BARCELONA.- Around the 1950s, a group of Catalan people interested in the artistic movements of the moment including Josep Maria Mestres Quadreny, Joaquim Gomis and Joan Brossa, and spurred on by Joan Prats, launched Club 49, a project that sought to recapture the spirit of the artistic avantgarde that had flourished during the Republic and been cut short by the Civil War. In the absence of institutional support, Ricard Gomis turned his house in La Ricarda pine forest in El Prat de Llobregat into a site for artistic experimentation during the final 15 years of the Franco era.

Under the title of "Open music", Club 49 presented a contemporary music programme consisting of three concerts at La Ricarda, two of which were captured by the lens of Joaquim Gomis, brother of the host and member of the group.

28 November 1964 saw the first performance of Concert per a representar, a musical action with a libretto by Joan Brossa, music by Mestres Quadreny and musical direction from Alain Milhaud, with six actors from Els Joglars and six instrumentalists on stage. Four years later, following its première at the Sigma II Festival in Bordeaux, and as a dress rehearsal for the performance at the Maeght Foundation coinciding with the exhibition in honour of Joan Miró's seventy-fifth birthday, the most extensive musical action born of the collaboration between Brossa and Mestres was staged: Suite Bufa, a piece lasting one hour, with Carles Santos, the singer and actress Anna Ricci, and the dancer Terri Mestres, directed by the philosopher and poet Lluís Solà.

A selection of thirteen images from the Joaquim Gomis Photographic Archive that document these two landmark concerts will be on display in the space set aside for photography in the foyer of the Fundació Joan Miró. The exhibition, which will run to 14 May, forms part of the activities programmed for the year commemorating Joan Brossa.

Joaquim Gomis i Serdañons (Barcelona, 1902-1991) was an entrepreneur, photographer, art promoter and the first president of the Fundació Joan Miró de Barcelona (1972-1975). For more than five decades, he produced a broad and powerful body of photographic work in keeping with the most avant-garde artistic expression of his time. He was a founder member of ADLAN (Friends of the New Art, 1932-1936) and of Club 49 (1949-1971), two of the groups that were most active in promoting the new art in Catalonia between 1930 and 1970.

Since 2012, the Fundació Joan Miró has organised photography exhibitions in the foyer. Through an agreement with the heirs of Joaquim Gomis and the Catalan Government, the Foundation manages the Gomis archive, publicising his material and promoting the study of his work. To this end, it organises temporary exhibitions of Gomis' work, alternating these with shows featuring the work of other amateur photographers.