|
|
|
January 1, 2002
REVIEW: Not exactly exotic
ANTONI Gaudi i Cornet was an extraordinary architect producing some of the world’s most incredible buildings — not so much buildings as swirling swathes of stone and bricks intricately decorated with ironwork and multi-coloured mosaics. They defy description but once seen, they are never forgotten. I recently visited Barcelona in north east Spain, where Gaudi lived and worked for 74 years, and was awed yet again by the playfulness, the audacity and even madness of his constructions.
You would have thought that somebody who produced such innovative stuff would be a compelling individual whose life story would reveal and inform his imaginative outpourings. Not so, Gaudi was a dull bird, almost wholly absorbed in producing his strange masterpieces. So although there are books and books and books about his work mostly stuffed with photographs, there is little written about the man himself. Van Hensbergen has bravely gone where few have ventured before. Not only was Gaudi’s life uneventful, he never married, was a strict vegetarian and a fanatical Catholic. There are few papers to draw on. He left no journals or diaries and only a few essays, statements and speeches setting out his philosophy and approach. Moreover it seems there is precious little contemporary comment from colleagues, rivals or friends.
So with so little to go on, it is a wonder that Van Hensbergen bothered but he has deftly woven what little there is about Gaudi’s life around descriptions of the masterpieces he built. It’s a good read and for my money a much better way of approaching the buildings than through a straightforward architectural approach. But you will need some good illustrations — those in the book are just not good enough.
I sat one day on the marvellous sinuous bench which waves its way around the edge of the open plaza in the Park Guell. The city of Barcelona, with the sea beyond and the hills gently enfolding it lay before me. The bench beautifully curved, easy to recline or sit on is a miracle of multi-coloured mosaic ceramics, so life-enhancing and fun, so captivating and exciting for those of us lucky enough to be there. And yet Gaudi was over fifty when he designed this joyful confection. And believe it or not but the benches and the rest of the carefully designed artifacts in the park have been invested not only with religious meaning as befits his spiritual leaning but deep cultural ones as well.
For Gaudi was a Catalonian nationalist. This north eastern part of Spain has always held itself proudly aloof from the rest of the Iberian peninsula. Rulers from Madrid have for centuries alternatively tried to crush or embrace the people from this part of their country. This was particularly so in the nineteenth century when Barcelona and its hinterland became very prosperous with industrialization.
But the Catalonians fought back and none more so than their intellectuals, their artists, poets and architects. And they were supported in this endeavour by the patronage of rich industrialists. Eusebi Guell was one such who commissioned Gaudi to build a palace, a chapel, crypt and the park among other things. Guell was a sort of latter day Medici with the same courage to allow artistic freedom and innovation to flourish among those he sponsored.
Gaudi’s most spectacular secular building in Barcelona is a block of flats called the Casa Mila. It is an extraordinary sight resembling a sea cliff which folds around the corner of two streets. The windows are like the mouths of caves decorated with iron work which looks uncannily like sea weed and on the roof is an extraordinary array of chimney pots in grotesque style but beautifully ornamented with mosaics. The whole building is a tour de force.
But Gaudi’s most emblematic building which has become the icon of Barcelona, as much as the Eiffel Tower is of Paris, is the unfinished church of the Sagrada Familia. This extraordinary huge dinosaur lies like a wounded beast bravely trying to come to life. It is swarmed over by tourists, while cranes are poised overhead, for even though it is still a building site it is compelling to all comers.
Most artists lead pretty exotic lives and frequently the story of their lives are more intriguing than their output. The reverse is true of Gaudi, his staggering output, his incredible buildings, mind blowing even by the standards of our post modern, eclectic times have almost eclipsed their creator. It is to Van Hensbergen’s credit that in this biography this immensely hard working, obsessive, singularly focused man is seen clearly alongside his buildings.
Gaudi: the biography
By Gijs van Hensbergen HarperCollins
ISBN 0066210658
368pp. $35
|
|
|
|
