Walter Benjamin Portbou Summer School

2026

 

4–6 September 2026: 11th edition. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ‘PROGRESS’ AND THE RISE OF ‘NEO-FASCISM’.

 

Speakers: Pau Pedragosa, Demetrio Fernández, Diego Ferrari, Jean McNeil, Claudia Kalász, Sam Abrams, Agnès Sinaï, Santiago Gerchunoff, Diana Padrón, Genara Sert, Konstanze Schmitt, Mimmi Woisnitza

 

Screening of the short film *More than a Sign* (2017). Presentation and opening of the exhibition ‘Day for Night. Landscapes of Walter Benjamin’, a project by DIEGO FERRARI and JEAN McNEIL. This comprises a series of works on landscape, borders and exile in the Mediterranean coastal landscape, as well as a reflection on the importance of landscape in Benjamin’s thought. The following themes will be presented: ‘Day for Night’, a study of light and darkness in Portbou; ‘Mode of Existence’, a mapping of Benjamin’s legacy in relation to the town’s contemporary urbanism; and ‘Minerals’, a triptych exploring the mineral complexity of Cap de Creus.

 

Book launches: WALTER BENJAMIN AND THE STORM OF PROGRESS, by Agnès Sinaï. WALTER BENJAMIN’S THEORY OF ART: A CRITIQUE OF ITS RECEPTION, edited by Genara Sert. WALTER BENJAMIN, TALES OF IBIZA, with an epilogue based on the testimony of Jean Selz and a foreword by Bruno Ferrer (University of Puerto Rico). A publication by the Angelus Novus Foundation and Edicions del Reremus.

 

 

Screening of the video ‘Na, Asja?’ (‘How are you, Asja?’). The performance/reading will be based on the aesthetic concepts of Asja Lācis that she shares with Walter Benjamin: revolutionary children’s theatre and porosity. Benjamin and Lācis introduced the concept of porosity in the article on Naples that they wrote and published together in 1924, For its part, ‘The Programme for a Revolutionary Children’s Theatre’ is a 1928 text by Walter Benjamin inspired by the practice Lācis developed in 1918 in her work with orphans of the Russian War and by the intellectual relationship he maintained with her.

 

Screening of the dialogue between Wim Wenders and Dani Karavan, Portbou, 2015

 

Presentation of the participants in the visual arts competition to design bookplates for the Walter Benjamin Library, followed by a public vote to select the three winning entries.

 

2024

06-09/09/24: IXth edition. Progress and catastrophe: The fissures of contemporary society.

Speakers: Cari Oriol Serres, Maria Mora Tibau, Patricio Salinas, Lluís Montull, Alba Gimenez Gil, Diana González Béjar, Vicent Ordoñez, Ramon del Castillo, Paula Kuffer, Claudia Kálasz, Detlef Jesgard, Carles Duarte, Arnau Ferre Samon.

Inauguration of the photographic exhibition by PATRICIO SALINAS: THE FOOTPRINTS OF A FLÂNEUR. Portbou as a space of progress and catastrophe. Customs hall of the Portbou International Station.

Screening of the film THE UNWANTED OF EUROPA. Walter Benjamin's journey in a film by Fabrício Ferraro, 2018. (Spanish subtitles). The film focuses on Walter Benjamin's Republican retreat and exodus, when he went into exile en route to the United States before deciding to end his life in Portbou on September 26, 1940.

Presentation of the first Catalan edition of Walter Benjamin's Sonnets, translated by Arnaú Ferre Samón, published by the Angelus Novus Foundation and Ediciones del Reremús. Presentation with Claudia Kálasz and Arnaú Ferre Samón, the translator.

Walter Benjamin Portbou Summer School

2023

22-24/09/23: VIII edition. History and memory Exile and Resistance.

Speakers: Cari Oriol Serres, Jordi Palou-Loverdos, Carmen Alda Elorza, Sara Barroso, Maria Gelpí, Amalia Rodríguez Monroy and Maria Mailat.

Advance of the opera in the Liceo Benjamin in Portnbou, by the composer Antoni Ros Marbà. Exhibition Flucht, with photographs by Espe Pons; screening of the film Die Wasser des Bug (The Bug’s Waters) by Marc Sagnol, about Paul Celan's experience of the genocide. Book presentations: Paul Celan and Walter Benjamin, poems translated by Antoni Pous, with prologue by Maria Maïlat. Poem "Portbou - German?", by Paul Celan, translated for the first time into Catalan by Arnau Ferré Samon, and Las sin sombrero [Women without hat], by Tania Balló, artists and writers of the generation of the 27th, with the presence of the author, and Walter Benjamin & la tempesta del progress `Walter Benjamin & the storm of progress, by Agnès Sinai.

2022

23-25/09/22: VII edition. Justice and abyss Time of exiles, dedicated to the 82nd. Anniversary of the death of Walter Benjamin and on the 80th anniversary of the death of Stefan Zweig.

Speakers: Cari Oriol, Manel Forcano, Marta Simó, Isaak Levy,Vicent Ordoñez, Maria Mailat, Mercedes Monmany. Exhibition The forest of “La Massane” and Walter Benjamin, with photographs by Josep Maria Casacuberta and José Casanova.

Presentation of Mercedes Monmany's book Sin tiempo para el adios [No time for say goodby]. Screening of the film High Maintenance, by Barak Heymann, documentary about Dani Karavan. Performance-concert in Tina Modotti, by the duo Catherine Estrade and Vincent Commaret.

2021

24-26/21: VI edition. Europeanism and borders.

Speakers: Cari Oriol, Núria Quevedo, Frederic Corderas, Anna Dot, Claudia Kálasz, Josep Tubau, Maria Maïlat and André Rouillé.

Flute and guitar concert by Sofía Martínez Villar and Ekaterina Záyteseva. Presentation of the Walter Benjamin House project, restoration of building of the old Portbou Town Hall by the architects Jordi Pigem de Palol and Joan Falgueras. Collaboration with the Fotolimo Festival. Presentation of Lisa Fittko's book, La meva travessia dels Pirineus [Escape through the Pyrenees], by the poet Carles Duarte.

2020

25-27/09/21: V edition. The border of memory.

Speakers: Carme Alda Elorza, Marta Simón, Jean-Yves and Michèle Troel, Claudia Kálasz, Maria Mailat and Christian Gattinoni.

Insula photography exhibition, by the Aladeriva collective. Collaboration with the Festival Fotlimo. Musical performance Lost in Berlin, by Catherine Estrade and Vincent Commaret. Rosa Brugat’s performance at the Customs Hall of the station. Presentation by the poet Carles Duarte of Walter Benjamin´s book: Art i literatura de masses [Art and literature of the masses], first translation of Benjamin's texts in Catalan by Antoni Pous.

2019

27-29/09/19: The wild frontier.

Speakers: Cari Oriol Serres, Carme Alda Elorza, Jean Calens, Fernando Hernández Sánchez, Anne Roche, Madeleine Claus, Maria Mailat, Manolo Laguillo

Presentation of the Walter Benjamin-Bertolt Brecht book. Encuentro in Portbou, by Maria Mailat. Exhibition Desired Landscapes, by the group of residents of the creation factory of La Escocesa, curated by Enric Puig Punyet. Performance Living threads, by Yael Karavan. Presentation of the photography workshop held in Portbou by Julio Barón and presentation of the Gian-Luigi Ponzano donation of books for the Walter Benjamin Library.