CATALONIA FALL 2016

DALÍ

DESTINATION DOQ PRIORAT WINE

LA SEU D’URGELL CAPITAL OF CHEESE

FALL 2016 AICSUSA.ORG

Hellena Cardus Publisher AICS President Fall 2016

Welcome to the Fall 2016 edition of CATALONIA, a quarterly publication by AICS (American Institute of Catalan Studies) which is based in the mega metropolis Houston, Texas. This is the 11th edition which over the past 2 years has grown and expanded over several continents and consists of the following principal collaborators: Hellena Cardús, AICS President, V.P. of North America FIEC (Federation of Catalan Entities), CATALONIA Publisher Roslyn Smith, AICS Cultural Arts Chairperson, Editor in Chief, CATALONIA Jordi Guillem, AICS Vice President, Senior Writer, CATALONIA Mayte Duarte Seguer, AICS Cultural Liaison, Interviewer and Senior Writer CATALONIA Gonçal Mayos, Senior Writer, CATALONIA If you are interested in becoming a Sponsor for CATALONIA magazine, please contact: Jordi Guillem jguillem@cataloniamagazine.com For more information regarding AICS or CATALONIA Magazine, visit our Facebook Page and our website AICSUSA.org Share the Experience!

Hellena Cardús hcardús@cataloniamagazine.com

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Roslyn Smith

Editor-in-Chief AICS Cultural Arts Chairperson

Fall 2016

CATALONIA FACTS ° Population, 7·6 million people (like Switzerland) ° Surface area: 32,114 km2 (bigger than Belgium) ° GDP: €204,000 million (like Denmark) ° Over 10 million people speak Catalan in Spain, France and Italy (more than Swedish for example). ° Catalonia’s Government has had 129 Presidents to date. Its first Constitution dates back to the 13th century.

Don’t forget to like us on Facebook.com/CataloniaMagazine rsmith@cataloniamagazine.com

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CATALONIA LINKS

CONTENTS

CATALONIA 3 PUBLISHER’S NOTE 8 CHEESE FROM THE PYRENEES

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14 DALI 26 DOQ PRIORAT WINE DESTINATION

29 CATALONIA EN CATALÀ COVER ART BY DALI

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2226 CATALONIA MAGAZINE is published quarterly by AICS- American Institute for Catalan Studies . Contact: aicsusa.org Publisher Hellena Cardus hcardus@cataloniamagazine.com Editor-in-Chief Roslyn Smith rsmith@cataloniamagazine.com Senior Writer Jordi Guillem jguillem@cataloniamagazine.com © 2016 CATALONIA MAGAZINE. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited. Printed in the U.S.

CATALONIA

LA SEU D’URGELL CAPITAL OF CHEESE

In 1048 , around the time of Bishop Guillem GuifrĂŠ , the first fair was documented on the Iberian Peninsula . The central position of the city, was the crossroads of communications for the Pyrenean people where all of their favored exchanges were made.

The fair Headquarters has changed dates throughout history. Generally it celebrates the entry of autumn, where farmers and ranchers could place their surplus and prepare for the winter. They would sometime add extra fair s in early Spring. But the most important fair was the one in fall, which coincided with the festival of Sant Ermengol. It was a big cattle fair. With the loss of vitality of the livestock it was converted in the seventies to a fair and agricultural samples. It was not until 1995 the first edition of the Fair of Artisan Cheeses of the Pyrenees was hosted, an event that has revitalized and has become one of the fairs in Catalonia with more personality and future.

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CATALONIA During the third weekend of the month of October , this year the 15 and 16 , La Seu d'Urgell celebrates a new edition of the ancient fair of St. Ermengol .

Every year in La Seu D’ Urgell ,44 artisan cheese makers from the Catalan Pyrenees, the Basque Country , Navarro, Aragon and France, offer over 100 different varieties of cheeses made by themselves. The entrance is free and visitors can purchase a ticket entitling them to taste different types of cheese.

The cheese guest of this year is the Green Goat Cheese from Coin, Malaga.

The fair also has an area dedicated to the wine-cellar, (Batlliu de Sort) beer maker (Ctretze de la Pobla Segur) , and mineral water company (Pineo).

