The church of the Sagrada Familia by Antonio Gaudí(1852-1926), is undoubtedly one of Barcelona's must-see landmarks. The unfinished masterpiece has become a symbol of this vibrant Spanish city, but we should not neglect his other colourful creations nor his part in the history of Catalonia.
Gaudí worked all his life in and around Barcelona, where he was part of the Renaixença or revival of interest in Catalan identity. The relative peace and commericial success of the second half of the nineteenth century helped to revive a strong sense of Catalan self-confidence which manifested itself in many ways; the Catalan language was re-adopted by the middle and upper classes, new Catalan literature emerged, and politicians demanded the reinstatement of Catalan institutions and legal systems. This renewed vigour was expressed most dynamically in the art of the period. Barcelona became the home of Modernisme, the Catalan answer to Art Nouveau, and Antonio Gaudí emerged as the most famous of the Barcelona Modernistas.
The spirit of the Modernistas' work was to take traditional styles and materials and transform them into a completely new form. Thus, Moorish and Gothic architecture provided the inspiration for much of the work of Gaudí but the forms are taken to the extreme. Gaudí worked at a time where there was money and space for grand schemes and he did some of his most expansive work for the industrialist Güell. Gaudí designed for him the Palacio Güell in Barcelona (1885-9), complete with tile-encrusted chimneys and ventilators. The serpentine seats of the Parque Güell (from 1900) were similarly decorated with multi-coloured tiles.
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