Understanding the figure (1877-1977)
Curated by Sergio Fuentes Milà
This exhibition is the continuation of an initiative that Sala Parés revived in 2017 on the occasion of its 140th anniversary. It was created to highlight the gallery’s roots and study them through research and exhibition projects to illustrate different episodes in its history and, in general, in the history of Catalan art.
After exhibitions such as “Paris a Parés. À la recherche de la Ville Lumière” (2018), “Salons at Can Parés (1884-1930)” (2019) and “Travellers (1877-1950)” (2021), among others, this year’s extraordinary exhibition is dedicated to the representation of the figure and how creators who moved in different styles and languages understood and represented the human body. The exhibition starts from the founding date of Sala Parés as an art gallery (1877) and unfolds over a hundred years in a journey made up of a selection of works for sale from important private collections and from the gallery’s own holdings.
The figure is the guiding thread of the exhibition, which presents some of the most paradigmatic cases of artists related to the Sala Parés over the course of a century. The group of works illustrates very different lines of expression: from the figure as the result of a careful study of nature, to the free and subjective figure that emerges spontaneously; from its conception based on colour and chiaroscuro, to the use of the rigorous line and academic drawing; from Fortuny-rooted preciosist realism, to the delicacy of symbolist portraiture; from the integration of the figure in the neo-Romantic landscape, to the relevance it occupies in fin-de-siècle anecdotism; from the figures of Parisian bohemianism to the return to Cézannian schemes and Noucentista Mediterraneanism; from the decomposition of the body as a result of avant-garde languages to the rediscovery of realism; or from volumetric forcefulness to the purity and sensuality of the body, as well as other particular visions of the figure, either as the main subject or as a complement and even an excuse.
REVIEWS
Casalé Soler, Ramon – “Un segle representant la figura”, in El Temps de les Arts. 25/01/2023
