Ever since her now deceased husband, German industrialist Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen, sold his unrivalled art collection to the Spanish state in 1992, Carmen Cervera has rarely been out of the headlines, her not-quite rags, but certainly to riches, story, combining a glamour, art, and a good old fashioned family feud providing the gossip writers with plenty of copy. Her latest appearance in the media came after she decided to sell Constable’s 'The Lock' earlier this month. The early 19th century landscape is now one of the most expensive British paintings ever sold and went under the hammer for more than €27 million. The former beauty queen — she was Miss Spain in 1961 — says she had … [Read more...] about Profile: The incombustible Carmen Cervera Thyssen
Culture
Miró and co. still in demand despite the crisis
On the heels of a successful Art Basel show in Switzerland in June, Europe’s largest auction houses have started their own summer selling seasons with some strong results. One of the highlights of Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Sale in London on June 19, 2012, was a worldwide record set for Joan Miró’s Peinture (Étoile Bleue), c.1927. The painting sold for £23.5 million, well over pre-sale estimates of £15-20 million and three times its price when it last sold at auction in 2007. Other works by Miró that fared well at the auction included a later gouache, Tête, that sold for over £260,000, exceeding its estimates of £150-200,000. There were also a handful of Salvador Dalí and … [Read more...] about Miró and co. still in demand despite the crisis
Willy Toledo: The reasons for being a rebel
Willy Toledo – you either love him or you hate him. He made his big break as an actor on the TV show 7 Vidas alongside Paz Vega and Toni Cantó, but he is better known for his political activism. Guillermo Toledo Monsalve, now 42, had an unusual upbringing. Christened by a left-wing priest in the final years of the Franco regime, Toledo’s father came from a working class family who managed to finance his degree in medicine and his mother is from an upper-class family. Despite his relatively privileged background, Toledo received an unorthodox education, studying at the Colegio Estilo, a school based on the principle of constant creative stimulation, which was popular with the members of … [Read more...] about Willy Toledo: The reasons for being a rebel
A turbulent history of Madrid’s towers of crisis
With the Spanish government accepting an EU bailout offer of up to €100 billion to recapitalize its ailing banking system, images of the country’s major financial institutions have been flashed repeatedly across global news reports. Perhaps the most displayed image has been that of the headquarters of Realia and troubled bank Bankia: a pair of towers that lean dramatically over the Paseo de la Castellana, a major Madrid thoroughfare. The Puerta de Europa towers were designed by the American firm of Johnson/Burgee Architects. Philip Johnson (1906-2005) had been an early proponent of the International Style, introducing Americans to European architects such as Mies van der Rohe and Le … [Read more...] about A turbulent history of Madrid’s towers of crisis
Rosales paints a masterpiece of family grief
Fresh from its premier in the Directors’ Fortnight sidebar at this year’s rain-soaked Cannes, Sueño y silencio was originally going to be a very different film. Or rather, a very traditional one. Catalan filmmaker Jaime Rosales planned to shoot in colour, with professional actors and a conventional script. But as he prepared the film, all that fell away, leaving us with grungy, grainy black and white, non-actors, no script and a series of fragmentary scenes that sketch out, with aching and rare authenticity, a family in terrible crisis. Oriol, an architect, and his wife Yolanda, a Spanish teacher, live in Paris with their two daughters. Their lives are comfortable and unremarkable. In … [Read more...] about Rosales paints a masterpiece of family grief
How an historic sea booty slipped through Odyssey’s fingers
With the “Mercedes” treasure safe in Spain, the five-year legal battle over an estimated 594,000 silver and gold coins recovered from a 19th-century shipwreck finally came to a close earlier this month. Not only was it a costly public dispute for all parties engaged, but it involved a canny behind-the-scenes ruse blending greed, deceit, political intrigue and even mutiny within Odyssey Marine Exploration, which eventually saw all the half-million historic minted pieces plucked from its hands after losing one court battle after another. The Tampa-based underwater salvager fought hard to keep the trove, but to no avail. On May 14, the US Supreme Court rejected Odyssey’s final appeal in the … [Read more...] about How an historic sea booty slipped through Odyssey’s fingers
Throwing a light on Western Sahara’s tragedy
There is a moment in Alonso Longoria's Los hijos de las nubes (or Sons of the Clouds) that sums up the situation of Western Sahara in all its tragedy and absurdity. It is when, after a five-hour wait, first-time director Longoria and his collaborators (that include Oscar-winning actor Javier Bardem) finally get an audience with a representative of the Algerian government. Once the man is informed that the interview concerns his country's role in the conflict over Western Sahara, his evasiveness is almost comical: “How long will this take? No, no... sorry,” he says, “I've got a meeting on the other side of town and there's a lot of traffic.” Cut to a later shot of Bardem who simply … [Read more...] about Throwing a light on Western Sahara’s tragedy
‘Seis puntos sobre Emma’: Blind motivation?
Seis puntos sobre Emma tells the story of Emma, a blind woman of around 30 who is attempting to get pregnant, with Machiavellian calculation. Interviews with director Roberto Pérez Toledo (himself a wheelchair-user) reveal that one of the main aims behind his film was to offer a portrait of a blind person as a flawed human being rather than a victim. Perhaps it is because I have grown up with visually impaired people, but whenever I see a film purporting to offer this kind of insight into the life of someone with a disability my first reaction is: tell me something new. After all, films featuring portrayals of disabled characters as strong and capable individuals already exist, albeit … [Read more...] about ‘Seis puntos sobre Emma’: Blind motivation?
Bilbao celebrates 15 years of Guggenheim-inspired transformation
When Frank O. Gehry won a limited competition to design Bilbao’s new art museum in the early 1990s, the idea was to turn an old brick factory along a bend in the Nervión River into a cultural focal point for a city that had seen its traditional industries, such as shipbuilding and mining, virtually disappear by the late 20th century. Gehry had designed the Fish (1992) sculpture for Barcelona’s Port Olímpic, utilizing computer-aided design (his first use of CAD for a major project) to model its sweeping curves. In Bilbao, he would employ similar methods, resulting in what appear to be random organic forms (reminiscent of billowing sails) with the combination of seemingly incongruous … [Read more...] about Bilbao celebrates 15 years of Guggenheim-inspired transformation
‘Extraterrestre’: entertaining alien farce just misses the mark
Those who have seen Nacho Vigalondo's debut feature Los Cronocrímenes will be familiar with the director's style. In terms of uniqueness, he is more on a par with the likes of Wes Anderson than Clint Eastwood. And much like Anderson, you either dig his particular vision of the world or you don't. Humour, mixed with a healthy dose of darkness, is an essential ingredient of Vigalondo's work and Extraterrestre (or Extraterrestrial) is no different. The laughs and lighter moments are frequent but they are accompanied by an underlying sensation of subtle menace (one of the most classic examples of this is his 2003 Oscar-nominated short movie 7.35 de la mañana. As in Los Cronocrímenes, in … [Read more...] about ‘Extraterrestre’: entertaining alien farce just misses the mark