The exhibition hosted by the Vila Casas Foundation presents the productive dialogue between two of the greatest exponents of Catalan abstraction of the second half of the 20th century. The painters Joan Claret and Joan Vilacasas, both members of the celebrated artistic group Zero Figura (1960–1963) along with Tharrats, Hernández Pijuan, and art critic Santos Torroella, were exhibited in the revolutionary Sala Gaspar throughout the sixties. The activities of these artists consolidated the abstract currents in our country while bringing innovative ideas that were extremely important for artistic freedom and the international dissemination of Catalan art in the midst of the dictatorship.
Each has a recognizable and particular, indivisible, and very distinctive body of work, and yet, there are evident parallels between Vilacasas's Planimetrías and Claret's kinetic art.
The connections between these artists and friends sparked the interest of German collectors Brigitte and Hans Robert Thomas, who followed them for over fifty years and, during this time, amassed more than 200 works that their heirs have now donated to the Foundation. It has, therefore, been the express wish of the couple's children that the works of the Catalan painters return to Catalonia.
The work of Vilacasas and Claret is a sample of the renovating spirit that was experienced in all areas throughout that decade, and especially in CataloniaThe relationship between the married couple and the two artists began back in the sixties, when the couple spent their summers on the Catalan coast, specifically in Begur, where they built a house. The prolific Sala Gaspar and the aesthetic affinity with the painters led to a long and deep friendship that remained unaltered throughout his life.
The work of Vilacasas and Claret is an example of the renovating spirit that was experienced in all areas, social and artistic, throughout that decade, and especially in Catalonia, where a predominantly dissenting and vindicative current appeared, very close to identity and language. The German couple admired the progressivism of Catalan art and this very particular singularity.
Brigitte Hueck (1929-2009) and Hans Robert Thomas (1924-2019) were born in Lüdenscheid (Germany), and married in 1951 after studying singing together. They moved to Weiden and began their career in the art world. They met Tàpies, Vilacasas and Claret in Barcelona and always understood art as a fundamental part of their lives. They wanted to export this deep feeling, along with the recognition of a unique and Catalan talent, to Germany, so that their fellow citizens could know and appreciate it, given the difficulties for the international dissemination of Spanish artists under those political conditions. Hans was a member of the Municipal Culture Commission of Weiden and organized three essential exhibitions: Claret (1988), Vilacasas (1988) and Tàpies (1992).
The aforementioned Sala Gaspar in Barcelona was a turning point when it came to talking about artistic agitation. It began its adventure in 1909 at the hands of its founder, gallerist and indispensable figure in the history of Barcelona art, Joan Gaspar (1940-2020), and reached its full avant-garde era with Picasso exhibitions in the seventies, supporting countless initiatives and artists who regenerated the country's artistic fabric in a very notable way.
The Zero Figura group was a group of artists formed by Claret, Hernández Pijuan, Tharrats and Vilacasas who acted and exhibited in the Sala Gaspar. Hand in hand with art critic Rafael Santos Torroella, they worked on a line of conceptual reflection that resulted in four exhibition catalogs and three monographs on Vilacasas, Tharrats and Subirachs.
This is the largest donation the Vila Casas Foundation has received in its history, with 177 pieces by Joan Claret and 81 pieces by Joan VilacasasThe group's name comes from the technical nomenclature of canvas stretchers and their dimensions: 0 figure—18 cm x 14 cm; and it is a clear reference to abstract painting and the absence of forms and references; no figure.
From the group, the exhibitions Informal Homage to Velázquez (1960), The Object (1961), The Mural (1962) and Grafismos (1963) stand out; always working together until the dissolution of the group in 1963, and in the unmovable line of informalism.
Joan Claret (Barcelona, 1929-2014), first studied architecture and then philosophy at the Sorbonne (Paris). Encouraged by his painter friend Joan Vilacasas, in 1959, he changed figuration for informalism and geometric painting, focused on the exhaustive work of space. He exhibited that same year at Sala Gaspar and in 1962 won the Joan Miró prize and participated in the Modern Spanish Painting, Seven Catalonian Artists, a traveling exhibition in American museums between 1964 and 1965. He was part of the aforementioned Zero Figura group and the Vila Casas Foundation already held a retrospective of his work in 2013 under the name Under the Appearance.
Claret worked constructivism with a marked lyrical accent. He used a subtle play of rhythms and curves, straight lines in plane and bands of nuances and color. His influences were Klee, Mondrian and Kandinsky, and he exhibited in Japan, England, the United States, France and Germany.
Joan Vilacasas (Sabadell, 1920-Barcelona, 2007) was a multidisciplinary artist and collector of kitsch art. His stay in Paris in 1949 changed his way of understanding art. He abandoned figurative art and delved into his characteristic planimetries and informalist abstraction. His projection was international with exhibitions at the Venice Biennials (1960), Sao Paulo (1961) and Alexandria (1964). in 1957, guided by the critic Michel Tapié, he exhibited alongside names such as De Kooning, Pollock, Tobey, Tàpies, Saura and Burri in Art Autre.
His paintings look like aerial views and plans of cities and artificial installations. Rhythmic, parallel and perpendicular lines, painted on any support. From these works derive the Astrometrías and the Siurells Extraterrestres.
As a writer, Vilacasas wrote novels, short stories, plays, and comedies (for Mercè Bruquetes, Montserrat Carulla, and Joan Capri), as well as television and radio scripts. His themes focused on the world of art he had known in Paris and moved between fiction and non-fiction, with a critical and corrosive edge. Notable works include Escritos (1954), Doble Blanco (1960), Materia Definitiva (1961), Operación Viaducto (1962), Cartas a Un Pintor (1964), and Nnoba Fygurassió (1965). In the words of Joan Oliver: "He is not a painter who starts to be a writer, nor a painter who has lost faith in his art. He follows the path that Apel.les Mestres and Rusiñol had taken before."
The exhibition, located at the Can Framis Museum of Contemporary Painting, can be visited until January 14 and has been curated by Bernat Puigdollers and his predecessor, Àlex Susanna, both responsible for sealing the agreement with Brigitte and Hans's relatives.
Unfortunately, this donation, the largest the Foundation has received in its history (177 pieces by Joan Claret and 81 pieces by Joan Vilacasas), could not be enjoyed by the patron and founder of the Foundation, Antoni Vila Casas, who passed away on September 14 of this year.