An Intro to Surrealism

Barcelona is home to some of the greatest surrealist artists of all times: Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dalí and Antoni Gaudi. During our trip through the catalan city, we were able to visit major works and museums by all three of them.

Picasso oscillated between homes in Barcelona and Paris during his life--when Franco was in power in Spain, Picasso spoke out against his regime and was exiled to Paris.  Picasso grew up in an artistic family and was a classically trained painter. While his later, more abstract works may be what he is known for, his beginnings were that of a realist painter. He painted landscapes, portraits, anatomic sketches, and scenes of everyday people, fully capturing every emotion. I had never seen this realism in Picasso's works before, so it was incredible to see how gifted and versatile he was as an artist. The Picasso museum in Barcelona is the largest Picasso collection in the world, the majority of which was donated by the artist himself a few years before his death. The museum was set up so that as you walked through it, you went chronologically through his works: from realism to surrealism. One could also note how his time in Paris and how life events effected his works and style.

Two Naked Women, drawn during Picasso's transition from realism to surrealism

Una mujer sentada

Le Piano (Velazquez) 1957

Dad and me on a balcony in the Picasso Museum 

Salvador Dalí lived the majority of his life in the nearby city Figueres, with short stints in Paris as well. As a result, Figueres is home to the largest collection of Dalí originals. I visited the Dalí museum in St. Petersburg, FL when I was a junior in high school and fell in love with his works. My parents had a similar reaction when they went to Figueres. Every piece of Dalí's art is layered with meanings. From up close, many of his early works look like realist paintings, but from afar another image is seen from this collection. Full images make faces, or faces are seen in different areas of the painting. On of his paintings, A Basket of Bread, appears as a simple loaf of bread in a basket, but if you look closely, there are 22 different animal figures that you can make out from the curves and the brushstrokes of the painted bread. It is astounding how he knew what a piece of art would look like from afar, as he was painting the small segments. Many have said that he was decades before his time and was able to do things with his eye that we now rely on computers for (ie pixelation, multiple images, etc).

Dali's final wife and love, Gala, was his muse for most of his works; most of his works either have her in them or are named after her. Dalí was also skilled in painting himself in a painting, either through a reflection or by adding his notable mustache to someone else.

Gala Contemplating the Mediterranean Sea: from afar, the painting appears as a pixelated Lincoln, up close we see that it is Gala staring into the Mediterranean

Dalí's Still Life

The Hallucinogenic Toreador (1970)--note that the bodies of each of the women appear as silhouettes of faces of woman from afar 

The Mae West Room.

Dad in an entryway in the museum

Dalí from the Back Painting Gala from the Back 1972-1973

Dalí painted ceiling: note the Dalí mustache given to Michelangelo (blue shorts on the right) as he is depicted painting the sistine chapel in the painting

Galatea of the Spheres (Galatee aux Spheres) 1952

Melting clock 'The Persistence of Memory' tapestry above Dalí designed bedroom

Dalí himself

The final part of the Dalí museum was a jewel collection. Dalí sketched and designed various jewels and jewelry that were made decades later according to his design. These jewels are on display in a separate exhibition.

Jewelry designed by Dalí: a mouth shape pin with ruby lips and pearl teeth

Unlike the previous two artists, Antoni Gaudi was an architect who used buildings as a medium for his artwork. His most famous work, the Sagrada Familia cathedral, was largely designed and started by him, but has been under construction for over 130 years now, in continuation of his original design. It is intended to be completed by 2026-2030 for the 100th anniversary of the artist's death. At the start of construction, Sagrada Familia was quickly progressing. However, work ceased for ~30 years during WWII and Franco’s reign. The church was funded by donations, so when there were little or no donations, there was also little or no progress. Now there is an entrance fee to enter the sacred cathedral; 80% of funding for construction comes from ticket sales and 20% comes from additional donations.

While some may argue that taking this long to build a church is unheard of, the intricacy of the building definitely explains it. The facade follows the life of Christ: the eastern entrance of the church, where the sun rise, depicts scenes from the nativity, whereas the western backside, where the sun sets, shows scenes from the crucifixion. When the work is finally completed, there will be a total of 18 spires, in ascending heights: 12 dedicated to the apostles, 4 to the evangelists (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John), one for the Virgin Mary, and the tallest dedicated to Christ. At its completion it will be the tallest (St Peter's Basilica at the Vatican will remain the largest though) religious building in the world.

Sagrada Familia

Praising the newborn King under the Star of David

nativity scene on the facade of Sagrada Familia

inside Sagrada Familia

me inside Sagrada Familia

Following our visit to Sagrada Familia, we traveled to Parc Güell, a park designed by Gaudi and originally intended for Barcelona's wealthy citizens. However, the park is located 2.5 miles north of the city center, so was impractical for its time. Like Dalí, Gaudi is also known for being ahed of his time: nowadays the middle-upper class live in the suburbs/outskirts of the city center, so a park located there would have indeed been perfect. However, back in the early 1900s, when cars were not prominent, the upper class wanted to live in the middle of the city, where everything was going one, hence making Parc Güell impractical. The park itself is enormous and completely decorated in Gaudi style mosaic with wavy walls and the famous mosaic dragon at the park's entrance. The park is situated on a hill, so one can climb to the top and see a view of Barcelona, the ocean, and the mountains from above.

Mom and Dad at the Parc Güell entrance

Parc Güell buildings as you enter

Mom and me from a terrace atop parc güell

Sagrada Familia as seen from the top of Parc Güell

Me inside of one of Gaudi's wall designs in the park

Wine Country

Baggage claim at Bordeaux airport

My great-grandfather was born in Bordeaux and spent the first couple years of his life there. As such, my father was very interested in touring this wine-savvy city and visiting his roots. One of the vineyards in Bordeaux is actually called Chateau Phélan-Ségur; unfortunately, we happened to visit Bordeaux for the two days a year when the vineyard in closed. Still, the first thing my Dad did when we arrived in the city, before we even entered our apartment, was buy a bottle of Chateau Phélan.