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CATALONIA Saturday October 15th, starting at 10:30, a jury formed of cheese experts will meet to try and assess more than 100 cheeses from the participants’ own production, made in any area of the Pyrenees, which will be presented to this year's Edition. The cheeses will be distributed in the following sections or categories: Non aged cheese Mozzarela Fresh cheese Cottage cheese Crème fraîche Fresh goat cheese (chevre

Aged cheese Goat cheese, Sour curd goat cheese, Curd Cheese Cow enzyme enzymatic soft Sheep's cheese, enzymatic curd Sheep's cheese, soft

Tupi or gazta-zaharra Blue cheeses Cheese with seasonings Yogurt and fermented milks The audience can follow the progress of the competition. Each category is assigned three awards: gold medal diploma, silver medal diploma and bronze medal diploma.

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CATALONIA

Foreign investment in Catalonia The Government has conducted a study in partnership with Catalonia Trade & Investment, ACCIÓ’s area for attracting foreign investment, which puts the figure for foreign investment in Catalonia in the past five and a half years at 14,532 million euros (January 2011-June 2016). This volume comes from 601 investment projects by multinational companies that have created 38,385 direct jobs in our country.

The report also points out that foreign investment in Catalonia from 2011-2016 has captured 31% of the volume of foreign investment received in the Spanish State during that period and that the investment is 37% of the number of foreign investment projects and 34% of the jobs created by those projects. At the same time, the report emphasizes foreign investments in the field of ICT, which show the pull effect of the Mobile World Congress on the Catalan economy and logistics.

In addition, the report proposes future actions to attract more investment: 

In the industrial sector (industry 4.0, painting and coating, smart containers and sports apparel).  In the ICT sectors (big data, e-commerce, smart mobility and videogames).  In the services sector (food services, shared value and services for the elderly).

The report concludes that Catalonia has more capacity than other Western Europe countries to attract projects primarily related to the sectors of pharmaceutical preparations, plastics, clothing and clothing accessories, computer equipment and paints; Catalonia exceeds Western Europe in attracting industrial projects and logistics centers.

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CATALONIA

BARCELONA

Since 1996 Barcelona has consistently held its top position as Europe’s number one spot to live and work. Proof of its attraction are the 5,000,000 visitors the city gets a year.

Despite having a metropolitan area similar in size to Frankfurt, Munich or Rome, and being home to around two-thirds of the population of Catalonia -4.8 million people- the city enjoys a relaxed open-air and active lifestyle. In the streets outdoor cafés mix with food markets full of fresh produce of a rich local gastronomy. From neighborhoods imbued with thousands of years of history to fun-runs or international music festivals; in any season of the year there’s always something to enjoy in the city.

A modern-day Barcelona icon is its Bicing smart-bike service, with 6,000 bikes and 420 pick-up and drop-off stations around the city, used both by people to get to work and for others to move around the city or along the beach in their leisure hours. One of Europe’s pioneer cities in this sense, the success of the initiatives in Barcelona has served as inspiration for many other cities around the world.

BARCELONA, MORE THAN A PLACE TO LIVE, A WAY OF LIFE The pleasures of a Mediterranean lifestyle are known to all, but Barcelona takes it to new levels and manages to mix work and pleasure wisely. It’s far more than just and festivals; it’s having the action-packed Pyrenees just a short drive away, frequently combined with modern flair, cosmopolitan urban centers such as neighborhoods imbued with thousands of years of history, and a local population who fill their weekends with community events.

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CATALONIA CULTURE & SPORT: BRINGING PEOPLE TOGETHER Further proof of Catalonia's international character is the busy trade fair activity, with Barcelona being the third most popular city in Europe to stage international events.

Besides the Mobile World Congress, the leading mobile communications event that attracts some 60,000 professionals and Carbon Expo, the most important global event dedicated to CO2 emissions, the other major events are the Motor Show, Construmat, Piscina BCN (Swimming Pool Show), EIBTM, the Boat Show, Sonimagfoto & Multimedia, Graphispag Digital and BCN Bridal Week. Barcelona also hosts important medical congresses - such as those of the European Neurology, Respiratory and Diabetes Societies - and technological events - such as EVS27, dedicated to electric cars, and Smart City Expo Barcelona.

CULTURE & SPORT: BRINGING PEOPLE TOGETHER In Catalonia you can always find a wide range of cultural and sporting activities that constantly move large sections of the population. The Catalan passion for football, with the omnipresent Barça and its internationally recognized game, is a clear example of this.

