Length: 4 days
Starting date: June 21 junio 2018.
Place: Fundacion Valparaiso (Mojácar). 
www.fundacionvalparaiso.com
Spots: 15
Fee: 460 €.
(Including  full room and board)

ABOUT THE WORKSHOP
In his text Character and destiny, Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio, following a family anecdote, begins by talking about the "self-sufficiency of significance", that is, the capacity of something or someone to be significant by itself, without the need for " argument" that explains it. And he considers that it is a trait typical of the field of character, as opposed to the need for argument, which is associated with the field of destiny. (Serve this simplification, perhaps excessive, as an appetizer).

Something makes me think that this self-sufficiency of meaning could have to do, in a certain sense, with what concerns the image, and more specifically, the photographic image and what we call its language... if that is possible. speak of a language without code or argument, of mere signs and symbols.

In light of this approach, we will study how this (possible) language has been crystallizing in a series of authors from whom I have traced a route for my own use, which I would dare to call familiar, to the extent that they make up the photographic family of my choice. And I'm not just talking about photographers, because the relationship between image and word, between photography and literature, is always something essential for me.

And, on the other hand, taking advantage of the recent new edition of my PHotoBolsillo, which presents a completely new selection of images, we will, from the same point of view mentioned above, take a tour of some of my most representative works, or, to use the term same term, significant. We will work with the editions and, especially, with the discards, without forgetting, of course, the crucial moment of taking the photographs, which could well justify, in my case, my dedication to this craft, and which would be the true moment of the significance.

This entire theoretical/practical part will take us through the mornings of the workshop. The afternoons will be dedicated to viewing and analyzing the photographic works presented by students who wish to do so.

Indications for presenting work in the workshop: images may be both on paper and in digital format (no more than 40). In the first case, if possible, loose copies or, if they are bindings, they must be removable; in the second, in jpeg and no more than 1600 px. the larger side, for reasons of system agility.

Jose Manuel Navia. Madrid, 1957
He graduated in Philosophy from the Autonomous University of Madrid in 1980 and studied with Julio Caro Baroja. He began working as a freelance photographer in 1987. His beginnings are linked to editorial, documentary and journalistic photography; He belonged to the Cover agency, and since 1992 he has been a member of VU'. He was graphic editor of El País Semanal between 1995 and 1996.

His work as a reporter has been decreasing in favor of increasingly personal photography. Making a particular use of light, he gives a primary role to color, which works as a modeler of his images. His works also highlight his way of presenting cities, with a style that reflects the historical and the mystical. He collaborates with two people: Carmen Martín Eizaguirre, his wife since 1979, and Marta Martín Emaldi, who are in charge of editing and the digital laboratory respectively. This unusual work process results in the high final quality of the images. Some of his series are Territories of Don Quixote, Antonio Machado, Miradas and Morocco, Fragments of Everyday Life.

Other media with which he has collaborated are La Vanguardia Magazine, the Spanish edition of National Geographic, GEO and La Repubblica. He has received the FotoPres Award (1987, 1989, 1990, 1991) in different categories, the Godó Photojournalism Award (1999) and the 2006 Imagen Award from the Spanish Geographic Society, among others. His work is in the collections of the Marugame Hirai Museum of Spanish Contemporary Art (Marugame, Japan) and the Municipal Museum of Contemporary Art of Madrid, to name a few examples..

Some publications from Navia: PhotoBolsillo, La Fábrica 2001; Pisadas sonámbulas: lusofonías. La Fábrica, 2001-2008; Marruecos, fragmentos de lo cotidiano. Barcelona, Edícola-62, 2003; Desde la Catedral. Fundación catedral Santa María de Vitoria, 2003; Territorios del Quijote. Lunwerg, 2004; Viaje a la Historia. Lunwerg, 2005; Ciudades Patrimonio de la Humanidad. La Fábrica, 2008; Un Madrid literario. Lunwerg, 2009.