   

Mom and Dad drinking Chateau Phélan Ségur

Daddy and I in front of the Museum of Customs 

 The apartment we were staying in was spectacular and perfectly located in the center of the old-town. We were right next to the medieval Porte Cailho and only a 5-10 minute walk from the Cathedral St. André and the Grand Opera House. The woman from whom we rented the apartment, Emmanuelle, is a photographer and had our apartment beautifully decorated with her works. Of course, Dad got to tell her all about Bito, mi abuelito, who was a photographer until the age of 89 and who always said “anyone can take a picture, but not anyone can be a photographer.” Emmanuelle had some of her works at an exhibit nearby, so we were also able to stop by that and see more of her photographs. Beautiful.

Porte Cailho  

The afternoon that we arrived, Tuesday, the three of us wandered through the small street of Bordeaux and went in and out of all of the cafés and boutiques that flooded every foot of every street. We went to Cathedral St. André and Dad and I climbed the bell tower so that we could see the city and the church from above.

Cathedrale St Pierre (view from atop bell-tower)

Kids playing in the water plaza, 'the water mirror,' in front of the Palace of Justice

Emmanuelle had recommended one of her favorite local restaurants to us, so for dinner we searched for the small restaurant, eventually finding it squeezed between dozens of other cafes lining a busy Bordeaux side street. It was worth the search. After 2.5 months living in France, this is by far the most authentic and best food I have had. Dad and I both had mussels in a garlic butter sauce to start off and Mom had a mushroom tart drizzled with cream. I have never had so many mussels and each one was perfectly cooked. The first course was so incredible that before we even got to our main plates, we made reservations at the same restaurant for the next night. For the main course Mom had beef that had been slowly soaked in a red-wine broth and then slowly cooked. The meat was so juicy and fell apart on your fork—a knife was unnecessary. Dad had rabbit that was cooked in a rich sauce. Again, the meat was perfectly cooked so that it was tender, but still held its strong flavor. I ordered  lamb cooked in a slow cream stew. Like Mom’s, it was an extremely tender piece of meat that fell apart on your fork. The flavor was absolutely incredible, and probably the best out of the three dishes. And to top the meal off, there was a little old Argentinian guitarist who was singing and playing on our street. The first song he sang was “Bésame mucho,” a song Bito used to sing a lot—it was a great memory of Bito while we were in his father’s birth town. By the end of the main course, we were all stuffed, but how can you say no to dessert at a restaurant like this? I had the profiteroles stuffed with vanilla ice cream and drizzled with chocolate ganache, mom had an almond panna cotta with a berry sauce, and Dad had caramelized apple pie.

Papi y la guitarrista

We started off our second day in Bordeaux with specialty coffee and pastries at a coffee/bookshop charmingly named “Books and Coffee.” We then made our way to the famous Bordeaux Opera House, The Grand Theater. To this day, operas and shows continue to be performed at the theater. When we toured it, the theater was decorated in an Alice in Wonderland theme, complete with a giant rabbit, a collection of mad hatter hats, and shrinking rabbit hole illusions throughout.

Breakfast

Entrance to the opera house

main costume room in the opera house

the theater at the Opera House

theater ceiling

Inside the grand theater

 We had originally hoped to visit Chateau Phélan-Ségur during our visit, but clearly this was not possible given the two days we were visiting. Instead we took a wine tour at another nearby vineyard, Chateau Luchey-Halde. The winery has been around for centuries, but during the Second World War, the French government took it over for military use and it was not returned until the 1990s. As such, it is a much more modern winery than some of the others in the Bordeaux region. We toured the vineyard and learned about the different grape leaves and shapes for each type of grape. Then we moved inside and saw all of the machines and equipment used to make the wines. First the grapes move through a conveyor belt to wean out inadequate grapes (both by machine and by hand), then they are crushed and moved to large metal chambers (each container is sorted by the type of grape) where the juice is subject to varying temperatures and allowed to ferment. When the wine is ready it is moved to oak barrels and left there for one year in order to give the wine a fuller, bolder flavor. At this time it is finally bottled and ready to drink. In order for a bottle to be labeled a ‘Bordeaux’ wine it must follow specifications. All steps of the wine making process must occur at the vineyard (from growing to grapes to bottling the wine), there can be no fertilizer or additional additives to the grapes and soil, grapes must grow from rainwater alone, and all Bordeaux wines must be a mix of different types of grapes/wines (ie a mix of cabernet sauvignon, merlot, etc.)

Chateau Luchey-Halde

Mommy and Daddy at the vineyards

Cabernet Sauvignon grapes

Dad found the cabernet sauvignon grapes!

wine making machine

where wine is tempered and made

barrels that the wine is stored in for a year to get the oaky flavor

wine tasting

Mom and Dad at the wine tasting following the vineyard tour

We spent our last night in Bordeaux walking through the hustling streets and exploring all of the shops. I introduced my parents to the gelateria Amorino—a gelato store that sculpts its gelato in the shape of flowers when they serve you. My friend Rose had told me about before it before I went to Paris and so I had some there and it was delicious and creamy, so I knew my parents had to try it too! We returned to the same restaurant for dinner and had an equally spectacular second night’s meal. It’s safe to say that Bordeaux was not only a culinary masterpiece, but also a comfortable and fun place to wander and touch base with family roots. 

Amorino: gelato carved into a flower

foot of a fountain