'We do not accept grants for political reasons'

To close our series on the Mediterranean Expanded exhibit at @konventzero in Cal Rosal Spain we sit down with the man who made it all possible.

Pep Espelt hasn't changed much throughout his life. He's a fiercely political and service-oriented Catalan and maybe that's exactly why he took on one of the biggest challenges in the art world, this being that as an emerging artist you don't yet understand your audience and support is nearly impossible to find.

Konvent is an abandoned nunnery turned interdisciplinary art space. It didn't emerge in Barcelona or Madrid but in a small town in the Pre-Pyrenees where the building itself was in ruins. Through Espelt's vision it is now one of the most striking examples of art thriving beyond the white walls of a museum or gallery. Walk through and the space tests you before the art does. Exposed brick that looks ready to fall. Dark corners that feel like something could go wrong. Then a bubble of light and art that couldn't exist anywhere else. Nothing about it is an accident.

Espelt and his team take risky bets on risky artists in their residency program. They work alongside institutions but won't take their money, a stance less about rebellion and more a quiet argument about what's broken in Spain's cultural funding. He calls counterculture absurd, like driving the wrong way down a highway just to prove a point.

Over twenty years he's often walked that road alone. Now the path has widened and both Konvent and Espelt have earned their place on the global art stage.

His closing advice is a dare: be curious, be restless, and make sure whatever you show is stronger than the room you're standing in.

Stay tuned into upcoming events at Konvent here:

https://konvent.cat/en/

Dora Marquez (@marquezborreanidora) is a Uruguayan printmaker and in-house resident at @konventzero in Cal Rosal, Spain. 

'Aqui trabaja la plancha'

Her gift lies in her ability to transcribe nature's ephemeral shapes with broken metal pressed delicately onto archival quality cotton/silk paper.

During this conversation (in Spanish), we discuss the inherent neurosis of the orthodox printmaker and her intentional deviation from that standard. She believes the Earth, the Moon and the nature of human being is innately mutable and as such is her practice.

‘It’s easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism’

Anouch Basbous is a French-Lebanese visual artist and experimental filmmaker whose practice unfolds between Marseille and Lebanon. Her work explores the relationship between fantasy, imagination and contemporary politics, inviting more-than-human presences into her creative process to imagine collective forms of resistance and emancipation.

During her residency at Konvent leading up to the Summer 2026 Mediterranean Expanded exhibit, she further developed “Hyena hyena”, an audiovisual research project centered on the striped hyena, an animal surrounded by superstition across the SWANA region. Drawing on Arabic shadow theater archives, scientific research and found footage, Anouch questions the boundaries between the human and the animal while experimenting with collected material to create an immersive audiovisual installation about memory, colonialism and belonging.

Instagram:

@anouch__basbous

@konventzero

Mohammad Husseini is a Palestinian documentary filmmaker and cinematographer whose current work explores memory, identity and the lived realities of Palestine. He was born and raised in Jerusalem, but we meet him 90 minutes northwest of El Raval at Konvent, a nunnery turned multi-disciplinary art community in the Pre-Pyrenees. His two week residency is coming to an end, the remnants of which are still available to see at the Mediterrani Expandit exhibit until the End of Summer 2026 in Cal Rosal, Spain.

His documentary Amina draws on his great-grandmother's archival footage of Palestinian women living in Jerusalem in the 60s, a time when ideologies of peace in the Middle East prevailed. He hopes we will remember this story not just through film, but also through the institutions they built that still exist today.

Instagram:

@huss.ps

@konventzero

Afef Omri and Mehdi Guermazi are the co-creators of Audioclopedia, a platform that invites users to listen and share the sounds from their homeland as a means to preserve the memory of a place and to collectively build a sensitive cartography of the sonic world.

Afef, an architect by training, approaches sound as another way of understanding space. Mehdi is a producer, DJ and founder of a record label reimagining traditional North African music. Together they explore what it means to archive a nomadic culture that has never been static and leverage sound to preserve what history often overlooks.

The project was born from artistic and ethnographic research on the popular songs of southern Tunisia which carry a spatial and communal memory. Their exploration of the Chott Ejrid region (between Kebili, Tozeur, and Gafsa) led to the idea of a living digital tool capable of linking sounds to their spaces of origin, preserving fragile voices and showcasing the diversity of each territory.

Their work weaves together field recordings, chants, rituals, environmental sound and architecture to create a living archive of a nomadic culture whose history has been carried through voice, memory and movement rather than written records.

During our conversation we explore resistance, identity, feminism, migration, oral tradition, and the responsibility of preserving cultural memory without freezing it in time. As Afef says, "My existence is found in resistance. I can't live in another way than this."

Audioclopedia is a living archive and anyone can be a part of it. If you have recordings, chants, memories or sounds from your land you can contribute to the project and help preserve a shared cultural history.

Website:

https://www.audioclopedia.org

Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/uareanotherme/

https://www.instagram.com/_afefomri/

https://www.instagram.com/realhenibal/

Soundcloud:

https://soundcloud.com/inlakeshrecords

What happens when an abandoned 19th-century nunnery in the Catalan countryside is transformed into a home for independent contemporary art?

Recorded at Konvent during the Summer 2026 exhibit Mediterrani Expandit (Mediterranean Expanded), this episode introduces you to one of Europe's most unique artist residency programs, where for two weeks artists from the 'other' side of the Mediterranean gathered to explore and showcase themes of migration, memory, identity, and belonging.

We hear from photographer Ali Zarray to discuss his documentation of the nomadic lifestyle for this installation. I speak with the audience about what attracts them to Konvent, as well as curator Laia Llobera on the stark contrast between this space and the museum and gallery world of NYC.

Together, these conversations explore what makes Konvent unlike any traditional gallery or museum, how the journey to this former nunnery shapes the experience of its visitors, and why independent spaces like this continue to foster some of today's most meaningful artistic dialogue.

Whether you're an artist, collector, traveler, or simply curious about discovering culture beyond the guidebooks, this episode offers an intimate look inside a place where art isn't just exhibited, its lived.

Important links:

Konvent Website

Ali Zarray Website

Konvent Instagram

Ali Zarray Instagram

Laia Llobera Instagram

We learn about the history of Cadaques and interview non-natives to find out what it's like being an outsider in a remote Catalan town fighting to maintain it's unique history.

Locations Mentioned:

Brown Sugar (Insta: @brownsugar.bar)

Ajuntament de Cadaqués (Insta: @ajuntamentcadaques)

Alicia Cayuela is a Catalan-American ceramicist, painter, poet, performance artist and founder of Escarlata Studio based in Cadaqués, a small coastal town on the Costa Brava known for its rocky coves, turbulent winds and clear Mediterranean waters. The Studio is a live and vital entity in the village - a refuge for anyone who wants to create. It is a space for romance, revelation and redemption.

"The presence of an angel would be overwhelming"

"...Zeus showing off in front of a mortal"

In this interview, Alicia describes the intensity of 'her town'. Her most essential challenge is the discrepancy between the summer population, which is abundant and heavily tourist-oriented, and the deep winter population which, while scarce and ideal for creation, makes it difficult for economic activity to flow.

"Art is the anti zombie attitude. It’s the way to stay alive. Vacation time should be about turning on, not turning off."

• Follow Alicia Cayuela on Instagram at @alicecayu
• Follow Escarlata Studio on Instagram @escarlata_studio_cadaques
• Purchase an original piece here