Crowds

Opera Gallery Madrid

14 November - 04 January 2025

The exhibition 'Crowds' at Opera Gallery delves into the tension between individuality and collective identity, showcasing artists who explore themes of mass culture, societal influence, and groupthink. This group exhibition considers the ways individuals navigate identity within crowds—both as unique entities and as participants in a larger, sometimes homogenising collective.

Juan Genovés, whose work centres on crowd formations, views his subjects as distinct individuals, envisioning a society where each person enjoys complete freedom. Similarly, Jean Dubuffet and Karel Appel explore societal margins through their distinct associations with Art Brut and CoBrA, challenging norms with a raw, unfiltered aesthetic. These artists emphasise the vitality of unique human experiences, resisting the urge toward conformity often imposed by crowds.

Antonio Saura, with his gestural style, portrays the emotional tumult and inner conflict that individuals face in mass society, asserting autonomy amid the crowd’s noise. This theme of isolation appears in Fernando Botero’s figures and the faceless busts by Manolo Valdés, which depict anonymous individuals who become emblematic of solitude within the collective.

Meanwhile, feminist narratives come to the fore through Niki de Saint Phalle and Lita Cabellut, who address cultural identity and gender roles, illustrating how crowds can simultaneously suppress and empower. Etsu Egami further extends this conversation by examining barriers in communication across civilisations and how these clashes reveal evolving perceptions of the self within the mass.

'Crowds' invites viewers to contemplate the complex dynamics of individual expression within collective frameworks, offering a rich spectrum of perspectives on how identity and personal agency interact with societal forces in contemporary life. Through diverse media, each work offers a lens to examine how the individual navigates, resists, or blends into the crowd, making it a thought-provoking experience on the nature of identity in modern culture.