Let's Talk About Gaudí.

So when I decided to come to Barcelona for a month, there were a few reasons - most of them vague, one quite practical. I knew I wanted to be on the Mediterranean coast - that was never in question. Also, it was always my intention to visit Mallorca while in Spain, but I wasn't just going to call my cousins and be like, "Hey, guys, is it cool if I crash at your place for a month?"

(Honestly, I think they would have been cool with it, but that wasn't what I was trying to do in any case.)

So Barcelona is one of the closest departure points to Mallorca. The only one closer (that's a major city, from which the boats leave) is Valencia, and to be honest, it was a toss-up at that point. I'd never heard anything bad about Valencia, I'd assumed it was beautiful, but Barcelona had been getting a lot of good press in the past couple of years.

I was a little intimidated by the idea of staying in Catalunya. I knew everyone here speaks Catalán, and I decidedly do not. But everyone told me that everyone here also speaks Castillian, so that was reassuring. Beyond that, I kept hearing about how full of great art and culture it was. These are vague accolades to be sure, but I was interested.

So when I got here, I was immediately blown away by how pretty it was, sure - but as I've recorded, I quickly became acquainted with the work of one Antoní Gaudí, Barcelona's most famous architect, whose genius has inspired generations of architects who've followed him.

Blah blah blah.

I saw La Sagrada Familia, probably his most famous work; I saw the Park Güell, which is the thing that everyone who´d ever even thought of Barcelona told me to go see. Both were absolutely breathtaking, for sure, and worth the hype. But yesterday and today I went to see the two apartment houses in the city he´s most famous for designing; Casa Battló and Casa Milá (better known as La Pedrera, or "The Quarry").

Now, while Vinnie was here, we'd planned to go see these on his last day in town, but I was so exhausted from our sojourn to Sitges (possibly my new favorite place on earth; Sitges will get its own blog post, rest assured), I opted to stay in that day, aside from running a few errands. Apparently, according to the Rough Guide, Vinnie had said, Casa Milá was the more impressive of the two, and more worth going to see. So, knowing that my days in Barcelona were numbered, but not really wanting to travel too far, and recognizing that there was more Gaudí work to be seen, I opted to take a look at these houses.





I went first to Casa Battló; its exterior is the one that had appealed most immediately to me. La Pedrera is clearly impressive as well, but Battló´s colors and curves drew me from the first time I saw it, and I´ve only come to think it more beautiful each time I´ve passed it.

The interior was hardly a disappointment. The building was commissioned by the Battló family; it had been a pre-existing structure, and they hired Gaudí to remodel it. Without getting into too many details about the whys and the hows (though I found them really interesting, how he combined form and function so seamlessly), he did just that.



As my audioguide told me, Gaudí was greatly inspired by nature, and the shapes and structures that appear in his architecture are ones that he discovered in the natural world. The colors, curves, arches, warped wood and glass that make up Casa Battló are inspired by the sea, and even on the rooftop, that motif remained consistent. Every inch was crafted with aesthetic and utilitarian purpose - it´s not just Modernist wank.



La Pedrera is a larger structure. The rooms of the apartment they let us see were not, to me, quite as interesting or impressive, but they were full of furniture from the period, which was really cool to see. The building - the indoor patios, the curved staircases, the balconies, everything - was really beautiful, don´t get me wrong. But it was working with more of an earth theme, as its name suggests, and I´ve always had more of an aesthetic and personal affinity for all things marine.



In the attic, though, there was not only some truly impressive architecture, but a ton of information on Gaudí´s work, with audiovisual aids, scale models, and a bunch of neat stuff. It was fascinating to learn more about the artist, where he got his ideas from, and examples of how his work not only carries its weight in artistic merit, but how he revolutionized architecture with methods that employed efficiency, ecological friendliness, and really, just ingenious thinking.



Also, we got to go on the roof - which had the craziest views!



So what about Gaudí? I don´t know - he was the descendant of coppersmiths, and he learned his trade from them. In architectural school, one of his professors said they were giving a degree either to a genius or a lunatic (probably a bit of both, if other geniuses are any indication). He had this amazing, creative eye and vision that melded nature and modernity in gorgeous and original ways.

All of this is bunk though - this whole post, really. How can I articulate how seeing all this affected me? How can I communicate, without sounding like a pretentious twit, the feelings that being inside these structures, seeing the work in front of me, inspired? Can I admit I was a little awestruck at points? I mean, I just did, but I was. It´s a small miracle to me that one person could have such vision; could be artist and technician, architect and visionary.

I'm a little dreamy, a bit of a romantic, especially when it comes to the arts. I've never been a visual artist - I used to sketch and doodle when I was a kid, but getting better took work - hard work. Writing evolved much more naturally for me - I did it all the time, so practicing didn't feel like practicing, it just felt like doing something I enjoyed (for the most part). This is not to compare my writing to Gaudí's genius - not even a little. If I could manage a pinprick of Gaudí's creative power, his uniqueness of vision, the unbearable beauty of his talent, I'd still be way ahead. But seeing his work made me want to make things, made me want to push at the boundaries of my expression; words seem so flat, so simple and plain compared to the polyglot that is visual structure - not even painting, not even sculpture, but an entire building of communication, where every tile, every stone, every length of wood or iron is saying something, is -being- something. Jesus god. Amazing.

