Giralt-Miracle, Daniel

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert


THE MODERNIST MOVEMENT 
T H E  G L O R Y  
O F  M O D E R N I S M  
MODERNISM O R  ART NOUVEAU- WAS RATHER MORE THAN A 
FIN DE SIECLE ADVENTURE STRADDLED BETWEEN EXASPERATED 
DECADENTISM AND THE TECHNOLOGICAL INDUSTRIAL 
REVOLUTION. MODERNISM CONCILIATED CHARACTERISTICS 
WHICH CAME FROM TWO OPPOSED WORLDS: ON THE ONE HAND, 
IT REVELLED IN THE APOTHEOSIS OF ARTIFICIALISM AND, ON THE 
OTHER. IN THE MOST FANTASTIC IRREALITY. 
DANIEL GIRALT-MIRACLE D E P T .  O F  P L A S T I C  A R T S  
G E N E R A L I T A T  D E  C A T A L U N Y A  
THE MODERNIST MOVEMENT 
a owever surprising it may seem to ( 1 us today, the understanding and 
W appreciation of Modernism is a 
relatively recent phenomenon. For the 
first fifty or sixty years of this centu- 
ry, Modernism was looked down on, 
criticised, often ridiculed and, more than 
anything, analised as a gratuitous form of 
Baroque and a decadent manifestation of 
the turn of the century. 
Today, the opposite is true: the Moder- 
nism that arose in Catalonia and the rest 
of the Peninsula -the Art Nouveau, 
Jugendstil, Modern Style, Liberty, Floral 
or Sezession as French, German, En- 
glish, Italian or Austrian manifestations 
of the end-of-the-century-style- is 
greatly appreciated and admired. It is 
considered an art that clearly showed a 
wish to break with the limitations of an 
academic past which was still very 
influential at the end of the nineteenth 
century and one which felt an unstop- 
pable, impassioned urge to live its time 
and its spirit of modernity. 
Modernism - o r  Art Nouveau- was ra- 
ther more than a fin de siicle adventure 
straddled between exasperated decaden- 
tism and the technological industrial 
revolution. Modernism conciliated cha- 
racteristics which came from two op- 
posed worlds: on the one hand, it revel- 
led in the apotheosis of ariificialism and, 
on the other, in the most fantastic irreali- 
tY. 
It can also be defined as an aesthetic re- 
action, based on ideas and symbols, 
against the increasingly industrial civili- 
zation and as an approach towards the 
morphology of nature according to the 
idea that art should not be an imitation of 
nature so much as an imaginative cre- 
ation that uses its symbols. Compared 
with the academic, the affected and the 
imitative, Modernism implied an authen- 
tic liberation in the name of life and 
sincerity . 
In the case of Catalonia, Modernism, as 
Professor Valentí said, was a phenomen 
that revealed the conscience of a people 
that, though not seeing itself as modern, 
wanted to integrate itself in modernity as 
a way of life which was democratic, in- 
dustrial, educational, hygienic, cultured 
and fully European. In the context of an 
impoverished, archaic Spain, with an 
agrarian system, Modernism meant ac- 
cepting a model to be found at that time 
in the most advanced countries of the 
continent, that is to say England, France 
and Germany. While in these countries it 
had a purely elitist nature which the 
bourgeoisie used as a sign of luxury and 
snobbism, in Belgium and Catalonia it 
had a far wider meaning. Al1 social 
classes felt identified with Modernism 
and its sinuous lines based on snaking 
whips and rich floral ornamentation, 
because both the bourgeoisie and the 
working-classes accepted it as their own 
and associated it with a very much wider 
national movement. This allows us to 
speak of a rich Modernism and a poor 
Modernism, of monumental buildings 
and small suburban villas, of collector's 
editions and programmes for village fairs. 
From Gaudí's Sagrada Familia, a genuine 
twentieth century cathedral, to Do- 
menech i Montaner's Palau de la Música 
Catalana, auditorium of the Orfeó 
Catala, everything is concentrated in a 
kind of madness without limits that 
doesn't skimp on detail, ornament or 
richness of material, so that art is taken 
beyond the bounds of logic to an irrea- 
lism dominated by vagueness, dream and 
scenes of total mystery. 
This nationalist style full of idealism, im- 
passioned by nature and determined to 
crush al1 other artistic styles, penetrated 
al1 the arts and crafts, leaving a profound 
mark on the most respected architects 
and the least-known artisans alike. The 
whole of Catalonia shared a single ar- 
tistic, ethical and social ideal, which con- 
tributed to give Modernism an intensity 
and depth that stretched to the Valles, 
the Maresme, the Empordii, Valencia 
and the Balearic Islands. As with Baro- 
