The sinuous forms and lavish decorations of Antonio Gaudí (1852-1926) broke the mold in architecture. "His imagination burnt holes through the musty pattern books," writes Gijs van Hensbergen. "His gift was an amazing capacity to imagine a building and then transform it into reality." Gaudí's fantastical creations give Barcelona an appearance unlike any other city in the world. One of the paradoxes that informs his many-layered biography is that this most original of architects was politically conservative and profoundly Catholic, fired by the desire to celebrate the history and culture of his native Catalonia. Hensbergen, author of books on art deco and travel in Spain, devotes a good deal of his book to situating Gaudí's life and thought within the context of Catalonian traditions, particularly the 19th-century Renaixença, which sought to revive the region's language (Catalan) and to affirm its national identity against the Spanish government's desire to absorb it. He surrounds Gaudí, too often depicted as an isolated eccentric, with the friends and patrons who shared his vision, illuminating the architect's impact both within Catalonia and beyond its borders. (Admirers included the surrealists, whose atheism and radicalism were anathema to Gaudí.) Detailed knowledge of Gaudí's leisurely, wickedly expensive working methods and the complex use he made of previous architectural traditions gives us a better understanding of the unique nature of his genius, while Hensbergen's obvious (though not uncritical) affection for his subject as a man helps us appreciate "an extraordinarily creative and religiously charged life." --Wendy Smith
From Publishers Weekly
Gaudi (1852-1926) is the Catalan architect most renowned for his Sagrada Familia cathedral and Park Guell in Barcelona; both feature dripping organic forms that fascinate some viewers and repel others. Van Hensbergen (A Taste of Castille), a U.K.-based lecturer on architecture, was able to do his research in Catalan, an inestimable advantage for any writer on Gaudi. In 16 lucid chapters, Gaudi's life and work are examined, from his ardent Catholicism and patriotism to his celibacy, which resulted from a disappointment in love. The chapter titles reflect the architect's own high-flown ambitions, but the writing doesn't contain the flatulent prose sometimes produced by fans of builders and buildings. Gaudi's often combative dealings with civic authorities are recounted clearly, up to his death in a street accident involving a tram, and are reconstructed as thoroughly as possible, yet not elaborated on or fabricated, as many another biographer might have tried to do. The author's virtues of balance and good taste are evident everywhere in this book, making it a powerfully creditable testament to the permanent value of Gaudi's contributions. Work on Gaudi is scarce in English, so this is truly a landmark effort. The book will fascinate anyone interested in modern architecture and urbanism, Spanish art or the relationships between art, religion and social improvement. Color and b&w illus. not seen by PW. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Van Hensbergen (A Taste of Castille) states that this is the first English-language biography of the Spanish architect Antonio Gaudi (1852-1926). While this claim may depend on the exact definition of biography, it is certainly true that most existing literature examines the man's architectural achievements rather than his life story. Gaudi was an intensely private person, and all of his personal and working archives were destroyed at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. Still, van Hensbergen does piece together a detailed yet readable story of the man, his achievements, and his close relationship to Barcelona and Catalonia. What results is not a coffee-table display of Gaudi's work but a scholarly treatment of an important architect. Recommended for large art and architecture collections. Jay Schafer, Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Antonio Gaudi (1852-1926), certainly one of the best-known, if not the best-known, of Spain's architects, is virtually synonymous with Barcelona. Long after his death, his playful style remains influential throughout the world, and his work continues to be built, for the Sagrada Familia, Barcelona's great cathedral, isn't scheduled to be finished until 150 years from now. Van Hensbergen's vivid and engaging biography, the first in English in many years, presents the eccentric Gaudi as thoroughly as the fact that most of his papers were destroyed at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War allows. Gaudi's origins were humble, and even as a boy he was obsessed with buildings, in particular the ruined monastery near his home. Van Hensbergen also explores Gaudi's reputation for dandyism, from the architect's student years and early commissions on. Eventually, Gaudi embraced celibacy, asceticism, and a pious, eremitical life, dwelling in the basement of the Sagrada Familia, his greatest triumph. Michael Spinella
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Chicago Tribune
Van Hensbergen … has produced a soaring biography of his subject, meticulously researched, elegantly organized, fluidly, lucidly written.
Camden Courier-Post
“Elegantly written, handsomely illustrated GAUDI … [is] a memorable account of an original life.”
New York Times
“A terrifically stirring biography …Mr. van Hensebergen animates ideas with narrative drive. Buildings are his characters.”
Commonweal
“A significant contribution to the understanding of the great Catalan architect.”
Publishers Weekly
The author's virtues of balance and good taste are evident everywhere in this book…truly a landmark effort.
Booklist Review
Vivid and engaging
Book Description
At the time of his death in 1926, Antonio Gaudi was arguably the most famous architect in the world. He had created some of the greatest and most controversial masterpieces of modern architecture, which were as exotic as they were outrageous. For many, Gaudi's unique architecture is Barcelona. But little is known about the shadowy figure behind the swirling, vivid buildings that inspired the surrealists. A fervent Catholic with an unstinting love for Catalonia, his homeland, an innovator who was profoundly orthodox, and a hermit who chose lifelong celibacy, having been rejected by the woman he loved, Gaudi was both brilliant and eccentric. He was very much the product of his time and place, and this masterful biography brings both man and architect powerfully to life against the changing backdrop of Barcelona and Catalonia.