Day Trip - Girona y Figueres (or - architecture and Dalí)

You know, I'm not even sure I have a post about Girona and Figueres (Dalí) in me. At first I'd been trying to upload the many, many pictures I took there, but my connection has not been cooperating - I'm really going to have to go to an internet cafe for that (fortunately, I've discovered a bar nearby with sandwiches, tapas, and wifi - oooo, what?!). But even beyond that, I'm not even sure how much there is to write on that experience.

It seems that any attempt I make to capture the feelings evoked by being in Girona - of exploring centuries- (in some cases, millenia-)old architecture, of taking in the views from the tops of towers and walls that I'd breathlessly (and a little fearfully) climbed, of having a glimpse of history as a living thing, of understanding what all the pages of often dry text and the arbitrary dates and lines drawn in the sand, demarcating who goes here and who goes there really amount to - will be inadequate. It a quietly thrilling, thoughtful, and really enjoyable experience. That much, I can say. Aside from that, it seems pointless to try to explain the wonder I felt, or the excitement - yes, excitement. This is maybe a nerdy thing, but I just loved the feeling of the narrowness, the sense of how close together life was then - and continues to be now, in many, but not all, ways - in this area. So there's that. For what it's worth.



Also, in Girona, I made a few new friends in the form of Tracey, Bill, and Ada - a couple and their two-year-old daughter who live in Australia, but are originally from northern England (Tracey) and Ireland (Bill). They were great fun and great company, and somehow we managed to get separated from the tour group in Girona and exploring the town on our own (and following up with some tasty lunch in the town square). Tracey has the most amazing camera eye, and not a few of the shots I took in Girona are owed to her. Also, Ada is pretty much the awesomest two-year-old I've ever met, bar none. Just the other day I was talking with Leez about how people don't need to be taking their damn kids on vacation, because the damn things don't know how to act right. Well, Ada is definitely the exception. Not only quiet and able to function independently quite well, she was funny and charming and fun without being intrusive or desperate for attention. She was a pleasure to spend time with, and by the time we'd all been traveling together for about an hour, she was clinging to my skirt and asking to be picked up. Heh!



As far as Dalí is concerned, I had a pretty good idea that he was a madman before ever having seen a piece of his in person. It hardly seems a rarity to have seen a poster of one or two of his works tattered and battered on the wall of the occasional college dorm or twenty-something apartment, a space usually also occupied by Pink Floyd or the Dead or maybe the Schpongle/Infected Mushroom crowd. Either way, I'd never really had an idea of Dalí's genius prior to this. I knew only that he was a crazy Spanish artist, and that it seemed like a trip worth taking to see his work.


Duuuuuuude, seriously... take a hit and look at this...

Right on all counts, but oh so incomplete.

Again, words fail here. Salvador Dalí was crazy, and Spanish, and an artist, but I'd never realized his genius. There is cleverness and humor all through his art, and he not only identifies connections between food, sex, relationships, violence, love, and death, but he twists them, braids them, juliennes them and then constructs things almost wholly unfamiliar but almost always recognizable. He slides in sly references to class, animals, love and loss. Also, he made puzzles, he was a magician; there are visual tricks all over that museum, and the three hours I had to peruse it were simply not enough. The scale on which he worked ranged from the smallest little seven-inch wide canvas to the entire building in which all his art was housed - the building itself was literally a work of his art, with the same visual puzzles built into it everywhere. I already want to go back.

How to Get Over Homesickness (Monday/Tuesday, 6/29-30)

It’s getting harder to keep track of what I do day to day – part of me really wants to record everything, for a variety of reasons, but part of me just really wants to be unfettered and enjoy these experiences without feeling any responsibility to anyone, even myself.

But of course, I can’t go more than a few days without writing something, and honestly, there’s nothing I want to write more about than Spain; what’s happening here, what this trip is doing to me, the things I’m seeing, et cetera. The problem is that so much happens every day, even when I do nothing at all, that if I lapse a few days (or four, like this week!), I end up having to do so much catch-up, it feels unwieldy.

But again, this is for my benefit. Maybe I’ll try to restructure things and really work this through. I think I may dedicate the rest of my morning to this.

So on Monday, I went on a little trip to recharge my cell (i.e., pay Vodafone some money), and while I was in the area, I took a walk to this spa I’d heard about to set up an appointment for a facial. From there, I was off to L’Arc d’Trionph (honestly, I keep forgetting how to spell this – it’s in Catalán, and I’m too lazy to pick up one of my guidebooks right now).

