Disparando con el corazón – Shooting from the heart

Joana Biarnés is a legend in Spain. Born in 1935, she was the first woman to conquer the hitherto purely male-dominated profession of press photographer. She is considered the Iberian Peninsula’s first female photojournalist.

Encouragement of her father, Joana Biarnés produces first small reportages already at an early age and enrols as a student at Barcelona’s newly founded Escuela Official de Periodismo (School of Photojournalism) in 1956. At the time of the Franco regime, a very traditional image of women prevailed; alternative lifestyles were an affront and were fought with all means. The young photographer has consequently to courageously assert herself against constant resistance and prejudice. In 1963, she finds a job at the daily newspaper Pueblo, where she quickly won people over: she is modern, cheeky and ironic. With her visual language and self-confident appearance, she strikes a chord in a country which is slowly opening up to Europe after decades of totalitarian rule.

As a photojournalist, Joana Biarnés conquers the world. She documented natural disasters, such as the Flooding of the Vallès (Riadas del Vallès) in 1962, as well as the nation’s most important sporting events; she turned her camera on the daily lives of the country’s people, photographed innovative fashion spreads and socialised with the stars and the members of high society of her time. One of her greatest triumphs is an exclusive reportage on the Beatles’ tour of Spain in 1965, which she manages to get by sneaking into the pop stars’ hotel room under some other pretext.

Joana Biarnés’ work, spanning more than 30 years, documents an epoch: Spain from the mid-1950s to the 1980s. Her images provide an optimistic account of what is termed the Transición, the transition from dictatorship to democracy in the country. Disappointed by the developments in photojournalism, which in the 1980s, with the democratisation and the privatisation of the media landscape, became increasingly oriented towards commercial considerations, she gave up photography.

Her work falls into oblivion for years until it is finally rediscovered in the mid-2010s. For the first time, Disparando con el corazón at freiraum für fotografie makes Joana Biarnés’ unique work accessible to a German audience.

Photo: Unknown. © Joana Biarnés / Fundación Photographic Social Vision.