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Man Jayen. Cristina de Middel

Name: Man Jayen. Cristina de Middel
Start: 2015-11-19T01:00
End: 2015-11-20T00:59
Location: {

By 1911, the North Pole had already been discovered, and these first brave explorers had paved the way for secondary heroes who wanted to prove their courage and take home some unforgettable and unique memories.

It was the dawn of extreme tourism.

In this context, a group of supposedly wealthy German and British scientists decided to "rediscover" Jan Mayen, an island located between Greenland and Iceland that whalers had used for years, but which science had never studied.

They sailed, argued, fought, forgot the compass, ran out of coal, managed to reach the island, but the ship was too big and they couldn't disembark.

End of story. No medals to bring home this time, nor any serious discoveries in any field of science that the team proudly represented.

History is written by the victors, and the team's cameraman knew this well. He convinced the failed group to stop on their way back at an Icelandic beach and stage the landing with all the drama that such a heroic feat entails.

This is the true chronicle of how history was staged.

Cristina De Middel

MAN JAYEN

The museum opened the exhibition yesterday. Man Jayen and the book of the same title, which constitute the latest artistic project by Cristina de Middel, a renowned bestseller of photography publications.

Produced in-house and curated byValentín VallhonratandRafael Levenfeld, members of the Museum's Artistic Direction Committee, the exhibition will be on display in theMuseum's Tower Room, on the +1 floor, until March 13. The artist's collaboration with the University of Navarra Museum will continue through the center's contemporary art creation program, called Tender Puentes, on which Cristina de Middel will begin working after the opening.

Before the World War I, a crew of English and Germans without experience in navigation but with experience in other sciences, embarks on a trip with the aim of reaching Jan Mayen Island. The ship managed to reach the island, but it was so ostentatious and inappropriate that did not manage to arrive to land. One of the expedition members was a cinematographer, and in order to show this adventure to the world, he convinced the crew to rrepresent the arrival on the islandConvinced, they docked the ship on a beach in Iceland and reenacted what would have been their feat. The captain described all the scenes filmed in his diary, from the excitement of stepping ashore to the raising of the flag.

Cristina de Middel recreates this storyby recording the video that was missing from the AMC archive, shot in Super 8 and following the staging described in the captain's diary. After making the video, the artist developed the project with a series of photographs taken on the Isle of Skye in Scotland, which are mixed with those from the original background. The two sets of images form a mural of 50 photographs and two display cases with material from 1911.

Thetitle of the exhibition, Man Jayen,is a play on words with the name of the island where the artist satirizes the absurdity of the exhibition. Her photography defies rules and presents fictional scenes through a lens based on the reality of her photographs. De Middelwants visitors to reflect on and question the validity of the image as proof of reality.

CRISTINA DE MIDDEL

2006 Madrid, Spain

IV War Correspondents Training, Army, Army School

Course on International Humanitarian Law and Peacekeeping Operations, by the Spanish Red Cross

2002 Barcelona, 0–0 Spain

Photojournalism, Postgraduate Degree, Autonomous University of Barcelona

2001 Valencia, Spain

MA Fine Arts, Polytechnic University of Valencia

2000 Oklahoma, USA

M.A. Photography from the University of Oklahoma.PROMOEScholarships

1975 Alicante, Spain

Born