It was a nice little walk, and as evidenced by my facebook photo album, I took a ton of pictures of the areas I visited. When I got home, though, I was really struck by an awful sense of homesickness and malaise. Doubtless precipitated by my agitation from not having internet over the weekend, even with my restored connectivity, I still felt lost and lonely, and – honestly, I haven’t even fully parsed through it all yet. I don’t like to write during times like those, because generally it ends up being a bunch of maudlin, hyperbolic drama. Nobody needs that, least of all me. Instead, I ended up talking at length to Leez, whose words once again proved invaluable; she just talked sense to me in a way that was both comforting and calming, appealing to my sense of logic in such a way that managed to subdue my heightened emotions.

So, between talking to her and consulting various websites on how to combat homesickness, I was even more determined to carry out my plan for the following day; a facial, the Museu de Picasso, and La Boquería.

The facial was phenomenal; not exclusive to Spain, but I think a lot of times vacation is the time when we give ourselves permission to indulge in luxuries that technically we could have at home, but good sense and pragmatism prevent us from enjoying. Fortunately, good sense and pragmatism only extend so far on this trip (and in Spain, I’m starting to suspect), so I got my damn facial, and I felt like a million dollars afterward.

I walked toward the Picasso museum, and on the way, saw a free art gallery, where I went in and took some more pictures.

I love that these things exist; again, I can’t express how much I love how highly art is regarded in this city, how encouraged it is, how much of it exists. After the gallery, I got myself a damn fine bocadillo de jamon serrano, which is basically like fresh prosciutto except even more delicious, in my estimation (sorry, Italians!), then trotted off to the Picasso museum. The thing was that once I got there, I saw a sign that said the Picasso museum is free on Sundays, so I was all, “eff that, see you Sunday, fools!”

(suckers! hope you didn't like that 9 Euro! LOL)

and started walking to la Boqueria, taking side streets, because I kind of love the way the streets are in Barcelona. Extremely narrow – many it doesn’t seem like you could fit a car through without scraping the side-view mirrors (which explains, in part at least, why there are so many itty bitty teeny weenie Citroens and Peugots all over the place!). The paths are twisty, the buildings tall, and there are balconies everywhere, which gives this really interesting feeling. If the buildings hadn’t had the balconies – if they’d just been very tall buildings with narrow streets between them – it probably would have been quite foreboding, unwelcoming, and sort of inhuman. (And to be honest, there were streets where the narrowness blocked out the light to the point where I did feel a little sketched out – and on the two occasions that happened, I didn’t hesitate to turn my ass around and find some other way to go).

In any case, there are balconies, which make all the difference. The buildings aren’t monolithic structures, inaccessible stone fortresses, or worse, just objects that exist to fill space. The balconies create an unmistakable sense of openness, maybe of curiosity or interest (whether in the occupants of the balcony or the people walking below), and they are implicit reminders of the fact that life and people inhabit every corner of this city – horizontal and vertical. This is only helped by the laundry drying on these balconies everywhere you look. People live here. In other cities, in the city centers, I’ve not had such a strong sense of the people, the residents, in commercial districts, in places where business happens. Not so in Barcelona – I am reminded of the people of Barcelona everywhere I go, and I really love that.

So anyway, the Boquería is lovely, and there’s something I really like about the way food is bought here. Yes, they have supermarkets where you can get all the stuff you need in one clean shot – and that’s convenient sometimes. But that development of modernity does not seem to have adversely affected the popularity of the old-school market in Barcelona – there are markets everywhere, places with a vendor for every taste. A stall for each food category (often more than one):fruit, nuts, meats, veggies, sweets, pastries, tapas, seafood, vegetarian foods, organic foods, cheeses… I could go on.

So you can find these kinds of stalls at any market (mercat), but the biggest and best is off La Rambla, the main drag, La Boquería. I can’t tell you much about La Boquería that hasn’t been written in travel guides over and over again other than to say that it was really cool. I was not overwhelmed with wonder, but at the same time, I was impressed (and tempted!) by the variety and freshness, and charmed by the liveliness of it. I can only seem to make it to market in the hours between 1:00 and 4:00 PM, which is, of course, when half the market’s taking a siesta – but I’m going to try again today and see how I do.

After I went to the Boquería, I walked down La Rambla, and enjoyed the sights. I’d previously (and uncharitably) compared it to Times Square in New York, and that was really a base, inaccurate description, and highly misleading. At the time when I wrote it, I hadn’t yet seen enough of it to make a call – I’d just been aggravated by seen a McDonald’s sign and the proliferation of tourists than crowd the place into a clusterfuck. So in those ways, it is like Times Square – also in the sense that it’s rife with overpriced restaurants and shops full of cheap, tacky, and overpriced souvenirs. But it’s also quite lovely – a tree-lined route in which pedestrians are the priority, though there are car lanes on either side, and jesus, the sun. The sun in Barcelona is so strong, it’s hard for me not to enjoy myself when I’m outside during the day.

So I bought tickets to a tour of Girona, a city about an hour, hour and a half outside of Barcelona, and Figueres – where the Salvador Dalí museum lives. I went to the Corte Ingles, bought pretty much the awesomest cherries ever, as well as a book in English, and wandered around that area a bit before heading home, sweaty, exhausted, and content.

Though less so once I got back and realized my air conditioner was still busted.

Goddamnit. LOLOL!