Yesterday, Castilla. Today, this house. On 12 September 2024, six months after a phone call made from Luxor, Ramón Masats's photographs filled our walls, 1,342 metres up in the mountains of Andorra. He had died in Madrid on 4 March, at ninety-two, and never saw the room.
It began five days after his death, in a crowded corridor at ARCO: "I've been thinking about you. Did you know Ramón Masats has just passed away? You must visit his archive. I think you are the right person, perhaps the only one, to make his name known around the world." That was Isabel Hernández. The next day we left for Egypt, called his daughter Sonia from Luxor, and on our return flew to the archive in Aranjuez — the first gallery to visit it — and came back with several dozen vintage prints.
David Campany wrote the text: photographs "with the potential to resonate far beyond the borders of his country". In Spain he needed no introduction; beyond it, almost nobody knew his name. Until 2024 every show in this house had been of a foreign photographer. Unveiling Masats ran until 30 January 2025, and friends, collectors and curators drove up the mountain to see it — many of them had never heard his name before.
Installation views: Unveiling Masats, Galería Alta, Anyós, 2024.
Works, in order of appearance: Madres de la División Azul, Madrid, 1957 · Jane Russell, Spain, 1960 · Las Ventas, Madrid, 1963 · Romería del Rocío, Almonte, Huelva, 1959 · Museo del Prado, Madrid, 1965.
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