Photography and music merge in Foto Colectania album exhibition

Antoine de Beaupré is a bookseller who specializes in photography, but he is also a big music fan who over 30 years has collected more than 15,000 albums. One day he noticed that a photographer he knew had taken the image for an album cover in his collection. Antoine soon found more examples of well-known photographers whose work adorned record covers and, what’s more, it seemed as if he had found a “bottomless well”.

Thus the idea for the exhibition 'Total Records. Vinils i fotografia' was born. On at Foto Colectania in Barcelona, the exhibition can be seen from Wednesday until March 11. De Beaupré and fellow curators Serge Vincendet and Sam Stourdzé have chosen 250 album covers paying tribute to the photographs specifically taken for them. On display are albums by The Beatles, Björk, U2, Madonna, John Coltrane and The Velvet Underground.

Sources at Foto Colectania say that the 'Total Records' exhibition includes "surprising associations, very famous vinyls and unexpected rarities”, such as Helmut Newton’s photograph of Australian band INXS, or iconic photos for Vanity Fair and other prestigious US magazines associated with Madonna or Cindy Lauper.

The exhibition organizers also point to the inclusion of work by the likes of Jeff Wall, for an Iggy Pop record, William Klein’s portrait of Serge Gainsbourg for his 'Love on the Beat' or Irving Penn’s portrait of Miles Davis. Other emblematic covers on display are 'Sgt. Peppers' and 'Abbey Road' by The Beatles and 'Sticky Fingers' by The Rolling Stones.

De Beaupré stresses that the photographers featured in the exhibition produced the work specifically for the covers “to show a reading of photography through such a popular medium as vinyl.” Going back to the 1950s, not all 250 album covers in the exhibition come from De Beaupré’s personal collection, and those missing were provided from the collection of fellow curator, Serge Vincendet.

Gladys Palmera Collection

The exhibition arrives at Foto Colectania after successful stints in the cities of Arles, Zurich and Berlin. In collaboration with the Fundació Banc Sabadell, the Barcelona exhibition also includes a section devoted to Spanish vinyl records, as well as examples from the Gladys Palmera Collection, the most highly recognized catalogue of Cuban music between 1940 and 1960 in the world.