Giménez-Frontín, J. L.

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert

CADAQUÉS: 
N E V E R - E N D I N G  ART 
TODAY, CADAQUÉS CAN TEACH US HOW A SMALL COMMUNITY 
MANAGES TO COMBINE THE TOURIST INDUSTRY WITH A 
CONCERNED CULTURAL LIFE AND MANAGES TO ATTRACT 
RESIDENT ARTISTS BY ORGANIZING FESTIVALS OF MUSIC AND 
PAINTING AND HAS MADE ART AN UNMISTAKABLE SIGN OF 
THE SOCIAL IDENTITY OF THE TOWN. 
ART 
adaqués, some thirty kilometres 
from the motorway linking Giro- 
na and La Jonquera, with barely 
2,000 inhabitants in winter and 20,000 i* 
summer, is a village which-presents a rare 
and illuminating phenomenon: the vital- 
ity, quality and density of its artistic life, 
especially in the field of plastic arts. It 
probably has the highest number of gal- 
leries and exhibitions per year, per inha- 
bitant and per square yard to be found 
anywhere in the world. The work pro- 
duced there, always up to date with the 
latest tendencies, can only be compared 
with that of the big cities, the cosmopoli- 
tan arbiters of art. But Cadaqués, above 
all, remains faithful to its own natural ar- 
tistic style, Dalinian Surrealism. 
This spectacular phenomenon has its 
roots deep in the unique personality of 
Salvador Dalí, a universal Catalan who 
gave to the world the water, the rocks, 
the beaches, the stones and the sky -of a 
delicate, intense blue- of the village 
where he shut himself away with his wife 
Gala in 1939, and which years before had 
been visited by the cream of European 
art: Marcel Duchamp, Paul Eluard, Fe- 
derico García Lorca.. . From Dalí and his 
good friend Pitxot comes the irresistible 
attraction which artists al1 over the world 
feel for this delightful former seafaring 
village. Today, Cadaqués can teach us 
how a small community manages to 
combine the tourist industry with a con- 
cerned cultural life and manages to 
attract resident artists by organizing festi- 
vals of music and painting and has made 
art an unmistakable sign of the social 
identity of the town. 
Because it is not only the gallery-owners 
of Barcelona and Girona who establish 
themselves in Cadaqués, and it is not 
only painters from al1 over the world who 
settle here -permanently or temporari- 
ly-: it is the village itself which has man- 
aged to compete, with al1 the honours, 
with the most professional galleries in 
Catalonia. One must, therefore, visit the 
municipal museum, in the Casino de 
I'Amistat, or the Rotllan gallery or the 
Perrot-Moore museum which organizes 
the Premi de mini-gravat internacional 
and which has announced the foundation 
of an ambitious permanent workshop in 
the town's former theatre. 
Over the years, some prestigious galleries 
have closed their doors, giving way im- 
mediately to other new ones, no less con- 
cerned or active. Amongst these are the 
Cadaqués gallery, the Nota Bene galle- 
ry, the Lanfranco Bombelli gallery, 
the Carlos Lozano, the Elena Ramos, 
the Carles de Sicart, the Usquam group 
gtillery and the Fort gallery, without 
forgetting the exhibitions held in the 
Port Lligat hotel and the Sirena book- 
shop. 
Who is to be seen at the vernissages and 
the opening nights? Writers, artists, 
tourists of al1 sorts, local residents and 
summer visitors; al1 of them, in buying 
works, are benefitted and, at the same 
time, they keep alive the cultural tradi- 
tion of the little town of Cadaqués. What 
painters, sculptors and photographers 
have exhibited there in the 1986 season 
alone? A complete list would, perhaps, 
be excessive. 1 will therefore restrict my- 
self to the more important exhibitions of 
last season in which we saw the work of 
Hernandez Pijoan, Richard Hamilton, 
Tapies, Guinovart, Bartolozzi and Fran- 
cesc Catala Roca, to name a few artists 
who need no introduction, to which we 
could add the experience and ski11 of Or- 
tiz Alfau, Jordi Curós, Adolf Genovart, 
Aguilar Moré, Todó, Carbó Berthould, 
and a long list of other important names. 
Perhaps we should also mention those 
from further afield who have exhibited in 
the town: Giuseppe Santomaso, Koya- 
ma, Phil Clarke, Dany Rauch and Tom 
Lennards. 
On a peaceful summer evening by the 
shore, or else in the streets that seem to 
play hide-and-seek with the newcomer, 
there is nothing like discovering an artist 
whose work we do not yet know: Antoni 
Torres, Lourdes Civit, Fernando Pove- 
da.. . Cadaqués is indeed a festival of the 
plastic arts. ¤ 


Cadaqués: Never-ending art

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert