The Naturgy Foundation presents the exhibition “La belleza de la máquina” on the most significant artistic work of Ramon de Baños (1890-1980).

Thanks to extensive research in the Historical Archive, today the Naturgy Foundation releases an unpublished selection of photographs that rediscover Ramon de Baños, known until now as a pioneer of Catalan cinema, as a photographer. The collection of photographs that have been brought to light, and which have their own visual code, offer a new perspective that allows us to enjoy the beauty of industrial photography. These photographs now make up an extraordinary graphic document of a world that no longer exists.

The company Catalana de Gas y Electricidad S. A., just like other companies of the time, carried out photography projects to document and publish its heritage and capacity of production. Despite the first collaborations between Ramon de Baños and Catalana de Gas in 1929 for the Universal Exhibition in Barcelona, he was not incorporated as a “photographer attached to the Technical Services” until later. The main project that Ramon de Baños then carried out for the company was called 1947 Album, a collection of 58 photographs of industrial machinery and architecture. It is a collection of images that had a propaganda objective and wanted to show the important asset the company once had, its modernity and its extraordinary business activity.

Ramón de Baños develops his own photographic style that enables him to embellish and glorify machinery and the industrial landscape. They are well-framed and well-structured pieces with a careful arrangement of the objects represented. The images are not representations of a truthful reality but rather, while avoiding a human presence, reveal the architectural magnificence of factories and the beauty of machinery. Hence, despite fulfilling a propaganda purpose, these images convey a distinctly spiritual emotion. The photographs have been altered, outlining certain elements with the finest of brushes, airbrushing techniques, paints, pencils and fine cutting tools. This meticulous work enabled him to define surfaces and planes of light, clean up irregularities and obscure imperfections to achieve the incredibly personal lyrical tone of his compositions.

The exhibition contains a selection of images taken from the 1947 Album and other industrial photographs, as well as a video from 1927 by Ramon de Baños. Thanks to the preservation of these photographs by the Historical Archive of the Naturgy Foundation, we can now enjoy this valuable material that serves as a graphical testimony to explain the history of science and technology that enables us to rediscover the industrial heritage of Spain.