Saturday, April 07, 2007
Barcelona, Spain, 31 Aug - 7 Sep 2006: La Sagrada Familia
Gaudi Gothic
  |
| Antonio Gaudi dedicated the last years of his life to building La Sagrada Familia, his towering vision of the Holy Family and the Apostles in concrete. Eighty years after his death, Gaudi's masterpiece is still very much a work in progress. Construction of the central nave continues apace -the finished nave but a model in the underground Gaudi Museum - as awed visitors tread the grounds of the Church, solemnly tracing the Modernista pilgrim trail. |
   |
| The Nativity Facade is a signature Gaudi original. Hate it ("wedding-cake-in-the-rain") or love it, the facade overwhelms with its grand scale and undulating surfaces dripping with foliate ornaments and myriad details - Gaudi's evocation of the rococco. |
   |
| In contrast, the modern Passion Facade is angular and spare, but nevertheless powerful. The Glory Facade, soon to be finished, will add to the apparent disparateness of the Church, yet strangely augmenting the whole. |
   |
| Unifying the different styles are the models on which Gaudi based his designs. Using curves, arches and hyperboloids, he conceived a new universe of pure geometric building forms - transcendent gaudiness that underscores the architectural genius and legacy of the man. |
 |
Labels: architecture, art, Barcelona, museum, religious site, Spain
Comments
Post a Comment
Home
Sagrada Familia is his most famous attraction. Begun over 100 years ago in 1882, and still less than half completed, this is undoubtedly one of Barcelona’s most characteristic buildings. You can visit the structure and climb up some of the towers if you have a head for heights, and there is a museum that has models of what the final structure will look like, with a massive central tower that soars 200 feet above and between the current towers. There are 3 façades: the Passion, the Nativity and the Gloria with sculptural contributions from different sculptors, including Japanese artist Etsuro Sotoo whose work can be seen on the Nativity facade and also in hotels in Barcelona decorations. On the Passion facade is the controversial work of local sculptor Josep M. Subirachs, which seems to stand apart from the rest of the work to most observers and therefore is the focus of great criticism from some quarters and praise from others.
Post a Comment
Home
Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License
These are the 30 countries that I have ever set foot on. Airport stopovers don't count!
