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PAUSE. A visitor pauses in reflection while viewing Eduardo Masferré’s black-and-white portraits of Cordillera elders and villagers at the Philippine Consulate General in Barcelona, part of the Masferré Photo Exhibit running from October 24 to November 21, 2025.

BAGUIO, Philippines – At a gallery in Barcelona, images of the Cordillera’s mountains, rituals and faces now stand in quiet dialogue with Catalonia’s own story of identity. The Philippine Consulate General in Barcelona has opened a photo exhibition honoring Eduardo Masferré, the photographer whose lens captured the spirit of the Philippine highlands and whose life embodied the intertwined histories of the Philippines and Spain.

The exhibit, titled Contempla las imágenes inmortalizadas a través del objetivo de Eduardo Masferré, which opened on October 24 runs until November 21, at the consulate’s gallery on Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes. It celebrates National Indigenous Peoples Month by showcasing Masferré’s timeless photographs — portraits of Cordillera elders, scenes of rice terraces, rituals and village life — works that have become visual testaments to indigenous dignity and endurance.

“Our family is deeply honored to see Eduardo Masferré’s photographs celebrated in Barcelona. Having been raised in Sant Feliu de Guíxols, Spain always held a special place in his life. His work was a lifelong tribute to the dignity and spirit of the Filipino people, and seeing his images return to the land of his childhood reminds us that art, like love, bridges nations and generations,” the Masferré family said in a message shared with Rappler.

Eduardo Masferré (1909-1995) was born in Sagada, Mountain Province, to a Spanish-Catalan father and a Kankanaey mother. His father, Jaime Masferré, had come from Spain as a teacher, while his mother, Mercedes Langkew, was from the uplands of Sagada.

Their union symbolized the convergence of two worlds, and Eduardo grew up between them — educated in Spain, rooted in the Cordillera, and fluent in both cultures’ ways of seeing.

Returning to Sagada in the 1930s, Masferré began photographing his community — not as an outsider but as a son documenting his own people. Over the next two decades, he created a visual chronicle of the Cordillera that would later define ethnographic photography in the Philippines.

His grandson, Albert Masferré, speaking at the exhibit opening, reflected on this interwoven heritage: “What makes tonight even more meaningful is that we are gathered here in Barcelona, the homeland of his father. In many ways, my grandfather’s own life was a bridge between Spain and the Philippines, between past and present, between two cultures that met in him and found expression through his lens. It feels fitting that his story should return here, across generations, to be shared with a new audience.”

From Bontoc to Kalinga, from Ifugao to the remote villages of Abra, Masferré carried his camera with patience and reverence. His portraits — such as the iconic image of Lakay Kabayo, an elder’s face etched with time and pride — captured not just individuals but the collective soul of a people in transition. His landscapes, too, spoke of harmony between human hands and the highland earth: terraces carved like verses, rituals framed by mist.