The opening will take place on Wednesday 21 February at 7pm and will include a vertical dance show. During the Fira de L’Aixada there will be guided tours of the new Museum.
Manresa will inaugurate the Museu del Barroc de Catalunya on Wednesday 21 February, coinciding with the Festa de la Llum. The event will start at 7pm in Plaça Sant Ignasi and will feature a vertical dance show by the Berta Baliu Company. Afterwards, there will be open doors at the new museum (limited capacity), accompanied by dance and music by Xuriach and students from the Conservatori de Música de Manresa. During the Fira de L’Aixada, on February 24 and 25, there will be free guided tours with prior registration. The inauguration event will be attended by the Minister of Culture of the Generalitat de Catalunya, Natàlia Garriga Ibáñez.
This is what was detailed this afternoon by the mayor of Manresa, Marc Aloy Guàrdia, in a press conference in which he was accompanied by the councilor for Culture and Language, Tània Infante Martínez, by the general director of Cultural Heritage of the Generalitat of Catalonia, Sònia Hernández Almodóvar, the director of the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (MNAC), Josep Serra Villalba, and the director of the Museu de Manresa, Francesc Vilà Noguera.
The new Museu del Barroc de Catalunya is located in the old Col·legi Sant Ignasi, which l’Ajuntament de Manresa has completely rehabilitated. In its first phase, it occupies the west and south wings of the first floor of the building, with an exhibition space of 675 square meters that will be doubled when the second phase is completed. The museum houses the most representative works of the Catalan Baroque, mostly from the Museu de Manresa and also from other museums in the country, with a total of 182 pieces. It also includes 12 audiovisual resources and 5 sound resources.
During the press conference, the mayor of Manresa highlighted the sum of efforts of all the institutions to make the new museum possible, which “positions Manresa as the epicenter of the Catalan Baroque and which will allow the general public to rediscover this heritage so important in our country”. He also highlighted the location of the Museu del Barroc, in the old Col·legi Sant Ignasi, “a unique location, declared a Cultural Asset of National Interest, which has been completely rehabilitated”.
Per la seva part, la directora general del Patrimoni Cultural ha destacat l’estreta col·laboració que hi ha hagut entre l’Ajuntament de Manresa i la Generalitat de Catalunya i ha manifestat que la posada en funcionament d’aquest nou equipament és clau pel Departament de Cultura i pel que representa en el mapa museístic del país: “el museu comarcal fa un salt important i agafa una rellevància nacional. És per això que us animem a iniciar el procés per tal que sigui declarat Museu d’Interès Nacional, un reconeixement al seu paper i a la importància de la seva col·lecció, tant a nivell nacional com internacional”.
Baroque territory
The Museu del Barroc de Catalunya highlights the heritage of this period in our country and promotes its knowledge and dissemination, providing a reading and interpretation that links society and the thinking of the present. As you walk through the exhibition, the areas of interpretation are presented with windows into the past that reveal the complexity of the Baroque period and build evocative narratives that invite visitors to connect with the works in a more intimate way. The visit culminates in a unique room, which is presented as the high point of the experience. This last space is transformed into an audiovisual immersion, transporting the visitor to the Catalan Baroque territories, and offering a multi-sensory experience that deepens the cultural and artistic richness of the Catalan Baroque.
The exhibition of the Museu del Barroc de Catalunya is formed from the holdings of the Museu de Manresa (96 pieces), the contribution of the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (27) and the Col·lecció Nacional d’Art de Generalitat de Catalunya (7), as well as the contribution of several museums in the country with which it expresses the will to coordinate in work programs for the dissemination of this heritage (51). In this context, the Generalitat de Catalunya has promoted the acquisition of Catalan art from the Baroque period in recent years.
The most representative
The collection consists of 182 pieces by the most representative authors of the Catalan Baroque, such as Antoni Viladomat Manalt, Joaquim Juncosa, Francesc Tramulles Roig, Francesc Pla i Duran or Pere Cuquet, among others.
In the museum we find the most representative authors of the Catalan Baroque, such as Antoni Viladomat Manalt, the most important painter of the first half of the 18th century in Catalonia, from whom you can admire three of the paintings in the series of paintings dedicated to Saint Francis d ‘So that they decorated, until the time of the Napoleonic invasion, the main cloister of the great convent of Sant Francesc in Barcelona.
Also Joaquim Juncosa, with ‘Flagel.lació de Crist’, which is part of the Col·lecció Nacional d’Art de la Generalitat de Catalunya; Francesc Tramulles i Roig, one of the most important names in 18th century Catalan painting, with the engraving ‘la Màscara Reial de Carles III’, from the MNAC; Francesc Pla Duran, known as El Vigatà, with the painting ‘Moisès destruint els exèrcits del Faraó’; Pere Cuquet, painter in the tenebrist style, with the Nativity scene that was part of the set of six canvases of the Retaule Major de l’Església del Carme de Manresa, saved from the destructive raids on the religious heritage during the Civil War; Josep Bernat Flaugier, with ‘Seguici nupcial amb l’estàtua d’Himeneu’, from the MNAC; Andreu Sala and Ramon Amadeu Grau, two of the sculptors of the Catalan Baroque, with the imposing ‘Sant guerrer’ or the delicate ‘Santa Anna i la Mare de Déu nena’, from the MNAC collection; Joan Grau, Josep Sunyer and Jaume Padró, of the 17th century Manresa Baroque sculpture school, of which you can see several works from the collection of the Museu de Manresa, del Museu de la Seu de Manresa i del Museu de Cervera; Agustí Pujol, with two busts from the Museu de Reus, or Pere Costa, with two altarpiece fragments from the Museu de Reus.
A comprehensive rehabilitation
Located on the first floor of the old Col·legi Sant Ignasi, which has been completely rehabilitated, the Museu del Barroc de Catalunya establishes a new concept using the presence of works and the implementation of audiovisual and sound applications.
The works to rehabilitate the old Col·legi Sant Ignasi (18th-19th century), declared a Bé Cultural d’Interès Nacional (BCIN), allow the city to recover 8,000 square meters of heritage equipment to be used for cultural and tourist Of these 8,000 square meters, rehabilitation work has focused on 6,000 (the remaining 2,000 correspond to the archive). On the ground floor, there will be the reception area for pilgrims, the reception and rooms for temporary exhibitions. The Museu del Barroc de Catalunya is located on the first floor, the second floor will be used for the Museu de la ciutat de Manresa and the third floor will host a space dedicated to the Josep Mestres Cabanes Foundation, a warehouse, which will be open to visitors , and the administrative technical spaces. As for the cloister, it will be freely accessible and, therefore, will be open to the public, who will gain a new public space also prepared to program cultural events.
The rehabilitation works of the building (structural reinforcement, facades and new volume) have amounted to 7.5 million euros and the construction and commissioning of the Museu del Barroc de Catalunya (civil works, museography, communication plan and staff) at 1.9 million euros, VAT included. More than half of the funding (€5.2 million) comes from specific grants for heritage recovery, from the European Feder funds, from the Generalitat de Catalunya, from the Diputació de Barcelona and from the Next Generation funds, from the call from the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism.
The intervention in the old Col·legi Sant Ignasi de Manresa is a strategic action that allows the city to fulfill several objectives: recover heritage, gain a cultural facility of reference in the country, urbanistically transform the entire environment —Via Sant Ignasi, street Bertrand Serra and Plaça de Sant Ignasi—, to revitalize the Centre Històric, especially the Escodines neighborhood, and enhance the role of Manresa in the national tourist area.
