Josep Clarà

JOSEP CLARÀ I AYATS (Olot, Girona, 1878 - Barcelona, 1958).
"Cap d'Adela", ca. 1934-1935.
Bronze sculpture.
Signed.
The MNAC conserves three versions of this work, one of them also in bronze (inv. no. MNAC/MC 99806 - MCGO 7246).
Reference bibliography: M. Doñate et al., "Clarà. Catàleg del fons d'escultura", Barcelona, MNAC, 1997, p. 200, cat. no. 295 to 297.
Measurements: 27 cm (bronze height); 31 x 13.5 x 15.5 cm (with base).

With this work, Josep Clarà took the postulates of Noucentisme to his personal terrain, achieving a timeless and modern image at the same time. The young woman, with a serious and concentrated face, preserves an invisible veil of mystery. Noucentisme, an ideological-aesthetic movement that arose in Catalonia at the beginning of the 20th century as a reaction to "fin de siècle" modernism, opposed the eighteenth-century mentality with a desire for rigor and a classicism that looked to the past for its models to imitate. Thus, its essential values will be order, clarity and moderation. Contrary to the naturalism, psychologism and sentimentalism of the 19th century, he sought the lucid creation of a Mediterranean spirit, as opposed to fin-de-siècle decadentism. Clará brought to its peak the materialization of the longed-for Mediterranean typology.

Josep Clarà began his training at the School of Drawing in Olot, and then continued at the School of Fine Arts in Toulouse, France. He went to Paris in 1890 and met Auguste Rodin, whose influence decided him to devote himself to sculpture. As a draftsman, his sketches stand out. He completed his training with trips to London and Italy, and then returned to Paris as an established sculptor. In 1932 he returned definitively to Barcelona. Among the awards he received are the gold medals of the Brussels (1910) and Amsterdam (1912) Exhibitions, the first medal of the National Fine Arts of Madrid in 1910, the medal of honor of the International of Barcelona in 1929, the Grand Prize of the II Bienal Hispanoamericana de La Habana in 1954, in 1956 the silver medal of the Diputación Provincial de Barcelona and gold of the Artistic Circle of the city, and in 1958 the award of the Juan March Foundation. His work is largely preserved in the Museo Comarcal de la Garrotxa in Olot and in the Museo Nacional de Arte de Cataluña, but he is also represented in the museum of the Abbey of Montserrat.