Last year, the Generalitat allocated 5,112,586 euros to the acquisition of works for the National Collection of Catalonia, a record figure that is partly explained by the extraordinary purchase of the Català-Roca archive (two million euros), but even so, it doubles that of 2022 (1,317,264 euros) and represents an astronomical jump compared to that of 2019, whose budget barely reached 650,000 euros. In total, they entered 345,543 works from periods and styles as diverse as the tympanum of the Sagrada Família, from the second half of the 12th century; fragments of the altarpiece of the church of Vilamur del Mestre d’Estamariu, from the 14th century; the 52 volumes of El Cajón de Sastre del Barón de Maldà; a self-portrait of Olga Sacharoff; an intervened mannequin of Amèlia Riera; the monumental film that Albert Serra made for Documenta de Kassel The Three Little Pigs (101 hours long) or the video work Las muertes chiquitas, by Mireia Sallarès, about the female orgasm.
“We are talking about a very relevant, extraordinary change of scenario, because there is a political commitment that is accompanied by the economy and continuity that impacts a country that cannot be explained if it does not preserve its heritage,” said the director of the MNAC. , Pepe Serra, in the presentation of the additions to the National Collection of Catalonia, announced yesterday by the Minister of Culture Natàlia Garriga. By area, 391 acquisitions of movable property have been made, 54 works of contemporary art, 26 of photography (309 works), 15 of comics and illustration and 20 of post-war art.
To the acquisitions, we must add 150 donations. For Councilor Garriga, the commitment to the National Collection implies strengthening all the museums and archives in the country, sending works to the different museums, with the aim of achieving “the territorial cultural balance to which we aspire.” A decentralization that is already a reality on the ground with the new Baroc Museum in Manresa, to which purchases worth 60,000 euros have been allocated in the last two years. The tympanum of the Sagrada Família has been deposited in the Museu d’ Art of Girona, where two works by Santiago Rusiñol related to his stays in Girona will also be preserved.
Other notable acquisitions have been the installation Geo-gràfics by Regina Giménez, drawings from the first era by Joan-Pere Viladecans, works by Jordi Pericot or long-term projects such as Canal*Gitano, by Antoni Abad. The photography background has been enriched with pieces by Marcelo Expósito (the series on the World Climate Strike in Barcelona, ??2019), Pilar Aymerich, Sandra Balcells, Joaquim Prats and Samuel Aranda, among others. In comics, he has opted for creators such as Isabel Bas, Juanita Bañolas, Laura Pérez Vernetti and Raquel Gu; and the post-war art includes new works by Guinovart, Maria Jesús de Sola, Montserrat Gudiol or Joan Puig Manera.
