JOAN BUSQUETS I JANÉ (Barcelona, 1874 - 1949).
Pair of modernist bedside tables, ca. 1900.
Light walnut wood with carved and gilded decorations. Marble top and metal handles.
Measurements: 127 x 45 x 41 cm.
Pair of modernist coffee tables designed by Joan Busquets, whose organicist structure contains a lower compartment closed with a folding door, followed by an intermediate openwork hollow and a final upper surface under which there is a narrow drawer. The upper part consists of a reddish marble top, with veins in different shades, on which rests a high backrest with a small shelf supported by two small corbels. It stands on low feet, the fronts of which have a typically Art Nouveau cut-out and sinuous profile. These front feet are decorated with gilt vegetal motifs. Both the door and the drawer and back of the side tables are decorated with stems and mouldings of marked eloquence, typical of Joan Busquets' cabinetmaking, which converge in rosettes, coup de fouet and other floral motifs, carved in high relief, which stand out for their volume and quality.
A furniture designer and decorator, Joan Busquets is now considered one of the most representative figures of Catalan Modernisme. He began his training in the family workshop and went on to study at the Llotja School in Barcelona, where his teachers were Guitart and Lostaló. In the academic year 1895-96 he was awarded a scholarship which enabled him to travel around Spain, and which he obtained thanks to a project for a Renaissance-style bookcase-cabinet. He exhibited furniture projects for the first time at the Barcelona Exhibition of 1896. Joan Busquets' workshop was one of the most outstanding in Modernista Catalonia and is today, together with the production of Gaspar Homar, the most representative example of Catalan Modernista furniture and decoration. He was president of the Foment de les Arts Decoratives between 1918 and 1921, and supervised the manufacture of the furniture for Gaudí's Casa Calvet. Works by Busquets can currently be found in the National Art Museum of Catalonia, the Güell Palace in Barcelona, the National Museum of Decorative Arts and the Museum of Catalan Modernism in Barcelona, among others, as well as in various important private collections.