Guide to Barcelona

Famous catalans - Marcel Martí

07.09.2010 12:36

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Marcel Martí was a noted catalan sculptor and artist. Despite his forays into geometric abstraction and its contacts with the neoconstructivismo in his early work, Marcel Martí is considered a sculptor linked to the informality of his expressionist works.

In his works he is a palpable influence of the great sculptors of our time (Moore, Zadkine, Julio González). In his sculptures he uses different materials: iron, bronze, limestone, marble, clay, wood, or steel cut polymethylmethacrylate. His most characteristic works are organic sculptures reminiscent in some ways the Catalan Modernism. They combine elements of concave and convex lines ever more simple and pure, evident the importance of volume and the pursuit of perfection in the bill.

He was born on March 8, 1897 Argentina to Catalan parents. In 1928 he returned to Barcelona. Marcel started drawing at age 17, and soon gave up college to devote himself to painting. Seeing his first drawings, the painter Pere Prat Ubach offered to give private lessons. In 1946 his father decided to give him a studio attached to the family business.

In 1948 Marcel Martí held his first exhibition in Barcelona in the Sala Caralt which was a wild success and enabled him to travel to Paris, where he joined the city's artistic circles. In the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere he recieved lessons from Ossip Zadkine, André Lhote and Paul Bornet.

In 1950 he traveled to Sweden and Italy, where he was impressed by the work of Michelangelo. Three years later he participated in the group exhibition "Contemporary Art", in Chile, and the Municipal Exhibition of Fine Arts in Barcelona. Alver dedicated himself mostly to sculpture from this point on.

He participated in the II Bienal Hispano and VIII Salón de Barcelona in October 1955. After a figurative period, from 1958 he moved towards abstraction.

That year he received the Manolo Hugué prize for sculpture , and was selected for the National Exhibition of Fine Arts in Barcelona. He participated in the informal tribute to Velazquez "at the Sala Gaspar de Barcelona with Canogar, Millares, Corberó, Ferrant, Narotzky, Planell, Rafols-Casamada, Saura, Sempere, Subirachs and Vilacasas.

In 1959 he presented his first exhibition of sculptures in the Barcelona Syra gallery. From that time he changed his style, exploring natural and symbolic forms.

In 1961 his sculpture is installed in a garden of Montbau, Barcelona; other selected artists in the same initiative are Subirachs, and Eudald Serra Angel Ferrant. This piece is his first monumental work. Participates in group "O figure" and "Object" in the Sala Gaspar de Barcelona.

The following year he opened the exhibition at Galerie Escoda Grifé and Barcelona. Participated in a group at the Marlborough Gallery in London and International Sala of Contemporary Art in the same city. Two years later he performed solo exhibitions at the Friendship Circle in Cordoba, in the Sala del Prado in Madrid and in Barcelona Galería René Metras. He was also invited to the "Week of Spain" in Rabat, the "Exhibition of Spanish Art" in Mexico, "Contemporary Spanish Art" in Helsinki, "22 Spanish Artists" in Fez and the XXXII Venice Biennale.

In 1966 he took part in the Exhibition of Contemporary Sculpture at the Rodin Museum in Paris and at the Art Centre in Milan. A year later, a solo exhibition at the Gallery Lorenzelli of Bergamo.

In 1968 he took part in a large number of group exhibitions at the Museum of Cuenca, in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, in the School of Architecture of Barcelona, in the First Exhibition of Contemporary Sculpture in Barcelona, at the Kunsthalle, Nuremberg and the Kunstmuseum Boijmans Rotterdam. He also made a monumental sculpture in Miami celebrating the discovery of America. The following year he was invited to participate in the Biennale of Antwerp.

In 1970 he married Gena, taking up residence at La Sala, a small town in the heart of Emporda. He made a presentation at the castle-palace of La Bisbal. After a few years moved to Corçà.

He was selected for "Art 73", a retrospective exhibition of Spanish artists in the March Foundation in Madrid. Part in the "Provincial II Mostra d'Art" held at the Fontana d'Or in Girona and in a collective Baracaldo. In 1974 a large sculpture for the Mediterranean Motorway, between Girona and Barcelona was inaugurated. Also that year Marcel Martí collaborated in the International Exposition of Sculpture in the Street of Santa Cruz de Tenerife.

Participated in "One Man Show" on the Basel Art Fair in 1977 with Rene Metras Gallery. He also collaborates with the International Museum of the Resistance Salvador Allende, a traveling exhibition that arrives in Spain through the Miró Foundation in Barcelona and Madrid Galería Juana Mordó. That year his daughter was born Elisenda.

In 1979 he made a monumental sculpture for the Observatory of Calar Alto in Almeria. Participate in "L'amnesty a l'Uruguai", held at the Miro Foundation in Barcelona. Peratallada decided to move to where he lives and has his studio.

In 1982 participates in "One Man Show" at Gallery 3 i 5 of Girona in the first edition of ARCO. On the occasion of the World Cup organized in Spain that same year, the exhibition "Dotze Escultors", of which Martí was a part; and also come into play in "Arts Plastiques 50-80" of Expocultura in Barcelona, and the "I Mostra d'Contemporary Sculpture "in Girona.

Individual exhibition at Galería Cadaqués, in 1984. The Gallery Series "organized in Barcelona Disseny 1985" Els Tallers "where participates with Corberó Xavier, Joan Mora, and Emilia Subirachs Xargay. It also participates in "i Escultors Pintors Segona Avantguarda Catalans of" organized within the framework of the commemoration of "Catalunya anys 1000." This show travels to Strasbourg, Vienna, Osaka, Tokyo and New York.

During the eighties he made several monumental sculptures: in the Plaza Salvador Allende in Barcelona (1984), "Homage to Miró Laureano" in Esplugues de Llobregat (1985) and "Monument to the Sardana" in the La Bisbal d'Emporda. In 1989, he produced a work for Rambla Xavier Cugat in Gerona, one for the N-II between Gerona and Figueras, and another to mark the Millennium of Catalonia, in Vic.

In 1991 Marcel Martí made two large sculptures, one for Codorniu, Napa Valley, California and another for the Motorways of the Garraf, Barcelona. Participate in "Catalan Painters and Sculptors the Second Vanguard" in Napa Valley, in "Journées Catalan Tunisie, Tunisia, in the Art Fund of the Government and" Les Avant-Gardes of Sculpture: The Catalogne " at the Espace Culturel du Pin Galant, in Mérinhac, France.

During the Universal Exhibition in Seville, held an exhibition of his work in the Pavilion of Catalonia.

On August 11, 2010, Marcel Martí died in the town of Peratallada at the age of 85.

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