There are several institutions and archives that preserve the photographic heritage of Catalonia. One of the most important collections is that of the Centre Excursionista de Catalunya, with 750,000 images of hiking and mountaineering, but also featuring the artistic and architectural heritage and daily life throughout the country. For its volume and variety, also notable is the collection of the Institut d’Estudis Fotogràfics de Catalunya with nearly 800,000 photographs.
In the Biblioteca de Catalunya there are photographic documents 250,000 archived, ranging from the mid-19th century to the present day. One of the stand outs is the Josep Salvany collection with 10,000 images of Catalan landscapes and popular culture.
The history of photography, from its beginnings up to the more contemporary production, is what informs the collection of the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, with 40,000 examples from notable photographers such as Pere Casas Abarca, Agustí Centelles, Pere Català Pic, Francesc Català Roca, Colita, Joan Fontcuberta, Pere Formiguera, Oriol Maspons, Kim Manresa, Josep Masana and Joan Colom. The MACBA also has, for example, the bequest of Xavier Miserachs.
And for its part, in the personal collections of the Arxiu Nacional de Catalunya one can find works of photographers such as Josep Gaspar, els Brangulí, Gabriel Casas i Galobardes, Bert i Claret or Frederic Cuyàs.
At the end of the 19th century in Europe, images which, until then, had been static, came to life thanks to the invention of cinematography. Catalonia did not remain on the sidelines. In 1897, Fructuoso Gelabert filmed Baralla en un Cafè (Fight in a café), which is considered the first fictional film in the history of Catalan and Spanish cinema.
From this point on, many other films have become a watershed in the evolution of the ‘seventh art’ in Catalonia. Of these was one of the key films of surrealist cinematography, Un chien andalou (1928), which was the result of an intense week spent by Luis Buñuel in Cadaqués with Salvador Dalí. As well, Montserrat is the main setting for filming of the blockbuster Parisfal (Daniel Mangrané, 1951).
During the Civil War, Espoir/Sierra de Teruel (André Malraux, 1938) became a valuable document on the activity of the Republican side, although it wasn’t released until 1978. In the midst of Francoism, Los Tarantos (Rovira Beleta, 1963) is a raw testimony about the urban fringes. And the period of the Spanish ‘transition’ cannot be understood without La ciutat cremada, The Burnt City, (Antoni Ribas, 1976).
In addition to the film production one must also take into account the preservation of this heritage. One of the main Catalan institutions dedicated to preservation and dissemination of such films is the Filmoteca de Catalunya, with a collection that includes more than 8,000 films and that has a regular programme of screenings. With regard to alternative and experimental cinema, the benchmark is the Xcèntric Archive of the CCCB. There is also the Girona Museum of Cinema, which displays close to 8,000 pieces of equipment and pre-cinematographic objects of the Tomàs Mallol collection.
The Catalan culture cannot be understood without all the fantastic facilities of Barcelona. This setting has become the backbone of the country's culture.
The Palau de la Música, the work of Lluís Domènech i Montaner and a Unesco World Heritage site, is much more than a refined example of modernista architecture. The witness to key episodes in Catalan history, it has become a reference point for Catalans.
Sharing centre stage as a symbol of the Catalan culture is the Gran Teatre del Liceu. Built in 1847, and linked from the beginning to the bourgeoisie of Barcelona, this building has survived two catastrophic episodes: an anarchist bomb in 1893 and a fire in 1994.
Among the modern facilities for the performing arts the Teatre Nacional de Catalunya, the Teatre Lliure and the Mercat de les Flors stand out. In the musical field, beyond the examples of the Palau de la Música and Liceu, is the L’Auditori of Barcelona. Regarding the visual arts, the main institutions are the Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya (MNAC), which offers a global and historical perspective of Catalan art, and the Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), offering a showcase of the most up-to-date art.
From the early daguerreotype to current media and distribution channels, Catalan photography has been at the forefront of a revolution lasting a little less than two centuries.
