Helena Goñi: Tell Me How Close We Are to a Riot

Spanish photographer and artist Helena Goñi presents her first New York exhibition, a collaboration between Aldama Fabre Gallery and The Storefront Project, and narrated by Julia Morandeira.

About Helena Goñi

Helena Goñi is currently based in Bilbao where she combines working on her personal projects with photographic assignments. Although her creations are predominantly photographic, they are deeply influenced by music, which is integrated into her work itself, alongside other devices such as video, screen printing, etc. She draws on her surroundings, paying particular attention to her experience through expectations, failure, utopia or encounters with the Other.

With a B.A. in Fine Arts from the University of the Basque Country, she moved to London to continue her studies, completing a Master’s in Photography at Central Saint Martins. After graduating in June 2015, her first individual exhibition was shown at the Cosmos gallery (Bilbao) in October of the same year, marking the début of her project Tourniquet. Between October 2015 and June 2016, she worked on her project Behind Blue Eyes, made possible by a Visual Arts grant from the Provincial Council of Biscay. This second project was published as a photo-book, after she won the first edition of Género y Figura.

She has won numerous awards, such as Ertibil 2016 and 2018, Barakaldo Foto Festival and GetxoArte 2016. Her work has been collectively exhibited in several countries, such as Germany, Malta, the UK, Switzerland and Spain. From January to March 2017, her second individual exhibition, Tell Me How Close We Are to a Riot, took place at Bilbao’s Sala Rekalde, as part of the Barriek program.

Her work can be found in private and public collections such as the Basque Museum-Centre of Contemporary Art (Artium) and the Bilbao Contemporary Photography Centre.

About Aldama Fabre

Aldama Fabre is a contemporary art space in the city of Bilbao, founded and directed by Eugenia Griffero Fabre. The space opened its doors in May 2016 offering exhibitions of national and international emerging artists, and creating cultural events and dance and theater collaborations. Basque Corner was born as an annual proposal and not as an ephemeral explosion, with the aim of publicizing different aspects of Basque culture, through its artists in New York City.

The Aldama Fabre Gallery understands that the art market and its fairs are saturated, which makes small galleries and independent exhibition spaces find a greater difficulty in staying and creating cultural fabric inside and outside the city of Bilbao. That is why they propose a new collaborative proposal with other galleries abroad, in order to house Basque artists and our culture under the Basque Corner project. When working in collaboration with another gallery, the artistic proposal of the Basque emerging creator will be welcomed by a space that already forms part of the city map, which has recognition and history. Artist and gallery thus enjoy the possibility of increasing their network of contacts and adding possible collectors.

About The Storefront Project

The Storefront Project’s mission is to connect artists influenced by pop culture, celebrity and advertising with the general public via their gallery storefront space on The Lower East Side. Their clients range from local LES residents, indie art collectors and friends working for small and big brands. They are a collective group of art directors, copywriters, filmmakers, editors, producers, visual FX and 2d/3d graphic artists utilizing their gallery space and work space to offer creative solutions for TV and digital content.