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Monday 13 August 2018

Sóller: Miro, Picasso, Rubió & Can Prunera Museu Modernista



























The town of Sóller is located on the northwest coast of the island of Mallorca and has two buildings by the architect Joan Rubió i Bellver.

Rubió was a keen disciple of Antoni Gaudí collaborating with him until 1905 on such works as the restoration of La Seu (the cathedral of Palma de Mallorca). Rubió went to Mallorca to collaborate with Gaudí on the Cathedral but his contacts with the curia provided him with other works on the island. Rector Sebastià Maymó, a good friend of Bishop Campins who commissioned Gaudí to work on the Cathedral, hired Rubió to design the façade for the parish church in Sóller, which had yet to be finished. He designed a traditional Gothic façade, but gave it what could be considered a Modernista interpretation. Work began in 1904 and ended in 1913 because of a lack of funding, and it was not completed until 1946. Rubió also designed the Banc de Sóller (1909-1912), a large grey ashlar building with asymmetrical windows covered by semicircular arches and a double semicircular overhanging corner gallery. The Banco de Sóller is remarkable for its intricate ironwork (wrought iron).

Can Prunera Museu Modernista is located in an old art nouveau mansion built in the early 20th century. Can Prunera, together with other buildings such as the Grand Hotel, Can Forteza Rey and Can Casasayas, the three of them in Palma, belongs to a large set of buildings erected in the early 20th century following the models of Catalan Modernisme and French Art-nouveau.

The visit starts in the ground and main floor rooms, containing some of the original furniture (tables, chairs, beds, wardrobes and showcases with a clear ornamental richness). In those same rooms, paintings and sculptures are shown. Most of the works displayed at Can Prunera Museu Modernista belong to the Serra Art Collection and this collection’s masterpieces encompass works by important artists from the 19th and 20th centuries, such as Joan Miró, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Paul Klee, Fernand Léger and Maurice Vlaminck; painters who were either born in Mallorca or have some link to the island and have reached international recognition are also included. These include Santiago Rusiñol, Joaquim Mir, Joan Fuster, Eliseu Meifrén, Ritch Miller and Miquel Barceló. Another important section of the Serra Art Collection is to be found in the paintings of the permanent collection, by Juli Ramis,

In the basement, there are the rooms popularly known as botigues: the old room containing a kitchen stove, an olive oil tank, a sink and a well, which can still be seen; a refectory for the domestic service –which nowadays hosts temporary exhibitions– and the storage rooms –today devoted to Juli Ramis, where works from three of the most characteristic periods of this painter from Sóller are shown: early years, Cubism and abstract works. In the garden, visitors can contemplate the inner façade of the house and the collection of sculptures displayed.

Biblically themed works on show included a bronze by Arnaldo Pomorodo dedicated to Pere A. Serra, an image of the Miracle at Cana by Calvo Carridôn plus a collection of drawings by Josep Maria Subirachs i Sitjar.

There are currently two temporary exhibitions. The Incarnate Spirits by Pep Girbent (Sóller, 1969) presents seven painting based on images from iconic films which introduce several overlapping discourses. The task I have set myself is none other than to untangle these interlocking blocks of thought, out of which, like the tips of icebergs, the seven paintings that comprise this exhibition emerge. The other is Joan Ramon Bonet. The photographer’s vision; in which photographs by Bonet of various artists are shown alongside examples of each artist's work.

The station and ticket office building at Sóller house a permanent exhibition of two of Spain's most famous modern artists, Pablo Picasso and Joan Miro. Aptly housed together because the two artists enjoyed a long friendship until the death of Picasso in 1973, the collection contains ceramics by Picasso and lithographs and paintings by Miro, as well as several photographs of the pair together. The Miro gallery includes his interpretation of Francesc d'Assis: Càntic del Sol, 1975.
 
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