Helsinki Photo Festival 2021 introduces the Spanish visual artist David Barreiro, winner of the festival’s first portfolio review in 2020, with his project A Breach of Margins. The curated exhibition is set up in the garden area of Finlandia Hall.
David Barreiro is interested in the concept of labor in relation to the processes of social, cultural and psychological development. This body of work focuses on the elements that embody, even if just metaphorically, ideas related to dominant constructions of gender, social hierarchy and economic system. The working environment is understood as a place for the generation of structures, not just physical, but also ideological. The project draws also from the artist’s interest in theories of representation, paying specific attention to the work of German playwright Bertolt Brecht. He believed that, when the spectator is able to realize the artifice, he is forced into unconventional interpretations of what is being represented, a process with subversive potential. In that sense, Barreiro tries to convey the idea that similarly to fiction, ideology is ultimately a product of direct experience. Human interpretation is what makes different ideas emerge from the same material elements.
His project “A Breach of Margins”, sponsored by the Embassy of Spain in Finland.
Authors Biography
David Barreiro (b.1982, Pontevedra, Spain) is a Spanish photographer and artist currently living and working in London. In his practice, he focuses on human constructs, such as identity categories and institutionalised spaces and activities. His photographs fluctuate between the literality of documentary photography and the evocative tension and artificiality of the staged image.
