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Exiting Gaudi Park
in Barcelona.
Photo: Pillar to Post/Phyllis Shess
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Editor’s note: Reposted
from the monthly newsletter of tour experts Discovery Tours by Gate 1 Travel.
GUEST BLOG--Among the many pleasures of
visiting Spain, art lovers especially revel in the ability to witness a
millennium's worth of the world's greatest masterpieces as they explore the
treasures of Museo del Prado in Madrid and the Guggenheim Bilbao. When you explore
Spain you'll be in the lands of Picasso, Goya, and Velazquez, native sons whose
fame reached well beyond their home country.
But two
other masters stand out: Antoni Gaudi and Salvador Dali-and complete our list
of Spain's Top 5 acclaimed artists. One was an architect and one a painter, and
their work seems dissimilar at a glance. But Gaudi's influence on Dali, and the
fact that both created work that broke the mold, link them in art history as
Spain's rebellious faces of modernity.
Gaudi: The Singular Saint
Born in
1853, Gaudi was part of the Modernistas, Catalan modernists who saw art in two
ways: as a way to defy bourgeois conformity and as an outlet for creating
change in society. Gaudi created works that elevated the influence of nature in
the man-made, reflected his faith, and defied rules of symmetry and restraint
that had previously defined good taste.
Born in
1852, he studied architecture but never managed to impress his teachers. He had
the last laugh, as he designed the otherworldly Sagrada Familia Cathedral (a
work still in progress!), the vividly tiled Parc Guell, countless mansions, and
even the ornate signature streetlamps of Barcelona. Seven of his creations are
now UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Unfortunately,
his face was not as easily recognized as his buildings. In 1926, after he was
struck by a streetcar, he was mistaken for a beggar, and couldn't convince a
taxi to take him to the hospital. When a policeman finally removed him from the
scene, he was left at the pauper's ward, and his friends couldn't find him till
the next day-when he refused to be moved to better conditions, as a display of
solidarity with the poor.
He died
there a few days later, and the outpouring of grief was profound: it was
reported that half of Barcelona's citizenry donned black and took to the
streets on the day of his funeral.
Dali: The Surreal
View
Salvador
Dali was born a half century after Gaudi, and by the time he was studying art,
the influence of the modernistas was waning. Expelled from art school, he threw
himself into experimenting with Cubism and Dadaism, and met kindred spirits in
Miro and Picasso. It was in Surrealism, a movement which revived and reframed
the values of the modernistas, that he found his visual language.
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Painted in 1931, Dali’s
“Persistence of Memory” was donated to and remains at the Museum of Modern Art,
New York in 1934 by an anonymous donor.
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With the
melting clocks of his most famous work, "The Persistence of Memory,"
he put surrealism on the global map, joining the pantheon of Spanish masters.
He was exhibited in Paris and New York and beyond, and held a special affinity
for the US, living in the states during World War II, working on a scene for
Alfred Hitchcock, and even appearing in a US film commercial.
His time
away from his native Spain allowed him to escape controversy at home. Dali was
a staunch supporter of fascist leader General Francisco Franco, who he said
brought "clarity, truth and order" to Spain. Despite the limited
success of his painting in the final decades of his life, he was indeed seen as
one of the most important artists of the century.
A few years
before he died, Dali was asked to write the foreword to a biography of Gaudi.
In doing so, he paid tribute not only to his predecessor but to his own work,
and he wasn't a bit modest in his assessment. He wrote, "Gaudi is a
genius; so am I.”
SOURCE:
http://www.discovery-tours.com/
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