casa BatllóChristianSchd / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Museu d'Història de Barcelona (MUHBA)J Irigoyen / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0