North of Bilbao, in Spain, the small town of Getxo is presenting the sixth edition of an unusual festival with clear intentions and a thousand miles between it and the season’s major festivals: We are a local festival with international content. These radical Basques work with limited resources—there’s only a handful of exhibition spaces—but the 80,000 locals are unlikely to escape photography during the month-long festival. Photography is everywhere: installations, T-shirts, photocopies, on the tables of cafés and restaurants, and even on chef’s apron. In this region where gastronomy is inseparable from everyday life, food plays a part in the festival.
The first artistic director of GetxoPhoto was Alejandro Castellote—the position he held for three consecutive years—a specialist in South American photography and a figure of the Spanish photography scene since the 1980s. This year Frank Kalero is concluding a cycle that allowed him to show the ages of man in many forms, by going back in time, from old age to childhood, the focus of this year’s festival. Kalero’s subject isn’t children, but the image that adults with complex relationships to their own past want to give of themself.
There are screenings, workshops, tours, meals and other surprises. The festival lasts until September 30 in Getxo, in the Biscay province. If you want something to remember from the festival besides its catalogue, you can purchase a number of original artworks, including handbags and pillows made from recycled tarps, featuring large-format images from last year’s festival.
All this and more is available on their site: Getxophoto.com. Don’t miss out on the hilarious clips presenting the festival every year.
Christian Caujolle
