Military strategy and religious worship are united on the highest peak of Cardona. From the 9th century, the Castle and the Collegiate Church of Sant Vicenç have dominated the region and control the salt basins. During the War of the Spanish Succession, when they become a symbol of the resistance for the supporters of the Archduke Carles against the defenders of Philip of Anjou: the castle was the last fortress to surrender to the Bourbon troops and it fell after the capitulation of Barcelona on 18th September 1714.
The medieval complex is divided between the stately pavilions and the canonry of Sant Vicenç. The Castle was built in 886 under the command of the Count of Barcelona, Guifré el Pilós, but was not completed until several centuries later. Of the most notable elements of the first building from the 9th century only the Torre de la Minyona remains. During the first half of the 11th century, it was constructed within the precinct of the Church of Sant Vicenç, an imposing building and one of the best samples of the first Catalan Romanesque.
A great example of medieval military fortification, between the 11th and 15th centuries, the castle was the residence of the Lords of Cardona but eventually it lost its residential function and gained strategic importance. From the 17th century, the fortress updated its defensive system with a ring of bastions.
Despite being one of the most emblematic sites, Cardona was not the only setting linked to the War of Succession. The "Route 1714", organised as part of the programme of activities for the tri-centenary, includes 10 locations, such as El Born in Barcelona, the University of Cervera and the Rafael Casanova House Museum, among others.
Around 65 million years old, more than 38,000 m2 in size and with 3,500 dinosaur footprints. These facts make this spot in Fígols-Vallcebre Fumanya one of the most important in Europe with Cretaceous fossil remains.
Located in Alt Berguedà, the paleontological area includes the old open mining coal operations in Fumanya Sud (Fígols) Fumanya Nord, Tumi (Vallcebre) and Coll de Pradell (Vallcebre-Saldes). In addition to the footprints (ichnites), paleontologists have identified fossil remains of dinosaur eggs and bones, a large number of plant remains (tree trunks, leaves of different kinds, algae ...) and animals (fossilised shells of mollusks and invertebrates).
The discovery of Fumanya area dates back to 1985 when Louis Viladrich and his wife, members of the group Berguedà Natural Sciences, were hiking in the area and suspected that the tracks they saw in the light in Fumanya Sud could be animal footprints. The subsequent investigations of Miquel Crusafont Sabadell Paleontological Institute confirmed their initial theory.
The Torre Glòries (The Glòries Tower), a modern office building located at the entrance of the 22@ (the technological district of Barcelona), has altered the city’s skyline since 2005. It is the work of French architect Jean Nouvel, who is inspired by the images of a geyser, the architecture of Gaudí and the mountain of Montserrat. A contemporary lighthouse that attracts the interest of locals and tourists in equal measure.
Rising from two elliptical, concrete cylinders, one inside the other, the Torre Agbar measures 142 metres high and is covered by two "skins". The innermost is an aluminium plate painted with earth tones, blues, greens and greys. The outermost is a transparent and translucent wall made up of nearly 60,000 sheets of glass. Thanks to this double façade an air chamber is created that allows the heating of the building to be delivered and provide ventilation. The glass used are pieces of a brie-soleil, a system that controls the sun's rays depending on the outside temperature.
These characteristics make the Torre Agbar an original, intelligent and sustainable building, the three principles on which Nouvel’s project is based. It is especially notable on weekend nights, when 4,500 points of LED light (the most efficient and least polluting system) illuminate the façade with colour.
Symbol of the city, the Cathedral of Girona is an imposing building, located on the highest point in the town and with a unique feature: its single nave is the second largest in the world (only surpassed by St. Peter's in the Vatican). But the temple hides many treasures beyond its dimensions. At the top of a spectacular staircase with 90 steps there is a compendium of 5 centuries of history.
Romanesque feet, Gothic body and Baroque face. This is the current appearance of the Cathedral of Girona. The Tower of Charlemagne, the cloister and sacristy are the only things left of the first Romanesque building from the mid-11th century. The cloister is one of the most important in Catalonia thanks to its sculptural wealth.
The church, of huge dimensions, was built between the 14th and 18th centuries and was dedicated to Santa Maria. The first stone of the facade of the Cathedral was placed in 1606, but it was not finished until well into the 20th century. The dilation in time means that the structure is between Baroque and Classical.
