More than 5 million people return to the centres of the "la Caixa" Foundation in a year marked by the pandemic

The "la Caixa" Foundation has taken stock of the attendance at its cultural and scientific centres and exhibitions during the year that has just ended, still marked by the pandemic. 

The organisation has made a great effort to recover the rate of visitors to the eight CaixaForum centres and CosmoCaixa, as well as the travelling exhibitions, adapting to the situation to ensure that culture is safe and following the capacity restrictions stipulated by the autonomous communities due to COVID-19. 

The public has backed this commitment and 5.2 million people have visited the centres and experienced the different cultural, scientific and educational proposals in 2021, which is 1.3 million more people than in 2020.

Thus, seven out of every ten regular visitors before the pandemic have returned to the CaixaForum and CosmoCaixa centres, a total of 1.9 million people. To this number must be added the 3.3 million people who have visited the travelling exhibitions, which have travelled to more than 70 cities throughout Spain.

CaixaForum Madrid welcomed 307,000 visitors (33% more than in 2020) and the most visited exhibition was 'The Human Image: Art, Identities and Symbolism', produced in collaboration with the British Museum, which runs until 9 January 2022. The second most visited exhibition was 'Objects of Desire. Surrealism and design, 1924-2020', with works by artists of the stature of Salvador Dalí, Björk and Le Corbusier. Overall, the interactive and immersive exhibition 'Teamlab. Art, technology and nature' at CaixaForum Barcelona was the most visited exhibition of the year.

The CaixaForum network has presented its most extensive offer for the current academic year with 40 exhibitions: 31 in centres and 9 travelling, and 15 of the titles are in-house productions. All with the aim of contributing to recovering enthusiasm and inviting reflection in order to rethink the future, from a transversal perspective that combines culture and scientific dissemination. The season runs under the slogan 'We believe in culture. We grow in culture' to offer the public windows that allow them to look into the past, live in the present and also face the future.

In its firm commitment to bringing culture closer to all audiences, "la Caixa" Foundation will open CaixaForum Valencia in July 2022. 

One of the great premieres of the season will take place at CosmoCaixa, which from March will offer a journey to discover the secrets of the Sun. The interactive exhibition 'The Sun. Living with our star', in collaboration with the Science Museum of London, will show the public the fascinating relationship between mankind and this star, which is essential to our existence. The exhibition includes more than one hundred historical and contemporary pieces, as well as an impressive large-format immersive audiovisual installation showing real satellite images of this star (from 22 March to 16 October).

February will see the arrival of the exhibition 'The Magritte Machine', a collaboration with the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza that will present more than 60 paintings by René Magritte together with a selection of photographs and family films from more than 50 museums and collections in Europe, Canada, Mexico, China, the United States and Japan. This monographic exhibition dedicated to the work of the surrealist genius is the first exhibition in Spain on the artist in more than 20 years and will demonstrate the non-systematic but methodical nature of the Belgian painter's work (from 24 February to 5 June).

After its premiere at CaixaForum Madrid, 'Tattoo. Art under the skin', the largest exhibition on the history of tattooing, will arrive in Barcelona. Produced and organised by the Musée du Quai Branly - Jaques Chirac in Paris and the "la Caixa" Foundation, the exhibition proposes a journey into the unique universe of tattooing from an anthropological viewpoint and analyses the resurgence of this global phenomenon. It will bring together more than 240 historical and contemporary works, as well as some twenty prototypes of hyper-realistic bodies modelled in silicone and tattooed with ink, created expressly for this exhibition, by masters of this art from different parts of the world (from 18 May to 28 August).
CaixaForum Madrid

Two premieres await the public in the first months of 2022 at CaixaForum Madrid. Jean Paul Gaultier will be the main protagonist with 'Cinema and fashion. By Jean Paul Gaultier'. The enfant terrible of fashion has been invited to take an author's look at the links between fashion and cinema through the collections of the Cinémathèque Française and through dresses, outfits and haute couture pieces, fashion accessories, drawings, film posters, shooting photographs, documents, reconstructions of sets and extracts from films by more than 20 international lenders. The exhibition, which can later be seen at CaixaForum Barcelona, reviews the presence of the world of fashion and fashion shows in cinema and the collaborations of great couturiers in film costumes. An auteur exhibition with the personal touch of Jean Paul Gaultier (from 18 February to 5 June).

The premiere of the exhibition 'Comic' will vindicate this art as a tool for reflection on the present and the future, and as a powerful means of creating parallel realities, imaginary worlds, utopias and dystopias. From its origins until the beginning of the 20th century, the comic has been a mirror of reality and has shown aspects that went unnoticed in the other arts. This self-produced exhibition, which presents the work of the great universal masters and also of Spanish comic classics, has featured internationally renowned scriptwriters and cartoonists (from the 20th of May to the 28th of August).

CaixaForum Palma will be offering an exciting journey through the world of the pharaohs based on the prestigious collections of the British Museum, which invite visitors to discover this ancient civilisation. 'Pharaoh. King of Egypt' not only explores the symbolism and ideology of Egyptian royalty, but also aims to discover the realities behind these characters. The exhibition is made up of around 140 pieces from the British Museum, from imposing busts, beautifully carved stone reliefs and shiny gold jewellery to the most unusual objects (from 11 February to 12 June).

Together with the National Sculpture Museum, CaixaForum Zaragoza will host the exhibition Non finito. The art of the unfinished, which delves into the poetics of unfinished art. The exhibition explores works of art from all periods that, for different reasons, have remained unfinished, have been interrupted or have been intentionally conceived as fragments. The exhibition, which brings together 94 works from more than 40 museums and collections, highlights the constant predilection of artists throughout history for fragmentary forms (from 10 February to 29 May).

In February, CaixaForum Seville will host the latest exhibition organised in conjunction with the British Museum. 'The Human Image. Art, identities and symbolism' is an exciting journey through one of the great themes - perhaps the most recurrent - of figurative art: the human being. Iconic works from ancient civilisations from the British Museum are combined with a selection of works from the "la Caixa" Foundation Contemporary Art Collection and some important loans from other institutions (from 17 February to 29 May).
CaixaForum Girona

In 'Art and Myth. The gods of the Prado', CaixaForum Girona will delve into the way in which classical mythology has been a constant source of inspiration for numerous artists throughout history. In fact, these fabulous narratives have been recorded in ceramic pieces, marble blocks, medals, panels and canvases such as those that form part of this exhibition. Made up of works from the Museo Nacional del Prado, the exhibition offers a broad overview of Greco-Roman mythology and its representation by artists of the stature of Francisco de Zurbarán, José de Ribera and Pedro Pablo Rubens, among others (from 2 March to 28 August).

CaixaForum Lleida will discover the golden age of the modern poster in an exhibition that shows the origins of advertising art in the transition from the 19th to the 20th century through the evolution of lithographic posters. The exhibition 'Posters of Modern Life. The origins of advertising art' tells the story of how the advertising poster became, around 1900 and throughout the intercentury period, a powerful means of mass communication and, in turn, a work of art. More than a hundred pieces by Spanish and international artists from the valuable historical poster collection of the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya (MNAC) will be on display, together with loans from public and private centres and collections (from 2 March to 24 July).

From the screen to the exhibition hall, some of the great protagonists of Pixar films will leap from the screen. With 'Pixar. Building characters', visitors will be able to discover the origins and vicissitudes that the characters go through to become the endearing protagonists of films such as 'Toy Story', 'Monsters Inc.', 'The Incredibles' and 'Inside Out', among others (from 9 February to 24 July).