As some of you may have seen via our facebook or instagram pages this Sunday we met up with our friend Carlos, and hit the streets for the Bicicleta Modernisme sponsored by the Modernist Museum of Barcelona. To clarify for ourselves, and for those who may not have been entirely clear, we took to wikipedia to differentiat Catalan modernism from the other Modernist movements which happened around the world. See below for a few photos of our fun filled evening.
"Modernisme (
Catalan pronunciation: [muðərˈnizmə],
Catalan for "modernism"), also known as
Catalan modernism, is the historiographic denomination given to an art and literature movement. Its main form of expression was in architecture, but many other arts were involved (painting, sculpture, etc.), and especially the design and the decorative arts (cabinetmaking, carpentry, forged iron, ceramic tiles, ceramics, glass-making, silver and goldsmith work, etc.), which were particularly important, especially in their role as support to architecture. Modernisme was also a literary movement (poetry, fiction, drama). Although it was part of a general trend that emerged in
Europe around the
turn of the 20th century, in
Catalonia the style acquired its own unique personality. Its distinct name comes from its special relationship, primarily with
Catalonia and
Barcelona, which were intensifying their local characteristics for socio-ideological reasons after the revival of Catalan culture and in the context of spectacular urban and industrial development. It is equivalent to a number of other
fin de siècle art movements going by the names of
Art Nouveau in
France and
Belgium,
Jugendstil in
Germany,
Sezession in
Austria,
Liberty style in
Italy and Modern or
Glasgow Style in
Scotland, and was active from roughly 1888 (the
First Barcelona World Fair) to 1911 (the death of
Joan Maragall, the most important
Modernista poet). The
Modernisme movement was centred in the city of
Barcelona, though it reached far beyond, and is best known for its architectural expression, especially in the work of
Antoni Gaudí, but was also significant in sculpture, poetry, theatre and painting. Notable painters include
Santiago Rusiñol,
Ramon Casas,
[1] Isidre Nonell,
Hermen Anglada Camarasa, Joaquim Mir, Eliseu Meifren, Lluïsa Vidal and Miquel Utrillo. Notable sculptors are
Josep Llimona, Eusebi Arnau and Miquel Blai
Modernistes largely rejected bourgeois values, which they thought to be the opposite of art. Consequently, they adopted two stances: they either set themselves apart from society in a
bohemian or culturalist attitude (Decadent and Parnassian poets, Symbolist playwrights, etc.) or they attempted to use art to change society (
Modernista architects and designers, playwrights inspired by
Henrik Ibsen, some of
Maragall's poetry, etc.)
Architecture and the plastic arts
[edit]
The earliest example of
Modernista architecture is the café Castell dels tres Dragons designed by
Lluís Domènech i Montaner in the Parc de la Ciutadella for the
1888 Universal Exhibition. It is a search for a particular style for Catalonia drawing on Medieval and Arab styles. Like the currents known in other countries as
Art Nouveau, Jugendstil, Stile Liberty, Modern Style or
Sezessionstil,
Modernisme was closely related to the English
Arts and Crafts movement movement and the
Gothic revival. As well as combining a rich variety of historically-derived elements, it is characterized by the predominance of the curve over the straight line, by rich decoration and detail, by the frequent use of vegetal and other organic motifs, the taste for asymmetry, a refined aestheticism and dynamic shapes.
[2]
While Barcelona was the centre of
Modernista construction, the Catalan industrial bourgeoisie built industrial buildings and summer residences -
cases d'estiueig - in many Catalan towns, notably
Terrassa and
Reus. The textile factory which is now home to the Catalan national technical museum
MNACTEC is an outstanding example.
In literature,
Modernisme stood out the most in narrative. The
nouvelles and novels of decadent writers such as
Prudenci Bertrana (whose highly controversial
Josafat involved a demented priest who ends up killing a prostitute),
Caterina Albert (also known as Víctor Catala), author of bloody, expressionistic tales of rural violence, opposed to the idealisation of nature propugned by Catalan Romantics, or
Raimon Casellas have been highly influential upon later Catalan narrative, essentially recovering a genre that had been lost due to political causes since the end of the Middle Ages. Those writers often, though not always, show influences from Russian literature of the 19th Century and also
Gothic novels. Still, works not influenced by those sources, such as
Joaquim Ruyra's slice-of-life tales of the North-Eastern Catalan coast are perhaps even more influential than that of the aforementioned authors, and Rusiñol's well-known
L'Auca del Senyor Esteve (roughly "The Tale of Mr. Esteve"; an
auca is a type of illustrated
broadside, similar to a one-sheet comic book) is an ironic critique of Catalan bourgeoisie more related to ironic, pre-Realist Catalan
costumisme.
