We had two occasions of re-discovering Barcelona last year, only because we are part of a study for the European Commission .
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european institute of cultural routes |
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| Michel Thomas-Penette |
| 19 March 2008 |
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| ON THE TRACKS OF EUROPEAN CO-OPERATION |
We had two occasions of re-discovering Barcelona last year, only because we are part of a study for the European Commission (D.G. X Culture, Education and Audiovisual) on bi- and multicultural policies implemented by 31 eligible countries for funding in this sector. Interarts of Barcelona (Eduardo Delgado, Director who died at the beginning of this year) and EFAH (Dragan Klaic, Director) have been entrusted to fulfil the job.
The D.G. X wanted to know more about the fundamental basis of this co-operation in order to prepare a recommendation and a programme that will respect subsidiary regulations. The Institute was in charge of the important sector of Cultural Heritage. But these meetings, although intense in their discussions and confrontations left us some hours - even at night - for interesting tours inside the city.
This was a good occasion to prepare a practical article for "Discovering Europe", helping tourists to be more conscious of the profound evolution of the Catalonia capital for thirty years.
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Maria Teresa Codina
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The first time I reached Barcelona was a journalistic occasion. I had to interview an artist, close to Tapiès : Maria-Teresa Codina for presenting her work in Textile / Art magazine.
It was a few weeks after her retrospective at the Miro Foundation. Her work, rough but sensible as well, should be re-discovered. It was during the night of Saint Jean. The largest avenues that go through the city were lighted by plenty of fires.
The Northern suburbs - to be more precise San Cugat del Vallès - where the artist was living, were like a calm and dusty summer island where the inhabitants were seeking shadow behind closed windows and shutters.
She helped me to discover the development of her work, but also the splendid church and cloister of San Cugat, as well as the colonia Güell church by Gaudi and the textile museum of Terrassa with which I will work for the silk routes implementation some years later.
She was inspired by the bags filled of sand that Gaudi used to establish the design of the arches, the embroideries of Girona, the pre-romanesque art and the rope of the well situated in the centre of her garden. She symbolically introduced all these references to create textile connections which were part of her world.
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Church of colonia Güell
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Closter of San Cugat
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Between the centre of the capital and this peripheral heritage, I had to go through a space that was really upside down and from which a new city was being born in a labyrinth of bypasses and deviations, of dead-ends and empty spaces.
A true European capital was at its dawn, while at the same time, Madrid was subject of the last anti-democratic attacks of the Franco nostalgia, even within the Parliament buildings.
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Pedrera building
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Pedrera building
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I came back six years later to convince the artist to prepare an in-situ work for the large nave of the Paris Museum of Decorative Arts in the context of an exhibition named "Fibres Art". During the next summer she brought piles of jute sacks coming from South America and an amount of ropes from which she developed a huge sculpture that reached the heights of the recently restored Louvre glass roof.
We were close to Christmas. Small shops were displaying sculptures for the crib and surrounded the cathedral. I was really impressed by the moving and noisy crowd of the Rambla. A new generation emerged after the death of the dictator. This generation - twenty to thirty years old - was close to the one which put fire in Paris in the 60's and slowly came to political responsibilities. The streets were laughing, twenty years after the Parisian May and this new generation will bring, as in France, the Socialist party in charge.
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On the Rambla
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On the Rambla
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I then came back almost every year for the implementation of Silk Routes in Spain, in the frame of a close co-operation with Eulalia Morral y Romeu, Director of Terrassa museum. A museum built in the heart of the textile industry area Terrassa - Sabadell, which reopened some months ago after a rather long period of refurbishment (see article).
In 1989 a travelling conference from Barcelona to Granada, then in 1994 the final conference in Melendez y Pelayo University of Valencia for a presentation of the whole work prepared on silk between the Middle Ages and today in the Iberic Peninsula. We prepared also in 1996 a series of broadcasts with France Culture on the silk routes, from Barcelona up to the legacy of Al-Andalus.
There were other occasions, linked to cultural tourism as the tourism fair of Catalonia in 1998 and for the visit of the tremendous industrial heritage museum of Terrassa that opend in a modernist style textile factory.
During all these steps, the airport became a huge international hub, Foster designed the communication tower and the harbour adopted a post-modern style. We are not only in a huge city but also in a megapolis in which ants are running in every direction, while cars are going back and forth on the highways passing through the last unbuilt areas or the remains of the Olympic Games buildings.
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On MacBa side
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On MacBa side
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Today another occasion to visit the city is there. Barcelona 2004 wants to be a world capital.
Today? Yes, the generation who was in the street in 1984 is now in charge and the previous generation tries to keep as intact as much as possible its habits of calm walks, of conversations in small groups, of close chatting on the way to the church, far from the flux of tourists who go from one Gaudi treasure to another. A clear gap is established between the alder, found of shadow, adults who want to participate in trade temples - Fnac and Habitat - to the new fashion tendencies, and youngsters who are considering the piazza of the Museum of Modern Art as a sports arena.
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In a word, Barcelona wants to face not only Europe, but also the entire world, trying at the same time to keep its identity in well-known clichés. This is certainly the reason why the Sagrada Familia continues to trace a continuity coming from last century, year after year, when at the same time design events and conferences on landscape aim at imposing new lines based on a certain globalisation of living spaces. But the clearest sign of this uncertainty, or better of this mixture of times and epochs is given by the museums which are offering exhibitions and assessments about past.
Some references are given in links and if you cannot go to see them, ask for the catalogues.
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Shopping line
The city has plotted out a route for this wealth of shops: the remarkable, five-kilometre-long Shopping Line.
The route makes it possible to visit Barcelona's main shops, which are a integral part of its urban fabric, and, at the same time, walk around places of real interest ot tourists.
The Shopping Line links up the city's different shopping areas which have evolved naturally during its history, and enables people to get from one to another on foot: the Port Vell, La Rambla, the historical centre, The Gothic Quarter, the Pl. de Catalunya, the Eixample (Rbla. de Catalunya and Pg. de Gràcia), the main thoroughfare of the Diagonal and the new business and shopping district of the Diagonal.
Turisme de Barcelona offers those people visiting the city for professional reasons -congresses, conventions, incentive trips- on cruises, for leisure and other special groups, a folder containing specific information about the participating outlets on the barcelona shopping line, together with a city map, information on vat refunds and a personalised special-customer card.
Visitors to Barcelona can also use the buses on the special Tombbus service, which can be identified by the sticker Barcelona Shopping Line. They operate along the Shopping Line from Pl. de Catalunya to El Corte Inglés -Diagonal and back again.
"Turisme de Barcelona places at your disposal the Barcelona Card and BCN Original which give you the best shopping deals".
Web site in link.
Other sites are also in the list in order to help you in the preparation of your travel. The gaudi 2002 is still working.
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Turisme de Barcelona offices
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The Liceu, operas shows that you should not miss in a place that has been completely restored after the great fire.
For the programme of the next season see link.
Gran Teatre del Liceu, La Rambla 51-59 Tel. : 00 34 93 485 9900.
An address for gourmets :
Cacao Sampaka Consell de Cent, 292 - 08007 Barcelona. Tel. : 00 34 93 272 08 33. Fax. : 00 34 93 487 26 23.
Web : http://www.cacaosampaka.com
E-mail : info@cacaosampaka.com
Don't miss the Year of Book and Reading 2005
See link.
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