Expo: Drawing Is Fighting
17 January to 31 May 2026 at MUME (Museum of Exile) in La Jonquera
Josep Bartoli: Drawing Is Fighting is a new exhibition produced by the Memorial of the Rivesaltes Camp and presented at the MUME (Museum of Exile) in La Jonquera from 17 January to 31 May 2026. The exhibition opens with a public preview on Saturday 17 January at 12 noon.
Focusing on the war and exile drawings of Catalan artist Josep Bartoli, the exhibition continues the work begun with Josep Bartoli: The Colours of Exile (2021–2022). It brings together powerful original drawings donated to the Rivesaltes Memorial by Bartoli’s widow, Bernice Bromberg, as well as a rare sketchbook created by the artist while interned at the Bram camp.
Produced as part of the Exilis project, a European-funded network of seven major sites dedicated to the memory of exile between 1936 and 1946, the exhibition highlights artistic resistance in the face of war and displacement. A major highlight is the presentation of a previously unseen 1939 letter of recommendation written to Frida Kahlo, offering new insight into Bartoli’s personal network and the international support that shaped his journey.
Why it matters
Josep Bartoli’s drawings bear witness to war, internment and exile, showing how art became an act of resistance and survival during one of Europe’s darkest periods.
About Josep Bartolí
Josep Bartolí never publicly revealed much about his experience of the war but producers discovered that he fought to the bitter end through a series of fiery letters between him and his lover, Frida Khalo.
These letters also revealed his loathing of Dalí, who had praised Franco’s military coup d’état and defended the dictator’s severe repression following the defeat of the Republic.
If he had not left behind him a few drawings, a few caricatures of his horrific stay in the French concentration camps, Josep Bartolí would have remained just another anonymous fighter among thousands of other nameless, faceless heroes who sacrificed their lives in the name of freedom.
Josep- a moving account of Spanish refugees in France
Josep is a 74-minute animated film inspired by the life and work of Josep Bartolí, anti-Franco fighter and cartoonist, exiled in France during the Retirada.
Producer, Aurel, discovered the work of Josep Bartolí completely by chance, wandering, bored, along the aisles of a book fair.
The cover of the book that Georges Bartolí dedicated to his uncle, Josep, showed the sketch of a Spanish Republican slumped on his crutches, half-man, half-corpse.
Aurel realised that this drawing could only be the work of a brilliant draftsman, and was amazed to discover the talent was replicated on on every page.
The rich political illustrations overflowed with detail and poignant meaning; criticising power, the state, religion, the cowardice of international leaders.
The force of Bartolí’s pencil struck a serious blow and pushed Aurel to bear witness to the horrific events, so little known from recent history.
Synopsis
February 1939. Completely overwhelmed by the flood of Republicans fleeing Franco’s dictatorship, the French government imprisons these Spaniards in concentration camps where many of them will perish from lack of care and food.
In one of these camps, two men, separated by barbed wire, became friends. One is a gendarme, the other is Josep Bartolí (Barcelona 1910 – New York 1995).[/vc_column_text]
Watch online
Rent/buy the film, with English subtitles, by subscribing to BFI Player.
Keep an eye out too for showings at the Memorial de Rivesaltes and/or visit the Memorial to see their permanent exhibition ‘Josep Bartolí. Les couleurs de l’exil’.
Test your French with this short (4 minute) documentary
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