For those who couldn't make it to Dr. Josep Minguell's presentation, "My Family Tree and Catalunya: The Culture of Painting" on April 6, or for those who worried that they didn't know enough Spanish and didn't want to feel left out, I have some good news.
First, I managed to record almost the entire presentation on video and was lucky enough to get a copy of the PowerPoint presentation as well. Secondly, the Spanish 305 Students of the department of Languages & Literatures of Europe & the Americas where kind enough to translate Dr. Minguell's notes, so even if you don't have a working knowledge of the Spanish language, you can still follow along.
For those unfamiliar with Dr. Minguell and his work, he is a renowned professor of art, as well as an artist, specializing in traditional fresco mural painting. And he does in fact, have a Web site (en español): http://www.josepminguell.com/
Videos
"My Family Tree and Catalunya: The Culture of Painting"
By Dr. Josep Minguell
Catalunya: Culture/Painting
Looking at the walls of a town gives you insight into its history and culture. Walls speak of times passed, wars, celebrations, young cultures and traditions, the people, their spirit ... so many things.
I am a fresco painter. I spend my days giving life to the old walls of southern Europe, to Catalan walls. I paint frescoes following a family tradition which I learned at a young age while working with my father, Jaume Minguell. He too followed his father's artistic tradition. I would prepare his colors, mortar, and scaffolding. Finally, after my studies at the University of Barcelona, I worked in the theater and started painting on canvas.
When my father died in 1991, I looked back on my life and came to the following conclusion: painting on canvas did not fully satisfy me. In the cold halls of the art galleries I had very little contact with the public. I recalled working with my father on the scaffoldings and how the architecture transformed with the colors of the pigment, and the intense relationship formed between the public and painting. That is when I decided to spend my life painting frescoes.
Fresco Painting
One of the first writings about this painting technique can be found in Chapter 7 of The Ten Books of Architecture by the Roman architect Vitruvius, who believed the fresco painting is the last stage in constructing a wall, as if it were a visual definition of the architecture.
The lime mortar (an ancient version of cement) is applied onto the wall and sanded down. While it is still humid and fresh, it is painted with pigments which have been dissolved in water – simply water and dirt. The lime mineralizes the pigments onto the wall's surface producing an unalterable matte paint with intense colors and mineral strength.
Throughout the Mediterranean, this decorative technique was associated with the construction of buildings and was used regularly until the 19th century; it was used less frequently in the 20th century due to changes in construction materials and the architectural designs of walls.
Living in Catalunya
Catalunya is a nation within a nation and although the Spanish Constitution has declared it a historic region, Catalunya's situation is unclear.
In Catalunya, as in the rest of Mediterranean cultures, fresco painting has existed since the Romans. The Middle Ages saw an increase in the production of frescoes and Catalan mural painting (Collection of the Catalan National Art Museum). Catalunya was the heart of the Kingdom of Aragon, which dominated Mediterranean commerce in the 14th century.
It is situated in the Iberian Peninsula and its capital is Barcelona. Currently, 7,364,078 people live in the Catalan territory. Our language is Catalan, and we are a self-governed nation led by the the Generalitat. The Catalan culture covers an extensive amount of territory including Valencia, the Balearic Islands and North Catalunya (a French province).
After the invasion in 1716, Castilian King Philip V imposed the Nueva Planta Decrees on the kingdom of Catalunya. This meant the loss of institutions, universities, and laws. Speaking Catalan was forbidden. In the second half of the 19th century, the influence of Romanticism helped spur a cultural and political movement called the Renaixença (Catalan Renaissance). Its purpose was to defend the declining national liberties of Catalunya and recover a culture and language, until then prohibited. The cultural impact of the Renaixença was best illustrated in its poetry and validated the Catalan language as a popular art form. One example of this is els Cors Clavé – the Clavé Chorus – an organization created to combat alcoholism (it kept men away from taverns). Its repertoire included sung poetry and popular music, which reinforced the language. Lay society organized itself into societies ("Societats") and each and everyone of them one had a theater of its own.
The 20th century began with Catalunya under the influence of two historically important artistic movements: Modernisme (Art Nouveau) and Noucentisme (specifically Catalan Art Nouveau). Their influence, which stretched over the entire region and most artistic manifestations, had a great impact on society.
Art Nouveau
With industrialization, Catalunya's personality flourished once again. Modernisme was a European artistic movement which became quite powerful and distinctive to Catalunya. Its spread was due to the particular sensitivity of the bourgeoisie, it main sponsor. My grandfather was a decorative painter, an expert in pigments, plaster techniques, and the many professional resources used by fresco painters.
The decorative painting of the time followed European models; however, in Catalunya the style produced its own forms, more Mediterranean-like, forming part of the architecture. The modernist architecture integrates artistic practices (ceramic, sculpture, cabinet making, metalwork, and stained-glass making).
The impact and the aesthetic innovation of modernisme are still of great interest, in tourism especially. One example is the enormous interest in Gaudi's numerous works in Barcelona.
