JOSEP PUIGDENGOLAS BARELLA (Barcelona, 1906 - 1987).
"Costa Brava".
Oil on canvas.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Size: 33 x 46 cm.
In this work we can appreciate the personal naturalism of Puigdengolas, marked by a totally personal chromatism, which balances the warm tonalities with the cold ones to support the three-dimensional construction of the space, creating at the same time a vivid and luminous atmosphere, which makes the colours vibrate. His is a short brushstroke, agile and controlled at the same time, which takes advantage of the white colour of the preparation to illuminate the darker areas.
Josep Puigdengolas trained at the schools of Arts and Crafts and La Lonja in Barcelona, later completing his studies at El Paular and at the Royal Academy in Florence. He was a disciple of Eliseo Meifrén and Joaquín Mir. In 1951 he was appointed professor of drawing at the Sant Jordi School of Fine Arts. Although he had his studio in Barcelona, he frequently painted in La Cerdanya and Mallorca, specifically in the town of Deià. His work, of a luminous naturalism, derives from the style of Mir, and earned him great public acclaim. He focused his work on landscape, but he also worked on portraits. Throughout his career he held several solo exhibitions, such as the one organised at the Salón Cano in Madrid in 1962, and took part in group exhibitions and competitions such as the National Exhibition of Fine Arts. A few months before his death, in January 1987, he held his last exhibition at the Sala Parés in Barcelona. He is currently represented at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía and the MACBA in Barcelona, among others.
In this panel Josep Puigdengolas offers us a corner of the town of Port de la Selva, in the Alt Empordà region. In the foreground is a coastal image of fishing boats, with the town in the background. Puigdengolas recreates it, paying special attention to the play of light and shade and the myriad of tonalities that derive from it. Also worthy of note is the atmospheric study, which speaks of a warm, dry day, a solitary atmosphere in which the beauty inherent in the everyday, the landscape, apparently nondescript but charged with lyricism in the artist's eyes, is revealed.