Welcome back to the Metropolitan Culture Corner!
This month we speak with Tarek Fresno, who is a Barcelona native, music aficionado, world traveler, and has been a bartender at the historic Bar Marsella in the neighborhood of El Raval for seventeen years.
But Marsella isn’t just “any” local bar. Founded in 1820, it’s the oldest bar in the entire city; generations ago, it was Ernest Hemingway’s favorite hangout, and a hot spot for artists and intellectuals of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Dalí, Gaudí, Picasso and many more were known to stop by for a drink or three. The bar’s signature cocktail — absinthe, the star drink of 19th-century Parisian bohemians — has remained the same despite the passing of the years.
Last month, we started off the 2024 fall season with an interview with film producer and visual artist Mara Adina. Born in Transylvanian, Romania, she now splits her time between London and Barcelona. The film projects she has worked on have been screened at major film festivals such as Sundance and the Clermont Ferrand International Film Festival, and on platforms like Netflix, Hulu and HBO Max, among others. And aside from her success in the world of cinema, Mara is also an accomplished abstract painter. Her first solo exhibition was here in Barcelona this past spring, titled Feel with Abandon, and she has another in the works.
Stay tuned to Metropolitan’s YouTube channel and social media to make sure you don’t miss a single episode of our monthly interview series! We’ve got a great lineup in store for you in 2024. You can also watch the full archive of previous interviews on our official YouTube channel, or listen to all the MCC interviews as free podcasts on Soundcloud. Be sure to follow Metropolitan on Facebook: @BCNMetropolitan, Twitter: @bcnmetropolitan and Instagram: @barcelonametropolitan.