EUROPA 2021

Last year, when we presented the previous Saló Europa, we talked about the exceptional situation we were experiencing due to the COVID-19 pandemic and wished that in the next edition, which we present now, we would already be returning to a certain normality.

We also talked about the inequalities that exist in the world in which we live, whereas we could all be victims of the virus as well.

Now, however, we realise that these inequalities are turning up crudely again, as some parts of the world are indeed returning to a certain normality, where everyone is thinking about travelling again and wants to go back to life as it was before, while the pandemic still wreaks havoc in other parts of the world and does not allow to return to any normalcy.

This shows us once again that we live in a contradictory and often unfair world with obscene and unacceptable inequalities.

As we have said on other occasions, we have always intended for our show to be a window open to the world. Through this window and the eyes of photographers from around the world, we can see these inequalities to which we allude reflected in many of the images that the photographers submit to us.

At the very least, they should help us to reflect on the world we will leave to our children and grandchildren, and we should try to do what we can to improve this world in which we are just passing through.

Despite all this and the pandemic, we can say that the photographers participating again in our show have helped us to live as normally as possible in these difficult times, even if only in the world of images.

Thus, we have received 4,448 works by 282 photographers from 44 countries around the world. We must once again thank all these photographers for their trust, without which Saló Europa would not exist. And we extend a very special thank you to the jury, which once again had to reach its verdict by videoconference.

We hope that next spring, in 2022, when we hold our show again, it will be much more normal in terms of health and social life in general.

Thank you and continue to take great care!

Josep M Casanoves Dolcet, AFIAP, EsFIAP
Curator of Saló Europa
Director of the FIAP Exhibition Centre at the CIMIR in Reus