The Visualization of a Nation: Tàpies and Catalonia

On March 23, 1981 Jordi Pujol gave a speech regarding the exhibition Catalunya Avui. The President of the Generalitat proudly expressed the artistic wealth of Catalonia, reminding the audience that when they hear of Tàpies, Miró, Dalí, and even Picasso they ought to remember their Catalan heritage. For Pujol in the 1980s, Tàpies had already made his mark as an important figure within el poblé Català. In 2014, after a referendum regarding Catalan independence, Artur Mas spoke to the press about the event. He was photographed in a room with Tàpies’s enormous painting Les quatre cròniques (1990) looming in the background. In a political climate dramatically different from when the painting was created, the image took on new meanings. This investigation analyzes Tàpies’s style, the institutional support that he received, the historical context of his artistic exhibitions, and the bilateral relationship between politics and art.