Attached to the Church we find the Cathedral Treasury with two notable pieces of great artistic value: the Tapestry of the Creation (one of the few examples of Romanesque textiles) and the Beatus de Girona (a 10th-century copy of the Commentary on the Apocalypse made by the Blessed of Liébana, with more than 100 full page miniatures).
With more than 300 works, the Fundació Antoni Tàpies (Barcelona) has the most comprehensive collection of the Catalan artist, which reflects all the creative periods of the artist. Driven by Antoni Tàpies, the Foundation is a Museum and cultural centre that also works for the study and promotion of contemporary art.
Including paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints and books, it displays all aspects of Tàpies’ artistic activity. The collection includes a selection of drawings and portraits from the 1940s (Creu de paper de diari - Newsprint Cross), an important example of the matter works of the 1950s and 1960s (Forma negra sobre quadrat gris - Black form on grey square) and a significant representation of the object works of the late sixties and early seventies (Palla i fusta - Straw and wood).
The visitor will discover the different typologies, techniques and materials used by Tàpies: works made of rubber-foam and spray, varnishes and sculptures in refractory clay and objects and sculptures made with metallic plates or bronze.
The Fundació Antoni Tàpies is located in a modernista building designed by the architect Lluís Domènech i Montaner. This construction is unique as it was the first in the Eixample district to combine the use of exposed brick and iron within the urban setting. Currently the building is crowned by the Núvol i cadira (Cloud and chair) sculpture by Tàpies himself, a work which has become a symbol of the Foundation.
The Natural Sciences Museum of Barcelona is located in the Parc del Fòrum. Built by the architects Herzog and de Meuron in 2004, the museum occupies 9,000 m2 and is considered, architecturally, to be one of the most iconic buildings in the city.
In the entrance hall is the most emblematic piece on display in the museum, the skeleton of a whale that was found on a beach in Llançà in 1862. By popular vote, it was named Brava.
The narrative of the permanent exhibition is the interpretation of the present-day Earth as the result of the interaction between the planet’s chemical and physical environment and living beings. All this is shown in an educational way and through tactile screens and display cases with the museum’s collection – fossils, naturalised animals, plants, algae, rocks and minerals. There are also areas dedicated to fungi and the microscopic world, including the reproduction of viruses and microbes. A total of 4,500 of the over 4 million pieces the museum owns are exhibited.
The Natural Sciences Museum of Barcelona is an institution with over 140 years of history. It started off with the legacy of the collections of the naturalist Francesc Martorell i Peña. In addition to the Fòrum building, the Museum has other sites located in different parts of the city: the Jardí Botànic de Barcelona (Botanical Garden of Barcelona) and the Jardí Botànic Històric (Historical Botanical Garden), situated on Montjuic, the Centre Martorell (Martorell Exhibitions Centre), and the Castell dels Tres Dragons in the Parc de la Ciutadella.
The home of the industrialist chocolatier Antoni Amatller is one of the greatest examples of the Catalan modernist architecture and one of the few that still have the ornamental richness of this style promoted by the bourgeoisie. Located on Passeig de Gràcia in Barcelona, it is the work of the architect Josep Puig i Cadafalch who was commissioned to remodel the building, acquired by the industrialist, from head to foot.
The Casa Amatller stands out for the composition of the façade and for the restructuring and redecoration of the ground floor and the main floor, a reflection of the originality of the modernista architecture and decorative arts. The façade is a colourful composition that incorporates sgraffito on a white base, ochre and red ochre, glazed tiles, green woodwork, black wrought iron and grey stone from Montjuïc. In addition, there is unique sculptural decoration, notable for the relief of St. George and the Dragon, designed by Eusebi Arnau. The tiered gable at the top of the façade is reminiscent of the classic shape of a tablet of chocolate and is one of the most characteristic features of the building. Inside, one must admire the antique furniture, the columns, the floor, the ceilings and the lamps, original decoration of the residence.
Currently, the Casa Amatller is home to the Amatller Institute of Hispanic Art. It has about 400 objects of Roman, Medieval, Baroque and Modernista periods. But above all it is noted for its documentary resources. It maintains a large photo library specialising in Hispanic art, with about 350,000 items illustrating and cataloguing the works of art. Its consultation is essential for any researcher in the history of the art.
