Discussió:Sant Víctor de Saurí

Sources

Chang, Katie. “Una Iglesia En Cataluña Se Vuelve Un Lugar de Peregrinaje Artístico (Published 2017).” The New York Times, November 6, 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/es/2017/11/06/espanol/cataluna-iglesia-sant-victor-santi-moix.html.

“Intervenció Artística de Santi Moix a l’església Seurí.” Intervenció artística de Santi Moix a l’Església Seurí. Accessed February 25, 2024. https://esglesiaseuri.cat/.

The Antioch Review, Vol. 74, No. 2, The Future of Museums: Challenges and Solutions (Spring 2016), pp. 249-270 (22 pages)

Maxpeiron (disc.) 03:37, 15 feb 2024 (CET)

Outline for edits to the article

Santi Moix and the story of the Fresco

By the time Moix worked on the Fresco inside the church he had made a name for himself exhibiting his art at the Brooklyn Museum and Milan's M77 Gallery, as well as a commission in Prada's SoHo store.

Moix resided in Barcelona, Spain growing up and often made trips to Sauri, a remote Catalan Village in the Pyrennees with a population of about two dozen people. In 2012 the local government and bishop asked if he would be interested in painting the interior of St. Victor. He agreed to do so but only under the condition that he was granted free artistic reign from conceptual obligations to the church or state, stating "I was clear that I would not paint Saints or Martyrs."

Moix would spend three years, sometimes working 15 hour days with handmade boar bristle brushes and organic pigments diluted with water to complete this work. His project consisted of three phases. The first one took place between September 14th and October 7th of 2015, where he painted the first layer of all the interior walls of the church. In the second phase, the painter and his team finished the intervention on remaining walls and the ceiling of the church. Lastly, the third phases involved the creation of the central piece of the project: a large porcelain flower that is located in the center of the apse and presides over the altar. This flower was constructed in the workshop of master ceramist Joan Raventos with the help of artisans David Rossell and Anna Balleste and consists of modeling and firing 56 sheets of translucent porcelain on which Moix applies different watered layers of color. With this feature Moix continues upon a tradition of his work, as he claims ceramics to be a central artistic discipline of his.

Themes and breakdown of the art

The Fresco was his largest piece to date, spanning 1,200 square feet which he describes as a garden full of fantasy. A big focus of the work which immediately jumps out to any viewer is the choice of color. As Moix says "churches used to strike fear with images of demons and fire," but he "loved the idea of overwhelming with color instead," defining his position in a movement that sees contemporary artists remaking religious spaces. Set in a mountainous area surrounded by vast nature, Moix wanted to make sure that the church was able to capture the colors of the environment. Another spotlight for Moix is being able to convey the relationship between the people of the area and nature. There are references to living being, animals and plants, alongside depictions of the working tools of the village farmers, creating, in a way, a portrait of the people who live in the valley. Ultimately, the many references to the environment in the fresco work to form a background for the main object, the floor hanging in the center the apse, as the culminating point of Moix's focus on serching for God through intimate contact with nature.

Contemporary art in churches

Although thirty years ago it was daring for an exhibition to present secular art in a ritual space, as of late these works in such settings have become more common. The precedent for meshing contemporary art with religious spaces was first introduced by people like Dean Walter Hussy, Bishop George Bell, and Pere Marie Alain, as they tried to foster a connection between the churches of the western world and contemporary art. As art has continually developed, the church has remained more traditional, and as the two have become further separated, the presence of modern art in sacred spaces has allowed for a relationship to once again build between the two, as seen in the work of Santi Moix. Although at first glance these two entities may seem far separated, as Moix is able to find a connection between the two, so have others, realizing that the two have strong structural parallels in their cultural tasks.

References

Chang, Katie. “Una Iglesia En Cataluña Se Vuelve Un Lugar de Peregrinaje Artístico (Published 2017).” The New York Times, November 6, 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/es/2017/11/06/espanol/cataluna-iglesia-sant-victor-santi-moix.html.

“Intervenció Artística de Santi Moix a l’església Seurí.” Intervenció artística de Santi Moix a l’Església Seurí. Accessed February 25, 2024. https://esglesiaseuri.cat/.

Koestlé-Cate, Jonathan. Art and the church: a fractious embrace: ecclesiastical encounters with contemporary art. Routledge, 2016.

Puig, Xavier, dir. Totes Les Criatures. 2017; Barcelona, Spain: TV3. On-line Video.

Sokolova, Lilia. "Post-Secular Space: On the Strange Place of Contemporary Art in Old Active Churches in Germany, 1987–2017." PhD diss., Universität zu Köln, 2018.

Taylor, W. David O., and Taylor Worley, eds. Contemporary art and the church: a conversation between two worlds. InterVarsity Press, 2017. Maxpeiron (disc.) 06:50, 7 març 2024 (CET)