In poetry,
Modernisme closely follows Symbolist and Parnassian poetry, with poets frequently crossing the line between both tendencies or alternating between them. Another important strain of
Modernista poetry is
Joan Maragall's "Paraula viva" (
Living word) school, which advocated Nietzschean vitalism and spontaneous and imperfect writing over cold and thought-over poetry. Although poetry was very popular with the
Modernistes and there were lots of poets involved in the movement, Maragall is the only
Modernista poet who is still widely read today.
Modernista theatre was also important, as it smashed the insubstantial regional plays that were popular in 19th century Catalonia. There were two main schools of
Modernista theatre: social theatre, which intended to change society and denounce injustice—the worker stories of
Ignasi Iglésias, for example
Els Vells ("The old ones"); the Ibsen-inspired works of
Joan Puig i Ferreter, most notably
Aigües Encantades ("Enchanted Waters"); Rusiñol's antimilitaristic play
L'Hèroe—and symbolist theatre, which emphasised the distance between artists and the bourgeoisie—for example, Rusiñol's
Cigales i Formigues ("Cicadas and Ants") or
El Jardí Abandonat ("The Abandoned Garden").
Modernista ideas impelled
L'Avenç collaborator
Pompeu Fabra to devise a new
orthography for Catalan. However, only with the later rise of
Noucentisme did his projects come to fruition and end the orthographic chaos which reigned at the time.
The end of Modernisme
[edit]
By 1910,
Modernisme had been accepted by the bourgeoisie and had pretty much turned into a fad. It was around this time that
Noucentista artists started to ridicule the rebel ideas of
Modernisme and propelled a more bourgeois art and a more right-of-center version of Catalan Nationalism, which eventually rose to power with the victory of the
Lliga Regionalista in 1912. Until
Miguel Primo de Rivera's dictatorship suppressed all substantial public use of Catalan, Noucentisme was immensely popular in Catalonia. However,
Modernisme did have a revival of sorts during the
Second Spanish Republic, with
avant-garde writers such as
Futurist Joan-Salvat Papasseit earning comparisons to Joan Maragall, and the spirit of
Surrealists such as
Josep Vicent Foix or
Salvador Dalí being clearly similar to the rebellion of the
Modernistes, what with Dalí proclaiming that Catalan Romanticist
Àngel Guimerà was
a putrefact pervert. However, the ties between Catalan art from the 1930s and
Modernisme are not that clear, as said artists were not consciously attempting to continue any tradition.
Modernista architecture survived longer. The Spanish city of
Melilla in Northern Africa experienced an economic boom at the turn of the 20th century, and its new bourgeoisie showed its riches by massively ordering
Modernista buildings. The workshops established there by Catalan architect
Enrique Nieto continued producing decorations in this style even when it was out of fashion in Barcelona, which results in Melilla having, oddly enough, the second largest concentration of
Modernista works after Barcelona.
UNESCO World Heritage
[edit]
- Antoni Gaudí, who went beyond mainstream Modernisme, creating a personal style based on observation of the nature and exploitation of traditional Catalan construction traditions. He was using regulated geometric shapes as the hyperbolic paraboloid, the hyperboloid, the helicoid and the conoide.[6]
- Lluís Domènech i Montaner created a genuine alternative architecture. Along with Josep Vilaseca i Casanovas he worked towards a modern and international style. Domènech continued on from Viollet-le-Duc, his work characterized by a mix of constructive rationalism and ornaments inspired in the Hispano-Arab architecture as seen in the Palau de la Música Catalana, in the Hospital de Sant Pau or in the Institut Pere Mata of Reus.[7] His Hotel Internacional at Passeig de Colom in Barcelona (demolished after the 1888 World Fair) was an early example of industrial building techniques.
- Josep Puig i Cadafalch was a Catalan architect, politician and historian who was involved in many projects to retore older buildings. One of his most well-known buildings is his rebuilding of the Casa Amatller in Passeig de Gràcia. It has elements in both the Catalan tradition and others originating in the Netherlands or the German Gothic. Neo-Gothic is also apparent in his Codorniu Winery (Caves Codorniu, 1904). He built Casa Amatller and Casa Trinxet."
www.wikipedia.com
- Saturday night carbo loading in our new outfits.
- Just before the bike ride began in front of the gorgeous UNESCO world heritage sight the Hospital Sant Pau.
- Making our way with Carlos
- (photo credit: Tomas Carcasona)
