Autumn in Barcelona – Art Museum & The Arenas

We have come to the final day of the Smart Cities Expo World Congress 2015, I caught up with my colleagues from Spain who gave me great advice on where to go and what to do in my three days two nights visit to Madrid.  They encouraged me to get out of Madrid and take a day trip to Toledo as I will likely feel bored spending three days in Madrid and that Toledo is a place not to be missed. I left the Expo and headed to my first stop –  Museu Nacional D’Art de Catalunya – National Art Museum of Catalunya.

Museu Nacional D’Art de Catalunya

Finally, I got to step inside the Museum to have a view of the interior of this architecture and art pieces.

As I walked to the Cupula Room, the space beneath the Dome, I saw the mural by Joan Miro and the sculptor, Joan Gardy Artigas, son of Josep Llorens Artigas. In 1978, IBM commissioned Joan Miro and Joan Gardy Artigas with this mural for its headquarters in Barcelona.

Joan Miro first met the Josep Llorens Artigas in the 1910s at the Barcelona art school of the painter Francesc Galf (1880-1965). From the 1940s onwards, Miro and Llorens Artigas began working as an artistic duo, producing objects and large ceramic murals.

As I walked around the Museum, I saw young aspiring artists at work.

I continued my way to view the vast collections of art pieces. Sharing photos of the few art pieces that captivated me.

As I explored the Museum, I walked into the section where I found the creation by Antoni Gaudi and Josep Maria Jujol, Gaudi’s pupil, who worked with Gaudi from about 1906. Josep Maria Jujol was the only person capable of preserving the master’s tension in his work, using an approach that eventually converged with the techniques of the avant-gardes.

 

More pictures of the view from the Museum.

The Arenas

After the museum, I walked to The Arenas. The Arenas was built between 1889 and 1900 as the Plaça de Toros de les Arenes, the bullring of Barcelona. It was designed by the Catalan architect August Font i Carreras in a Moorish style with a monumental horseshoe-shaped entrance decorated with colourful tiles. Now it is a shopping mall, filled with shops, restaurants, and cinema.

 

From the Museum, I made my way to Passeig de Gracia to try my luck at Casa Batllo, Gaudi’s mystical masterpiece. Will share more on my visit in my next post, stay tuned!

This trip was made in November 2015.

 

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