In this small valley in the Pyrenees there are a group of exceptional churches and chapels which stand as both the cradle and the ultimate expression of Catalan Romanesque art. Declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 2000, the Vall de Boí group comprise Sant Climent and Santa Maria in Taüll, Sant Joan in Boí, Santa Eulàlia in Erill la Vall, Sant Feliu in Barruera, Sant Quirc and Church of the Nativity in Durro, Santa Maria in Cardet and the Church of the Assumption in Coll. All the churches can be visited except for Sant Quirc in Durro, and the Church of the Assumption in Coll.
In the Lombard Romanesque style, the churches of the Vall de Boí are functional, simple temples with one or three naves, built with small granite ashlars. The roofs are wooden-beamed or barrel-vaulted. And these churches are the artistic reflection of an austere society, tied to the natural environment and strongly hierarchical.
The interiors of the churches were decorated with mural paintings and carvings. The hieratic figures (with images of the Virgin and the Saints and the dominant figure of the Pantocrator) and the play of colours characterise symbolic paintings of great creativity which represent one of the highest achievements of Romanesque art at an international level.
Since the late 19th century and into the early 20th century, this Romanesque group fascinated the intellectuals of the Catalan Renaixença. Josep Puig i Cadafalch, among others, and institutions such as the Institute of Catalan Studies contributed to the appreciation and preservation of the art of the Pyrenees.
Today, a good many of the paintings, carvings and furniture are kept in different museums, particularly in the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (MNAC). Even so, many of the churches have important fragments of mural paintings and original Romanesque sculptures, as well as reproductions of those which are preserved in museums. In the case of Sant Climent de Taüll, a modern mapping recreates the original frescoes of the apse and offers an immersive experience of what it was like at the time of its creation. At the same time, a visit to this group of churches can be complemented with a visit to the Romanesque Centre of the Vall de Boí.
Under the protection of Kings and noblemen, the monastery of Poblet became the nerve centre of medieval Catalonia. The royal pantheon during the middle ages, the complex has become a cultural and historical symbol where the Cistercian monks have come back to live.
The construction of the monastery began in the 12th century and in avariety of architectural styles such as Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque. However, the complex enjoys complete harmony both among its architectural elements (which contain all the splendour of theCistercian order) as well as in its relationship with the surroundings of the Prades mountains.
Some of the most notable elements of the monastery include: the Church, which follows the style of Cistercian temples, and where one must admire the altarpiece from the high altar, a Renaissance group in white alabaster by Damià Forment; the beautiful gothic chapel of Sant Jordi, built in the time of Alfonso the Magnanimous (15th century), and the royal gate, a magnificent Gothic construction flanked by two octagonal towers.
It was the king, Pere III El Ceremoniós, (Peter the Ceremonious, 1319-1387) who tied the monastery to the Crown of Aragon, constructing the royal pantheon there, which until then had been in Santes Creus. Here they installed the sepulchres of Alfonso I, Jaume I el Conqueridor (James the Conqueror), Pere III and many of his successors. The sepulchres, made of white Alabaster, were worked by some of the best sculptors of the time.
The Palau de la Música Catalana and the Hospital de la Santa Creu i de Sant Pau, works of the architect Lluís Domènech i Montaner, are two emblematic buildings of Catalan modernista architecture. Located in the city of Barcelona, they were built in the early years of the 20th century and have been on the Unesco World Heritage list since 1997.
The two buildings are good examples of modernista architecture, an artistic movement that arose in Europe in the late 19th century and which, in Catalonia, and especially in Barcelona, became widespread.
Both the Palau de la Música Catalana and the Hospital de la Santa Creu i de Sant Pau are public buildings in which tradition and modernity are fused together. They show a significant renewal of traditional techniques and the incorporation of new architectural solutions. To their architectural value is added beauty and decorative exuberance, becoming works of universal artistic and historical significance.
These constructions masterfully display the essence of modernisme and the period in which they were built: beyond the artistic side, he represented an ideological movement, based on the modernisation of the country and the search for an identity in a historical context in which civil society, especially the bourgeoisie, became the most loyal sponsor.