Barcelona itself is a cultural hub with top international cultural and sporting events that attract locals, visitors and new residents alike. Music festivals such as Sonar or Primavera Sound are popular and established venues on the international music circuit, while other more traditional venues like the Liceu Opera House are acclaimed acclaim for quality of their programs. This mix, arising throughout Catalonia, adds to the region’s international atmosphere, especially considering the 1.2 million foreign residents from 150 countries now living here.

“Barcelona is the top cruise destination in Europe and, with 5,000,000 foreign visitors, the 4th most visited European city. Catalonia attracts 27 million visitors a year. “

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CATALONIA

LEARN CATALAN Parla.cat This virtual learning environment offers a wide range of teaching materials for learning Catalan. The website is available in Catalan, Spanish, French, English and German.

Parla.cat is broken down into four learning levels: basic, elementary, intermediate and advanced, with each level in turn divided into three courses.

Courses are offered in two learning modes, free mode and tutored mode. If you select the free mode, you will have access to materials and will be able to learn. However, if you prefer the mode with tutors, which entails a charge, you will have the support of a tutor. The tutored mode is managed by the Consortium for Language Normalization and Ramon Llull Institute.

Furthermore, the Parla.cat portal has a space where you can interact with other users via forums and chats and another space with courses and activities called Aula mestra.

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CATALONIA

GOOD READS

Long neglected by European historians, the unspeakable atrocities of Franco’s Spain are finally brought to tragic light in this definitive work.

The remains of General Francisco Franco lie in an immense mausoleum near Madrid, built with the blood and sweat of twenty thousand slave laborers. His enemies, however, met lessexalted fates. Besides those killed on the battlefield, tens of thousands were officially executed between 1936 and 1945, and as many again became "non-persons." As Spain finally reclaims its historical memory, a full picture can now be given of the Spanish Holocaust-ranging from judicial murders to the abuse of women and children. The story of the victims of Franco's reign of terror is framed by the activities of four key men-General Mola, Quiepo de Llano, Major Vallejo Najera, and Captain Don Gonzalo Aguilera-whose dogma of eugenics, terrorization, domination, and mind control horrifyingly mirror the fascism of Italy and Germany.

Evoking such classics as Gulag and The Great Terror, The Spanish Holocaust sheds crucial light on one of the darkest and most unexamined eras of modern European history.

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CATALONIA

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CATALONIA

Salvador Dali was born on May 11, 1904 in the town of Figueres, in the Emporda

region, close to the French border in Catalonia, Spain. Dali's older brother, also named Salvador (born October 12, 1901), had died of gastroenteritis nine months earlier, on August 1, 1903. His father, Salvador Dali i Cusi, was a middle-class lawyer and notary whose strict disciplinary approach was tempered by his wife, Felipa Domenech Ferrés, who encouraged her son's artistic endeavors.

When he was five, Dali was taken to his brother's grave and told by his parents that he was his brother's reincarnation, a concept which he came to believe. Of his brother, Dali said, "...[we] resembled each other like two drops of water, but we had different reflections." He "was probably a first version of myself but conceived too much in the absolute."

Dali also had a sister, Ana Maria, who was three years younger. In 1949, she published a book about her brother, Dali As Seen By His Sister. His childhood friends included future FC Barcelona footballers Sagibarba and Josep Samitier. During holidays at the Catalan resort of Cadaqués, the trio played football together.

Dali attended drawing school. In 1916, Dali also discovered modern painting on a summer vacation to Cadaqués with the family of Ramon Pichot, a local artist who made regular trips to Paris. The next year, Dali's father organized an exhibition of his charcoal drawings in their family home. He had his first public exhibition at the Municipal Theater in Figueres in 1919.

In February 1921, Dali's mother died of breast cancer. Dali was sixteen years old; he later said his mother's death "was the greatest blow I had experienced in my life. I worshipped her... I could not resign myself to the loss of a being on whom I counted to make invisible the unavoidable blemishes of my soul." After her death, Dali's father married his deceased wife's sister. Dali did not resent this marriage, because he had a great love and respect for his aunt.

In 1922, Dali moved into the Residencia de Estudiantes (Students' Residence) in Madrid and studied at the Academia de San Fernando (School of Fine Arts). A lean 1.72 m (5 ft. 7 in.) tall, Dali already drew attention as an eccentric and dandy. He wore long hair and sideburns, coat, stockings, and knee breeches in the style of English aesthetes of the late 19th century.

