BBK KUNA hosts the new exhibit “Retratos de un barrio” (Portraits of a neighbourhood) by Bego Elexpe 

Portraits of a neighbourhood is a way of getting closer view of the people who live, work, and enjoy ourselves in San Francisco, Bilbao La Vieja and Zabala. A campaign which seeks to reflect the social and commercial reality of our environment. Inviting people to be portrayed and to buy in our neighbourhoods.

Thus, these 55 portraits are windows which bring us closer to the neighbourhood, allowing us to get to know and value it, obtaining a content with a human factor, which is a fitting tribute to its people and respective establishments. A project which emerged in 2020 with the collaboration of the two Assoc. and recovered in 2022 thanks to the support of BBK republishing the proposal and broadening the content with new protagonists and portraits.

This particular exhibition has been conceived by Begoña Elexpe, a young photographer and artist from Erandio, who has not always been linked to the world of photography. Her beginnings in drawing led her completely unaware into photography, a field in which she has spent two years giving free rein to her creativity.

With her studio in San Francisco, the place where she lives and works, along with the support of the Associations she decided to create an introduction letter of our neighbourhoods and their people, managing to put faces to the people who bring life to our surroundings. And as the Trade Association puts it “The Trade and Hospitality sector means life for you and life for our neighbourhoods”.

In order to continue improving the project and using the exhibition as the backbone of the project, the organisers have decided to put together an extensive programme of activities throughout the month of June as a tool to complement the exhibition by means of an awareness campaign and showcasing these neighbourhoods steeped in history and with most flavour in Bilbao.

Therefore, in order to enliven this summer month, programmes, dramatized tours and several seminars have been designed along with the exhibition. A different and closer way of working in the area, seeking to attract citizens, in order to improve people’s awareness of the environment, providing different, closer and innovative proposals in the interest of the citizens.

This means that 4 dramatized tours will be organised throughout our neighbourhood environment on 2, 11, 16 and 25 June, departing from BBK Kuna at 18:30 on Thursdays and at 11:45 on Saturdays.

A kind of dramatized tours given by the renowned artist and costume designer Nati Ortiz de Zarate characterised by one of the most recognised photographers and figures of the history of Bilbao such as Eulalia Abaitua who will walk through the exhibition and part of the Neighbourhoods with whoever is interested, meanwhile discovering and visiting some of the protagonists of the exhibition, which are the trades, establishments and bars of our area and the people who run them.

Therefore, whoever wants to attend can sign up to the visits by contacting the Asoc. De BilbaoHistoriko and/or Trade owners and Businesses of San Francisco, Bilbao La Vieja and Zabala at bhk@bilbaohistoriko.org or asociacion@sanfranbilbizabala.eus or by calling 94 679 33 79 .

Together with this, seminars and talks will also be organised where the trade and images will be the protagonists. A kind of live programme where personalities, business people and artists, will talk about the neighbourhood, its history and evolution, their experiences and the importance of taking care of and working on their image in general in order for neighbourhoods to improve and be successful.

The overall objective of this project is no other than to boost, revitalise and promote the coexistence between our neighbourhoods and surrounding area, presenting the area as a value-added backdrop in the innovation, social and cultural field and also from the commercial and hospitality perspective. Showcasing the area as a dynamic and vibrant space in which to get lost and discover. An area which perfectly complements the value offer on the other side of the estuary with innovative, original and different proposals. Spaces that have a soul and with which this work seeks to give them a face and value.