Word: gaud
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Born in 1852 and run over by a Barcelona tram 74 years later in 1926, Gaudí would probably be embarrassed by so much fuss. A vegetarian bachelor who washed in cold water and wore tattered suits, Gaudí avoided publicity. He left few personal papers, most of his architectural records were destroyed during the Civil War, and there are only a handful of black-and-white photos of him, which can't show the intense blue of his eyes. When not at building sites Gaudí spent much of his time kneeling in prayer. But he would probably have...
...coordinator of International Gaudí Year, Daniel Giralt-Miracle, says Catalans have had an uneasy relationship with the man they are now celebrating. "I think Barcelona has finally decided to have an entente cordiale with him," says Giralt-Miracle, who is director of the Gaudí Space, an area dedicated to the architect's works located in the vast attic of one of the best-known of them, the Casa Milà, in Barcelona's elegant Passeig de Gràcia. An example of this relationship is that Catalans unflatteringly dubbed the Casa Milà La Pedrera "the quarry...
Giralt-Miracle says one aim of the year of conferences, exhibitions, school activities and open days - smaller shows are being negotiated for cities ranging from Berlin, Rome and London to Shanghai and Philadephia - is to go beyond the postcard image of Gaudí's best-known work, the incomplete Sagrada Família cathedral. (Its latest guesstimated finishing date is 2030.) "Today Gaudí is more popular than known, and we want to change that," says Giralt-Miracle. "He had his feet on the ground, but his imagination in the infinite, arriving at a time - the turn of the 19th...
International reaction to Gaudí has also been ambivalent. Architecture critic Nikolaus Pevsner ignored him altogether in the 1936 edition of his seminal Pioneers of Modern Design. It was only after 1962 that Gaudí was admitted to its pages. George Orwell, in Barcelona during the Civil War, was more explicit, calling the Sagrada Família "one of the most hideous buildings in the world...
Many architects would say Orwell was talking through his hat. Le Corbusier described the school Gaudí designed as part of the Sagrada Família project - its roof an ingenious, wave-like structure - as "a masterpiece." Norman Foster has called Gaudí's methods revolutionary. Spain's best-known architect, Santiago Calatrava, shows Gaudí's influence in his use of trencadís (broken ceramic tiles) as decoration, his use of arches, and his primary source of inspiration - nature...