Poetic Intention From 14 December, new presentation of the Collection

Poetic Intention can be seen as a prelude to the new permanent exhibition of the MACBA Collection, associated with the upcoming construction of the Museum’s extension. In this spirit of renewal, the exhibition features recently acquired works and works on loan, in a dialogue with the existing works in the Collection. Some challenge the usual framework of the building, while others require the viewer’s active participation in a very physical way. Borrowing its title from the eponymous book by the Martinican poet and philosopher Édouard Glissant, the exhibition is an attempt to deconstruct the dramaturgy of the Museum and put the works and their way of experiencing the world at the centre of the discourse. If, as Glissant argued, a poem must never deny the way of the world, can a museum advocate the perception of the work in itself, its energy and desire, its poetic intention? This is the question we are asking from 14 December, through more than one-hundred works by almost one hundred artists.