Noucentisme
The cultural and political movement began in 1906 at a time when the bourgeoisie favored Catalanism and supported initiatives aimed at establishing Catalan governmental institutions (political autonomy). The Mancomunitat, an emerging form of self-government, made a concerted effort to establish to establish a cultural infrastructure dedicated to Catalan culture: the Institute of Catalan Studies, libraries, and museums, and Catalan Language Studies.
The basic idea was "to construct Catalunya" and to consolidate a united political and cultural identity whose reference was Rome, Greece, and Mediterranean cultures. Artists played an important role as they attempted to connect art and society together giving art a more social function. Influenced by Classical and Renaissance models, they created an art that was beautiful, serene, orderly, harmonious, and based on the simplicity of forms.
A significant event in Catalan mural painting is Torres García's work in the Salon Sant Jordi in the Generalitat Palace. Siquieros, one of the painteres in Jean Charlot's circle of Mexican artists, came into contact with a number of Catalan muralists, namely Pere Pruna and Torres García, both well known for their fresco style. These two painters appeared in the journal Siquieros published in Barcelona in 1921 called "American Life" ("Vida Americana"), in which he published his Barcelona Manifesto. This is considered to be the premier document of Mexican mural painting as it attempted a liaison between environmental and climate conditions, and cultural and artistic roots.
This time period ends in 1923 with the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera who covered up Torres García's frescoes in the Generalitat Palace. In 1922, Jean Charlot created his first fresco in Mexico, "The Massacre of the Mayan Temple."
With these cultural movements, art acquired a social dimension that could be found in each and every aspect of public life. This helped strengthen the Catalan identity of artists and the public.
Between totalitarianisms. Civil war.
In 1933, two manifestos appeared forming a perfect symmetry highlighting the social role of mural painting: Mexican (Siqueiros) and Italian (Sironi). This reflects a radical ideological polarization.
In Catalunya, this polarization was extreme and although it initially manifested itself among the political elite, it would finally lead to a civil war (1936 -1939). The public was severely punished by both sides.
My town was bombarded by Italian fascists airplanes, punished with the burning of religious buildings, the murder of forty priests and nuns, the confiscation of properties and businesses by Anarchists and Communists.
At this time, my grandparents and father, who was only 13, were forced to flee the country and hide. The war ended with a terrible dictatorship. Many Catalans thought that [Francisco] Franco would establish order and would respect Catalan identity, but there was severe political and military repression instead.
Avant-gardes
The great tensions in Europe between its most powerful states, the struggles resulting from the World Wars, economic recessions, and the fear sparked by totalitarian systems (Fascists and Communists) led to the seclusion of many artists looking to explore new forms of expression, separate from the public society.
An impressive generation of muralists, following the noucentist tradition, evolved in Catalunya as they produced work in reconstructed public buildings. It was a somewhat marginal art given that they were following the criteria given by the avant-garde.
My father developed his pictorial work as a muralist in this period, producing 25 sets of fresco mural paintings spread over the entire Catalan territory. I relate this artistic movement to the art that Charlot created independently but deeply rooted in Catalan culture.
Despite the dictatorship, Catalan art was always on the forefront of the avant-garde artistic movements, thanks to very unique personalities that showcased Catalonian culture and the personal microcosm of their artistic creations, such as Joan Miró i Ferrà in his "Montroig del camp" or Salvador Dalí in his "el Emporda". Obviously Catalunya was able to generate its own creative power. Except for these artists, the art from this time period was a very individualized endeavor, of interest to specialists and intellectuals alike and shown in specialized spaces such as art galleries and museums.
This avant-garde time is different from previous ones in its elitism. It situated art in a space by itself where only artists and experts participated. Thus begins a progressive disconnect with the public. The isolation of Catalonian art was further accentuated during the forty years of Franco's dictatorship.
During the new democratic era after the death of Franco more institutional museums and contemporary art centers were built. The latter were obviously imported international models even architecturally, conceived as they were from avant-garde cultural precepts which were already starting to disappear in the rest of the world.
Why I paint frescoes
Postmodernism – a very controversial and debated term in itself – appears at the end of the 20th century, when the changes initiated at the start of the the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution were being questioned. The exhaustion of ideas and of the system are already apparent. Artistically, this new period articulates a series of events: the role of the media and its social and cultural impact, the revision of historical tradition and the manner of interpreting the history of art, the disappearance of the artist's protagonism, the integration of all types of artistic practices, the impact of new types of production and visual consumption, and the diversity of artistic offerings.
On the horizon one can gleam the possibility of experimentation; a new critical context from which to interpret art and create art.
I paint frescoes because paint is the origin of visual communication; paint is the direct contact of humans with pictorial material without technological interventions.
Mural painting takes us back to the origins of painting; it is an art form which can be found wherever humans live and work.
In our present world, where virtuality is the norm, murals embrace us and allow us to connect emotionally with the painting and come into direct contact with the public, as it reflects the culture of the community, it creates an open manifestation of art.
Globalization also affects art; it does not mean giving up or negating our identity. In any case, art is the manifestation of richness and diversity. This is what makes it universal.
zgjgxjqg...
ReplyDeletezgjgxjqg...