Months after the daguerreotype appeared in France (1839), Ramon Alabern became the first Catalan to take pictures with this new invention. Soon after, photographers such as José Martínez Sánchez and Juan Martí, bore witness to the Industrial Revolution.
At the end of the 19th century, the first Catalan artistic photographers appeared (Joan Vilatobà, Miquel Renom and Pere Casas Abarca), approaching Symbolism and Impressionism, while the second generation followed Pictorialism (Joaquim Pla and Claudi Carbonell). The Avant-gardism also came to Catalan photography, and the work of professionals such as Pere Català Pic and Gabriel Casas meant an artistic and technical revolution.
It was not until the 1950s that tradition of documentary photography was reawoken. A new generation (Francesc Català Roca, Ramon Masats, Xavier Miserachs, Oriol Maspons, Joan Colom, Leopoldo Pomés, Colita and Eugeni Forcano) showed reality both critically and ironically.
In the seventies and eighties, the dissemination and cultural prestige of the photograph increased, finally reaching the museums. With the arrival of the digital era, its use was further democratised.
During the second half of the 20th century, Barcelona experienced the largest urban expansion in its history.
The "Barcelona model" was born in the eighties thanks to the collaboration of the democratic institutions and architects such as Oriol Bohigas. From this period are the Parc de l'Espanya Industrial (Peña i Rius) or the Moll de la Fusta (Solà-Morales).
But the pinnacle of Catalan urban planning started with the choice of Barcelona as the host city for the 1992 Olympic Games. La intervenció a l’anella olímpica de Montjuïc inclou la restauració de l’Estadi Olímpic i les Piscines Picornell i la construcció del Palau Sant Jordi (Isozaki). The Vila Olímpica (Martorell-Bohigas-Mackay) brought the city to the sea with the construction of the Port Olímpic. Other examples of Olympic architecture are the Torre de Collserola (Foster), the Montjuïc Communications Tower (Calatrava) or the Hotel Arts (Skidmore, Owings & Merrill).
With the Fòrum Universal de les Cultures (2004), the Diagonal was extended to the sea, and the Centre Internacional de Convencions (Mateo), the Forum Building (Herzog and de Meuron) and the large photovoltaic panel (Martínez Lapeña and Torres) were built.
As for post-Forum, highlights include the spectacular displays of authorial architecture such as the Torre Agbar (Nouvel) or the Edifici Gas Natural (Miralles and Tagliabue).
The Catalan journal Dau al Set (1948) and the artistic group of the same name are considered the most important manifestations of the post-war avant-garde.
The vast majority of its founding members (the poet and playwright Joan Brossa, the philosopher Arnau Puig and the painters Joan Ponç, Antoni Tàpies, Modest Cuixart and Joan-Josep Tharrats) lived in the same neighbourhood of Barcelona, and linked the disagreement with the repressive ideological situation and the limited creative possibilities of the period. They also shared a great creativity, sensitivity and sense of action.
The name of the magazine played with the idea of the impossible (Dau al Set meaning the seventh face of a dice that has only six), and expressed the intention of the group, located between the negation and confusion of Dadaism and the liberating creative expression of Surrealism.
The political circumstances hindered the desire of Dau al Set to influence the social environment, and the freedom of expression of its members was above all creative and artistic. As well, they fought to prevent the expressive forms established by the regime, they showed that repression can not stifle creativity and they were the triggers for new attitudes of free expression.
During the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), artistic demonstrations in Catalonia adopted modern media such as posters and documentary photography.
The vehicle of slogans for awareness and mobilisation, posters stand out for their artistic creativity and techniques during this period.
Some of the most active poster artists were Josep Renau (Hoy más que nunca: Victoria), Martí Bas i Blasi (Feu tancs, tancs, tancs...), Jaume Solà (Unió és força), Lleó Arnau (Assassins!), Carles Fontserè (Llibertat!), Lorenzo Goñi (I tu... què has fet per la victòria?), Pere Català Pic (Aixafem el feixisme), Antoni Clavé (Catalans!... 11 de setembre), Lluís Garcia Falgàs (Informeu-vos dels que lluiten al front), Enrique Ballesteros "Henry" (Voy a luchar por tu porvenir) and Paco Ribera (Diada de la Dona Antifeixista).