Gijs van Hensbergen leads us through the design and construction of Gaudi's most significant buildings, revealing their innovation and complexity and demonstrating the growing relevance of Gaudi's architecture today. The author captures not only the power and importance of Gaudi's work but the unique spirit of Catalan culture as well.
This supreme artist lived by extravagant gestures and a creativity that bordered on madness. Even his legendary death under a tram as he stepped back to admire his cathedral in Barcelona has the hint of absurdity and poetry. In this first critical biography of one of Spain's most celebrated artists and the twentieth century's greatest architect, Gijs van Hensbergen makes a compelling argument for Gaudi's stature as icon of artistic integrity and genius.
About the Author
Gijs Van Hensbergen lectures in architecture and is the author of Art Deco and of the highly acclaimed travel book A Taste of Castille. He lives in Dorset, England.
Gaudi: A Biography FROM OUR EDITORS
His extraordinary, surreal architecture has made Barcelona a pilgrimage site for those eager to behold such creations as the massive, unfinished Sagrada Familia cathedral. In the years since his death in 1926, Antoni Gaudí's works have been easier to understand than his life, due to the tragic destruction of his papers during the Spanish Civil War. Now, biographer Gijs Van Hensbergen has completed the first exhaustive chronicle of the eccentric architect's life, revealing the details of his childhood, education, and career.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
At the time of his death in 1926, Antonio Gaudí was arguably the most famous architect in the world. He had created some of the greatest and most controversial masterpieces of modern architecture that were as exotic as they were outrageous. But little is known about the shadowy figure behind the swirling, vivid buildings that inspired the Surrealists. A fervent Catholic with an unstinting love for Catalonia, his homeland, an innovator who was profoundly orthodox, and a hermit who chose lifelong celebacy, having been rejected by the woman he loved, Gaudí was both brilliant and eccentric.
This illustrated biography captures the power and importance of Gaudí's work and the unique spirit of Catalan culture.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Gaudi (1852-1926) is the Catalan architect most renowned for his Sagrada Familia cathedral and Park Guell in Barcelona; both feature dripping organic forms that fascinate some viewers and repel others. Van Hensbergen (A Taste of Castille), a U.K.-based lecturer on architecture, was able to do his research in Catalan, an inestimable advantage for any writer on Gaudi. In 16 lucid chapters, Gaudi's life and work are examined, from his ardent Catholicism and patriotism to his celibacy, which resulted from a disappointment in love. The chapter titles reflect the architect's own high-flown ambitions, but the writing doesn't contain the flatulent prose sometimes produced by fans of builders and buildings. Gaudi's often combative dealings with civic authorities are recounted clearly, up to his death in a street accident involving a tram, and are reconstructed as thoroughly as possible, yet not elaborated on or fabricated, as many another biographer might have tried to do. The author's virtues of balance and good taste are evident everywhere in this book, making it a powerfully creditable testament to the permanent value of Gaudi's contributions. Work on Gaudi is scarce in English, so this is truly a landmark effort. The book will fascinate anyone interested in modern architecture and urbanism, Spanish art or the relationships between art, religion and social improvement. Color and b&w illus. not seen by PW. (Nov.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
The first English-language biography of the great modern architect. Antoni Gaudi (1852-1926) is often called "mysterious," "enigmatic," and "elusive," right after he's called "eccentric," "saintly," and "mad." The aura of hushed confusion arises partly from the idiosyncrasies of his style, partly from the mystique of modernist artists, but most prosaically from the dearth of information available on the man. Shortly after his death, Gaudi's complete personal and professional archives became early casualties of the Spanish Civil War, a loss made particularly glaring by the fact that he seldom left his home city. The known facts-his birth, his childhood apprenticeship in his father's smithy, his education at the Escola Superior d'Arquitectura in Barcelona, his exposure to Gothic revivalism and socially minded aesthetics, his early success, his intense religious devotion later in life, and the astonishing sequence of buildings that emerged from his studio-all are set forth here with as much empathetic insight and contextual richness as the author's thorough scholarship, critical passion, and grasp of Catalan sensibility can supply. Unfortunately, the result is only half as valuable as it should be. Struggling to penetrate the myth of Gaudi, van Hensbergen evokes specific people, places, and buildings with quick, confident strokes, but writes in the disjointed, gnomic style of one so immersed in his subject that he has lost all sense of his audience. Despite stretches of coherent discussion, the absence of narrative and expository consistency make the text hard to follow. Thus it plunges into a detailed discussion of the process by which Gaudi, at only 31, took on his life's work, thedirectorship of the Cathedral de Sagrada Familia, without mentioning that the project had to be financed entirely by fundraising, a stipulation that would go far to explain the building's lifelong hold over the architect, whose socialistic sympathies gradually metamorphosed into Catholic piety. Readers, then, should be reasonably well-acquainted with Gaudi's career before sampling this substantial but lumpy stew.
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