At the Residencia, he became close friends with (among others) Pepin Bello, Luis Buñuel, and Federico Garcia Lorca. The friendship with Lorca had a strong element of mutual passion, but Dali rejected the poet's sexual advances.

However, it was his paintings, in which he experimented with Cubism, that earned him the most attention from his fellow students. At the time of these early works, Dali probably did not completely understand the Cubist movement. His only information on Cubist art came from magazine articles and a catalog given to him by Pichot, since there were no Cubist artists in Madrid at the time. In 1924, the still-unknown Salvador Dali illustrated a book for the first time. It was a publication of the Catalan poem "Les bruixes de Llers" ("The Witches of Llers") by his friend and schoolmate, poet Carles Fages de Climent. Dali also experimented with Dada, Dada artists like Max Ernst influenced his work throughout his life.

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CATALONIA

Salvador Dalí. Portrait of the artist's father and sister, 1925 In this work, one of the most representative from Salvador Dalí's youth, the artist puts to one side his worry about composition and colour and begins a stage which could be considered to be one of the most balanced periods in his artistic production, even though, as he himself would explain, it was a time that he lived in an exalted and frenetic way.

In this drawing, the father, represented in three quarters seated in profile and looking towards the right, reminds us of the same figure of the portrait in oil that Dalí would paint some months later. It reaches a cleansing of the line, which is made evident in the details of the faces, that are worked on in a highly delicate way, a particular way of drawing that later on, and from then on always, which would characterize his surrealist works.

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Dali was expelled from the Academia in 1926, shortly before his final exams, when he stated that no one on the faculty was competent enough to examine him. His mastery of painting skills was evidenced by his flawlessly realistic Basket of Bread, painted in 1926. That same year, he made his first visit to Paris, where he met with Pablo Picasso, whom the young Dali revered. Picasso had already heard favorable reports about Dali from Joan Miro. As he developed his own style over the next few years, Dali made a number of works heavily influenced by Picasso and Miro.

Some trends in Dali's work that would continue throughout his life were already evident in the 1920s.

Dali devoured influences from many styles of art, ranging from the most academically classic to the most cutting-edge avant garde His classical influences included Raphael, Bronzino, Francisco de Zurbaran, Johannes Vermeer, and Diego Velazquez. He used both classical and modernist techniques, sometimes in separate works, and sometimes combined. Exhibitions of his works in Barcelona attracted much attention along with mixtures of praise and puzzled debate from critics.

Dali grew a flamboyant moustache, influenced by seventeenth-century Spanish master painter Diego Velazquez. The moustache became an iconic trademark of his appearance for the rest of his life.

In late 1920s, Dali began to involved in Surrealism movement. Surrealism is a collective adventure that began in Paris shortly after the first World War, in the form of an association of individuals grouped around Andre Breton. Among the artists to participate in Surrealism were: Giorgio de Chirico, Yves Tanguy, Max Ernst, Andre Masson, Rene Magritte and Salvador Dali. The Surrealist movement was greatly influenced by the theories of psychologist Sigmund Freud, whose interest was dealing with the unconscious self. Surrealists often dealt with the id, ego and superego. According to The Ego and the ID by Freud, the id is the part of the unconscious that is the source of instinctive energy. The ego is the part of the psyche that reacts to the outside world. The superego mediates between the id and ego.

In 1929, Dali collaborated with surrealist film director Luis Buñuel on the short film Un chien andalou (An Andalusian Dog). His main contribution was to help Buñuel write the script for the film. Dali later claimed to have also played a significant role in the filming of the project, but this is not substantiated by contemporary accounts. Also, in August 1929, Dali met his muse, inspiration, and future wife Gala, born Elena Ivanovna Diakonova. She was a Russian immigrant ten years his senior, who at that time was married to surrealist poet Paul Éluard. In the same year, Dali had important professional exhibitions and officially joined the Surrealist group in the Montparnasse quarter of Paris. His work had already been heavily influenced by surrealism for two years. The Surrealists hailed what Dali called the Paranoiac-critical method of accessing the subconscious for greater artistic creativity.

Meanwhile, Dali's relationship with his father was close to rupture. Don Salvador Dali y Cusi strongly disapproved of his son's romance with Gala, and saw his connection to the Surrealists as a bad influence on his morals. The last straw was when Don Salvador read in a Barcelona newspaper that his son had recently exhibited in Paris a drawing of the "Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ", with a provocative inscription: "Sometimes, I spit for fun on my mother's portrait."

