MASK

Mask arrives at Casa del Lector on 10March. This exhibition gives a brief overview of one of the most important cultural phenomena of late modern Spain: the process by which two elements – the powerful publishing industry that sprang up at the dawn of the 20^th century around the so-called “popular book” and the development of a social entity that demanded reading as a pastime – fed each other to create an era-specific phenomenon which reached its qualitative peak mid-century with the publication of a series of novels featuring El Coyote, a character created by José Mallorquí Figuerola who was a true mass phenomenon. 

This show gives an account of the transformation of reading in our society through the attractive imaginings pictured on the covers of popular publications and the idealisation of the Hispanic West by its best textual interpreter, offering a mode of understanding the writer’s trade.