Reinless Spirit: Gaudí

REINLESS SPIRIT: Gaudí

Is it possible for architecture to coexist in harmony with nature?, a friend of mine asked me while we were having lunch in a restaurant.

Yes, I replied. And the best example, accordingly, is the architect from Barcelona, Antonio Gaudí, at the same time the founder of the modern mosaic.

My friend shrugged. The nature is being damaged, he continued, the trees are being decimated, the waters running foul, all is being substituted with the concrete. A sort of INDUSTRIAL DISEASE that corrupts all that is in its path. I am not familiar with the masterpieces of Gaudí, he told me with a sorry voice, where do his works differ so much?

At that moment I had no paper and pencil to sketch the Sagrada Família, one of the masterpieces of that artist. I always carry paper and pencil with me. Instantly my eyes caught the toothpicks which stood on the table and promptly took them and modeled the shape of the Sagrada.

Antonio Gaudí, I spoke while I was modeling, was a FREE SPIRIT, just as a horse that might have the reins and the saddle but not the horseman on his back.

So, friend, I carried on, this fragile matter shall be the body of the next creation which I will realize in honor of Antonio Gaudí. All will be made of toothpicks.

My friend was staring at me with amazement just as if he was staring at the original Sagrada for the first time ever, meanwhile I devoured through the imaginations of the new challenge, and had a wooden taste in my mouth.