Outraged, Don Salvador demanded that his son recant publicly. Dali refused, perhaps out of fear of expulsion from the Surrealist group, and was violently thrown out of his paternal home on December 28, 1929. His father told him that he would disinherit him, and that he should never set foot in Cadaquès again. The following summer, Dali and Gala would rent a small fisherman's cabin in a nearby bay at Port Lligat. He bought the place, and over the years enlarged it, gradually building his much beloved villa by the sea.

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Portrait of my F ather

DalĂ­ held his first exhibition at the Galeries Dalmau in Barcelona in 1925, before making his first trip to Paris and turning towards Surrealism. One of the most outstanding paintings in the exhibition, considered one of the best from his early period, is this portrait of his father. DalĂ­ concentrated on the severe expression of the face and, especially in the piercing eyes, on the forceful character of his father, a notary in Figueres, with whom he had a difficult relationship. The technical mastery the young painter had achieved at that time can be seen in the cleanly drawn outlines, the treatment of light and shade and the expressive power of the sombre tones.

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Birth of a Goddess

© Salvador Dalí, Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí, VEGAP, Barcelona, 2016

“The eye of time”

Ruby Lips with Teeth Like Pearls” brooch by Salvador Dali 18K gold with 6cts of rubies, American, circa 1980. Designed by Salvador Dali, fabricated by Henry Katson. Leah Gordon Gallery, The Manhattan Art & Antiques Center

Portrait of Joan Maria Torres

Circa 1921

CATALONIA In 1931, Dali painted one of his most famous works, The Persistence of Memory. which introduced a surrealistic image of soft, melting pocket watches. The general interpretation of the work is that the soft watches are a rejection of the assumption that time is rigid or deterministic. This idea is supported by other images in the work, such as the wide expanding landscape, and the other limp watches, shown being devoured by insects.

Dali and Gala, having lived together since 1929, were married in 1934 in a civil ceremony. They later remarried in a Catholic ceremony in 1958.

Dali was introduced to America by art dealer Julian Levy in 1934. The exhibition in New York of Dali's works, including Persistence of Memory, created an immediate sensation. Social Register listees feted him at a specially organized "Dali Ball." He showed up wearing a glass case on his chest, which contained a brassiere. In that year, Dali and Gala also attended a masquerade party in New York, hosted for them by heiress Caresse Crosby. For their costumes, they dressed as the Lindbergh baby and his kidnapper. The resulting uproar in the press was so great that Dali apologized. When he returned to Paris, the Surrealists confronted him about his apology for a surrealist act.

While the majority of the Surrealist artists had become increasingly associated with leftist politics, Dali maintained an ambiguous position on the subject of the proper relationship between politics and art. Leading surrealist André Breton accused Dali of defending the "new" and "irrational" in "the Hitler phenomenon," but Dali quickly rejected this claim, saying, "I am Hitlerian neither in fact nor intention." Dali insisted that surrealism could exist in an apolitical context and refused to explicitly denounce fascism. Among other factors, this had landed him in trouble with his colleagues. Later in 1934, Dali was subjected to a "trial", in which he was formally expelled from the Surrealist group. To this, Dali retorted, "I myself am surrealism."

In 1936, Dali took part in the London International Surrealist Exhibition. His lecture, entitled Fantomes paranoiaques authentiques, was delivered while wearing a deep-sea diving suit and helmet.

He had arrived carrying a billiard cue and leading a pair of Russian wolfhounds, and had to have the helmet unscrewed as he gasped for breath. He commented that "I just wanted to show that I was 'plunging deeply' into the human mind."

Also in 1936, at the premiere screening of Joseph Cornell's film Rose Hobart at Julian Levy's gallery in New York City, Dali became famous for another incident. Levy's program of short surrealist films was timed to take place at the same time as the first surrealism exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, featuring Dali's work. Dali was in the audience at the screening, but halfway through the film, he knocked over the projector in a rage. “My idea for a film is exactly that, and I was going to propose it to someone who would pay to have it made,” he said. "I never wrote it down or told anyone, but it is as if he had stolen it." Other versions of Dali's accusation tend to the more poetic: "He stole it from my subconscious!" or even "He stole my dreams!"

At this stage, Dali's main patron in London was the very wealthy Edward James. He had helped Dali emerge into the art world by purchasing many works and by supporting him financially for two years. They also collaborated on two of the most enduring icons of the Surrealist movement: the Lobster Telephone and the Mae West Lips Sofa.

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CATALONIA

CULTURE

CATALONIA In 1939, Breton coined the derogatory nickname "Avida Dollars", an anagram for Salvador Dali, and a phonetic rendering of the French avide a dollars, which may be translated as "eager for dollars". This was a derisive reference to the increasing commercialization of Dali's work, and the perception that Dali sought self-aggrandizement through fame and fortune. Some surrealists henceforth spoke of Dali in the past tense, as if he were dead. The Surrealist movement and various members thereof (such as Ted Joans) would continue to issue extremely harsh polemics against Dali until the time of his death and beyond.

In 1940, as World War II started in Europe, Dali and Gala moved to the United States, where they lived for eight years. After the move, Dali returned to the practice of Catholicism. "During this period, Dali never stopped writing," wrote Robert and Nicolas Descharnes.

In 1941, Dali drafted a film scenario for Jean Gabin called Moontide. In 1942, he published his autobiography, The Secret Life of Salvador Dali. He wrote catalogs for his exhibitions, such as that at the Knoedler Gallery in New York in 1943. Therein he expounded, "Surrealism will at least have served to give experimental proof that total sterility and attempts at automatizations have gone too far and have led to a totalitarian system. ... Today's laziness and the total lack of technique have reached their paroxysm in the psychological signification of the current use of the college." He also wrote a novel, published in 1944, about a fashion salon for automobiles. This resulted in a drawing by Edwin Cox in The Miami Herald, depicting Dali dressing an automobile in an evening gown. Also in The Secret Life, Dali suggested that he had split with Buñuel because the latter was a Communist and an atheist. Buñuel was fired (or resigned) from MOMA, supposedly after Cardinal Spellman of New York went to see Iris Barry, head of the film department at MOMA. Buñuel then went back to Hollywood where he worked in the dubbing department of Warner Brothers from 1942 to 1946. In his 1982 autobiography Mon Dernier soupir (English translation My Last Sigh published 1983), Buñuel wrote that, over the years, he rejected Dali's attempts at reconciliation.

An Italian friar, Gabriele Maria Berardi, claimed to have performed an exorcism on Dali while he was in France in 1947. In 2005, a sculpture of Christ on the Cross was discovered in the friar's estate. It had been claimed that Dali gave this work to his exorcist out of gratitude, and two Spanish art experts confirmed that there were adequate stylistic reasons to believe the sculpture was made by Dali.

Starting in 1949, Dali spent his remaining years back in his beloved Catalonia. The fact that he chose to live in Spain while it was ruled

by Franco drew criticism from progressives and from many other artists. As such, it is probable that the common dismissal of Dali's later works by some Surrealists and art critics was related partially to politics rather than to the artistic merit of the works themselves.

In 1959, André Breton organized an exhibit called Homage to Surrealism, celebrating the fortieth anniversary of Surrealism, which contained works by Dali, Joan Miro, Enrique Tábara, and Eugenio Granell. Breton vehemently fought against the inclusion of Dali's Sistine Madonna in the International Surrealism Exhibition in New York the following year.

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Late in his career, Dali did not confine himself to painting, but experimented with many unusual or novel media and processes: he made bulletist works and was among the first artists to employ holography in an artistic manner. Several of his works incorporate optical illusions. In his later years, young artists such as Roy Lichtenstein proclaimed Dali an important influence on pop art. Dali also had a keen interest in natural science and mathematics. This is manifested in several of his paintings, notably in the 1950s, in which he painted his subjects as composed of rhinoceros horns. According to Dali, the rhinoceros horn signifies divine geometry because it grows in a logarithmic spiral. He also linked the rhinoceros to themes of chastity and to the Virgin Mary. Dali was also fascinated by DNA and the hypercube (a 4-dimensional cube); an unfolding of a hypercube is featured in the painting Crucifixion (Corpus Hypercubus).

