Alejandro Castellote

Independent Curator

About the Reviewer

In 1982, Alejandro Castellote began working as photography curator. From 1985 through 1996 he was director of the Photography Department at the Círculo de Bellas Artes (CBA) in Madrid, where he organized five editions of the Festival FOCO (1985-1989) and created the Minerva Photography Gallery, a space devoted to emerging photographers.

He has been artistic director and co-founder of the International Photography Festival PHotoEspaña in Madrid from 1998 to 2000. He worked for Lunwerg Publishers as responsible for Contemporary Photography, publishing among others MAPAS ABIERTOS. Latin American Photography 1991-2002. During 2005 and 2006 he was editor for C International Photo Magazine, Ivory Press, London, and curated the exhibition C on Cities at the Padiglione Italia in the X Venice Biennale of Architecture (2006). He has been guest curator for Latin America at Photoquai (2007-2009) a Biennial organized by the Museum Quai de Branly, Paris, guest curator at the Seoul Photo Fair 2010, Korea; curator for the first three editions of the Festival Getxophoto in Bilbao. In 2012 was guest curator of the Singapore International Photography Festival and curated in 2013 the exhibition and book Spain throughout Photography. 1839-2010, at MAPFRE Foundation, Madrid. In 2014, he was the director of the Daegu Photo Biennale in Korea; in 2015 chief-curator with Wang Qingsong and François Hebel of the First Chang-Jiang International Photography & Video Biennale, in Chongqing, China, and guest curator for the Guangzhou Image Triennial 2017 at the Guangdong Art Museum, China. In 2019, he was guest curator of the first edition of Imago Lisboa, Portugal.

As a teacher, writer, and lecturer on photography, he has collaborated with and contributed to many photo magazines from Europe, Latin America, and Asia, and with several Masters in Europe and Latin America. He participated as a guest professor in the Joop Swart Masterclass 2010 at the Foundation World Press Photo in Amsterdam. He was the Series editor of the Biblioteca de Fotógrafos Latinoamericanos, PHotoBolsillo, La Fábrica Editorial, Madrid (2010-2012). In 2006 he was awarded with the PHotoEspaña Prize Bartolomé Ros for the best professional track record in photography in Spain. From 2014 through 2016, he lived in Peru where he was director of the Latin American Master of Photography and Visual Arts at the Centro de la Imagen of Lima, Peru.

Language Proficiency
 Spanish, English, Italian, Portuguese