que, a totally decorative medium was 
achieved (the Gesamtkunstwerk) where 
everything, absolutely everything, was 
treated with the curviliniar sinuosity of 
the new style. 
Maybe this was Modernism's greatest his- 
torical originality; the desire to integrate 
art into the totality of social life, from 
architecture down to the smallest object 
in daily use. 
Society lived an authentic object-fe- 
tishism. This became the protagonist of 
al1 decoration. Sensuality presided and 
determined al1 the decorative arts. There 
was a manifest desire to provoke sen- 
sations. A deliberate leaning toward the 
ambiguous, the unclear, so as to provide 
new experiences. The translucent, the 
iridescent, the opalescent; milky or clou- 
dy white misting a glazed interior or 
colouring the transparent varnish of a 
piece of gaudy jewellery. 
Traditionally, one talks about three 
phases in the evolution of Modernism: 
the aesthetic (1880-94), in which the 
triumphant bourgeoisie saw its dream of 
modernization come true thanks to eco- 
nomic prosperity and the consequences 
of the Exposició Universal of 1888; the 
phase of floral Modernism (1894-1906), 
which opened up to the European 
modernisms and the Japanese influx and 
culminated in the coup-de-fuet, obviously 
far more idealised and stylized than the 
one before, and, finally, the third phase, 
known as formalism (1906-10). The art 
influenced politics and the triumph of po- 
pular Catalanism allowed the Diputació, 
led by Prat de la Riba, to start the work 
of reconstruction that the Mancomunitat 
was later to carry out in the institutional, 
technical and cultural field. 
Order, planning, proportion dominated 
once more and led to Noucentisme, em- 
bodiment of good sense and controlled 
pleasure. 
Architecture was undoubtedly the me- 
dium which brought together the greatest 
number of creative artists and which was 
responsible for a revival of the craftsman. 
Antoni Gaudí, the most outstanding fig- 
ure, took the concept of architecture fur- 
ther than anyone. He created spaces with 
filtered light, thought up organic forms 
which he decorated with multi-coloured 
floral patterns and ceramic coverings of 
different types so as to give a sculptural 
dimension to the shapes found in the 
Sagrada Familia, the Parc Güell, the casa 
Batlló, the casa Mila and the crypt at 
Santa Coloma de Cervelló. 
THE MODERNIST MOVEMENT 
At the same time, special mention should 
be made of Lluís Domenech i Montaner, 
who achieved a new form of ex- 
pressiveness with brick- and iron-work. 
In the Palau de la Música Catalana 
(1908), he created a real apotheosis of 
floral art in an architecture rich in 
sculpture, mosaic and glass-work. 
Josep Puig i Cadafalch added to Moder- 
nism a fantastic elaboration of medieval 
languages and other borrowings from 
rustic architecture, always supported by 
the ancient crafts he retrieved. J.M. Ju- 
jol, with his decorative paintings, mosaics 
and wrought-iron work, went ahead of 
his times and opened the way for future 
avant-gardes with a superreal or abstract 
influence. 
In painting, a host of great masters ap- 
peared: Santiago Rusiñol, Ramon Casas, 
Isidre Nonell, Joaquim Mir, Apeleles 
Mestres, Xavier Nogués, Joan Brull, 
Joan Llimona, Picasso, Renart, Xavier 
Gosé, Anglada Camarasa, Canals, Tor- 
res-García; names now both well-known 
and highly-valued. 
Sculpture also lived a period of rebirth: 
Josep Llimona, Miquel Blay, Lambert 
Escaler, Pau Gargallo, Eusebi Arnau. 
The artistic trades were the real and most 
original conquest made by Modernism. 
Cabinet-makers, glass-workers, enamel- 
lers, printers, blacksmiths, jewellers, pot- 
ters, etc., contributed their versions of 
Modernism with as much or more energy 
as the architects who normally hired 
them to intenene in their work. Some 
outstanding figures were Francesc Vidal, 
Concordi and Joan González, Josep 
Pascó, Lluís Bru, Gaspar Homar, Joan 
Busquets, Lluís Masriera, Antoni Serra, 
etc. 
A long chronicle of artists of building and 
decorating could follow on for ever, but 
what should be underlined now is not 
Modernism's plurality and diversity so 
much as its overwhelming energy, its in- 
fluence in al1 of social life and its contri- 
bution to the cultural and visual 
movement which gave Catalonia a genu- 
ine national conscience which has conti- 
nued growing and developing to the 
present day. 
m 


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Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert