CHRISTA LEEM
Josep Gol, Manuel Guerrero Brullet, Joan Brossa, Jordi Coca, Marina Garcés
2015
This collection, in a conservation box of red velvet, contains 10 photographs by Josep Armengol, Gol, accompanied by a booklet with texts by Manuel Guerrero Brullet, Joan Brossa, Jordi Coca and Marina Garcés. In them appears Christa Leem, a woman who in the seventies and eighties turned the music hall scene of the Catalan capital on its head. Her way of doing things, so far removed from the vedettes of the moment, her wiry, thin body turned her into the reference and muse of the night and culture in the Barcelona of the seventies.
Leem’s erotic, sensual dances did not make specific reference to sex, so much as to desire. Leem was the provocation and source of inspiration; the eroticism and the surprise factor of her striptease established her as an icon of sexual liberation for many intellectuals at the time, amongst whom we should highlight Joan Brossa, who said she had made the greatest contribution to the improvement of cabaret in the country.
Much like a curtain, the red velvet box hides ten photographs of the striptease artist. The images, all in black and white, show the artist on stage and in the dressing room, the defiant, provocative, and intimidating nude body, but also the private woman, stripped of her artifices, face to face with herself in front of the mirror.
The edition contains:
10 photographs by Josep Gol, digital giclée printed with pigmented inks on Hahnemühle Matt Fibre paper, 200 g of 21 x 30 cm.
1 booklet with texts by Manuel Guerrero Brullet, Joan Brossa, Jordi Coca and Marina Garcés.
1 conservation box lined with red velvet, of 31,5 x 22,3 x 3 cm.
Publication curated by Manuel Guerrero Brullet.
Bookbinding by Àngels Arroyo.
Graphic design by Jaume Roure.
The edition is made up of:
70 copies signed and numbered from 1/70 to 70/70.
5 copies PA signed and numbered in Roman numerals PA I/V to PA V/V.