Catalogue > Un extrait vidéo au hasard

The Colegio de Arquitectos de Catalunya commissioned Pere Portabella to make this film for the Joan Miró retrspective exhibit in 1969. There wew heated discussions on whether it would be rudent to screen the film during the exhibit. Portabella took the following stante: "either both films are screened or ther don`t screen any" and, finally, both Miro l`Altre and Aidez l`Espagne were shown. The film was made by combining newsreels and film material from the Spanish Civil War with prints by Miró from the series "Barcelona" (1939-1944). The film ends with the painter`s "pochoir" known as Aidez l`Espagne.

Ever since the 1960s, Pere Portabella involved himself in the movements against the Franco dictatorship and in support of liberties. In 1977, he was elected senator in the first democratic elections, and took part in the drafting of the Spanish constitution (1978). Since 2001, he has chaired the Fundación Alternativas. Before working as a director, with Films 59, he produced some of the most emblematic spanish films: Los golfos (1959) by Carlos Saura, El cochecito (1960) by Marco Ferreri and Viridiana (1961) by Luis Buñuel wich provoked a scandal that obliged him to move to Italy. In 1964, he wrote the screenplay for Il momento della verità with Francesco Rosi. He began directing in 1967 with No compteu amb els dits followed by his first feature-length film, Nocturno 29 (1968). Vampir-Cuadeduc (1970) is a key work in his filmography, togheter with Umbracle (1972), represents a phase of radical rupture with the production of those years and marked him as one of the most original forces in underground and avantgarde cinema of the time. After Informe General of 1976 he only returned to directing in 1989, with Pont de Varsòvia. In 2001, his films became part of the collection of the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA). In 2002, he was the only Spanish artist to be invited to Documenta 11 in Kassel. In 2008, the Museum of Modern Art of New York (MoMA) acquires a copy of Vampir-Cuadecuc and Die Stille vor Bach (2007).