Documentary photography offers a testimony of the reality both at the front and in the rearguard during the Civil War. Catalan photojournalists such as Agustí Centelles, Josep Maria Sagarra or Carlos Pérez de Rozas portrayed the daily life of the conflict side-by-side with the foreign professionals such as Robert Capa or Gerda Tardo, creators of legendary images.
In the 18th and 19th centuries a new social class, the bourgeoisie, pursued a more personal, emotional, original and, above all, rebellious art and claimed identification with a homeland and common roots.
In Catalonia, Romanticism had clear political connotations: the Catalan literati claimed the right to restore the language, literature, and popular culture.
The first romantic poem in Catalan language was Oda a la Pàtria, by Bonaventura Carles Aribau (1833), but it didn’t become ingrained until the coming of Lo Gaiter del Llobregat, by Joaquim Rubió i Ors. In the novel, the first romantic works in Catalan were by authors such as Antonio de Bofarull and Martí Genís i Aguilar. With regard to the theatre, the exponents were playwrights such as Víctor Balaguer, Edward Vidal and Frederic Soler, known as "Pitarra".
The Renaixença shares with Romanticism the will to revive the national consciousness after a period of decline, and in fact the two movements coexisted together throughout the 19th century.
In Catalonia two factions that coexisted were: the conservative (Bofarull), and the reclamatory (Balaguer). They shared the desire to restore the Jocs Florals (floral games) as an instrument to promote Catalan socially and to stimulate literary production. The definitive push of this literary event arrived in 1877, when Jacint Verdaguer and Àngel Guimerà were awarded prizes.
New against the old. Modern instead of Modernism. Noucentisme, the cultural and political movement of the early 20th century (1906-1923) was born with the aim to overcome the Catalan art scene that had dominated until then. According to the principles defined by Eugeni d’Ors, it had to recover the roots of the classical world and create a new language and iconographic universe.
The essay and poetry were the main literary genres of Catalan Noucentisme, and names such as Josep Carner, Enric Prat de la Riba and Pompeu Fabra mark the beginnings of the movement.
If the Noucentisme broke with modernism, the Avant-gardes broke with the Noucentisme. It arose in Europe between the first and second world wars as a reaction against the power and the aesthetic tastes of the bourgeoisie. It included artistic movements such as Cubism, which reinterpreted space and used geometric shapes; Futurism, which challenged classical beauty; Dadaism, characterised by negation and confusion; and Surrealism, which focused on the absence of reason in the creation.
In Catalonia the leading names of the avant-garde literary movement were poets such asJoan Salvat-Papasseit, Carles Sindreu, Joan Josep M. Junoy and J.V. Foix.
Breaking with established social and artistic values and transforming them into a modern and national culture with new ideas. These were the objectives of modernism from the late 19th century to the first decade of the 20th century and applied to all the arts, including literature.
The first steps of this movement in Catalonia were linked to the appearance of L'Avens (The Advance), the cultural magazine from Valentí Almirall, with the collaboration of Àngel Guimerà, Narcís Oller, Jaume Brossa, Joaquim Casas-Carbó and Jaume Massó. The disagreements within the publication led to the emergence of two distinct tendencies: the Regenerationist, concerned with changing society and headed by Jaume Brossa, and the Aesthetic, driven by Santiago Rusiñol and Raimon Casellas, defenders of Art for Art’s sake.
With the turn of the century the differences were overcome with the emergence of new organs of modernist expression (the magazine, Catalonia and the weekly, Joventut), which encouraged a more moderate and participatory discourse.
This was the stage that gave rise to the most diverse and highest quality literary work: Els sots feréstecs (Raimon Casellas), Solitud (Víctor Català), L’auca del senyor Esteve (Santiago Rusiñol) and Josafat (Prudenci Bertrana). Among the poets, the leading figure of the Catalan modernism was Joan Maragall, responsible for renewing the genre, making the language more colloquial and less grandiloquent.