Dali's post-World War II period bore the hallmarks of technical virtuosity and an interest in optical illusions, science, and religion. He became an increasingly devout Catholic, while at the same time he had been inspired by the shock of Hiroshima and the dawning of the "atomic age". Therefore Dali labeled this period "Nuclear Mysticism." In paintings such as "The Madonna of Port-Lligat" (first version) (1949) and "Corpus Hypercubus" (1954), Dali sought to synthesize Christian iconography with images of material disintegration inspired by nuclear physics. "Nuclear Mysticism" included such notable pieces as "La Gare de Perpignan" (1965) and "Hallucinogenic Toreador" (1968-70). In 1960, Dali began work on the Dali Theatre and Museum in his home town of Figueres; it was his largest single project and the main focus of his energy through 1974. He continued to make additions through the mid-1980s.

In 1968, Dali filmed a television advertisement for Lanvin chocolates, and in 1969, he designed the Chupa Chups logo. Also in 1969, he was responsible for creating the advertising aspect of the 1969 Eurovision Song Contest and created a large metal sculpture that stood on the stage at the Teatro Real in Madrid.

In the television programme Dirty Dalì: A Private View broadcast on Channel 4 on June 3, 2007, art critic Brian Sewell described his acquaintance with Dali in the late 1960s, which included lying down in the fetal position without trousers in the armpit of a figure of Christ and masturbating for Dali, who pretended to take photos while fumbling in his own trousers.

In 1980, Dali's health took a catastrophic turn. His near-senile wife, Gala, allegedly had been dosing him with a dangerous cocktail of unprescribed medicine that damaged his nervous system, thus causing an untimely end to his artistic capacity. At 76 years old, Dali was a wreck, and his right hand trembled terribly, with Parkinson-like symptoms.

In 1982, King Juan Carlos bestowed on Dali the title of Marqués de Dali de Púbol (English: Marquis of Dali de Púbol) in the nobility of Spain, hereby referring to Púbol, the place where he lived. The title was in first instance hereditary, but on request of Dali changed for life only in 1983. To show his gratitude for this, Dali later gave the king a drawing (Head of Europa, which would turn out to be Dali's final drawing) after the king visited him on his deathbed.

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CATALONIA

Gala died on June 10, 1982. After Gala's death, Dali lost much of his will to live. He deliberately dehydrated himself, possibly as a suicide attempt, or possibly in an attempt to put himself into a state of suspended animation as he had read that some microorganisms could do. He moved from Figueres to the castle in PĂşbol, which he had bought for Gala and was the site of her death. In 1984, a fire broke out in his bedroom under unclear circumstances. It was possibly a suicide attempt by Dali, or possibly simple negligence by his staff. In any case, Dali was rescued and returned to Figueres, where a group of his friends, patrons, and fellow artists saw to it that he was comfortable living in his Theater-Museum in his final years.

There have been allegations that Dali was forced by his guardians to sign blank canvases that would later, even after his death, be used in forgeries and sold as originals. As a result, art dealers tend to be wary of late works attributed to Dali.

In November 1988, Dali entered the hospital with heart failure, and on December 5, 1988 was visited by King Juan Carlos, who confessed that he had always been a serious devotee of Dali.

On January 23, 1989, while his favorite record of Tristan and Isolde played, he died of heart failure at Figueres at the age of 84, and, coming full circle, is buried in the crypt of his Teatro Museo in Figueres. The location is across the street from the church of Sant Pere, where he had his baptism, first communion, and funeral, and is three blocks from the house where he was born.

DALI'S INSPIRATION Looking at Dali's paintings, you might suspect that they were the result of heavy psychotropic drug use. Yet, Dali famously stated, "I don't do drugs. I am drugs." So where did he get his inspiration if not from drugs? Well, Dali had some tricks for making himself more creative. One involved a tin plate and spoon. Dali would sit in a chair holding the spoon above the plate and doze off. As he fell asleep, the spoon would drop onto the plate, making a noise loud enough to wake the artist in time to jot down the surreal images he saw in his dreams.

Other times, Dali would stand on his head until he almost passed out, allowing him to become semi-lucid. Dali's most famous technique was called the "Paranoiac-Critical Method." This involved trying to create a self-induced paranoid state, allowing him to draw irrational relationships between unconnected objects and to depict the landscape of his own subconscious mind. dalipaintings.com

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CATALONIA

DESTINATION

DOQ Priorat WINE The Carthusian monks started to grow vines in this inland part of the province of Tarragona way back in 1262. Since then, and in spite of the poor quality of the soil, the considerable thermal fluctuations and the extremely dry climate, an excellent quality wine has been produced.

This Designation of Origin comprises the towns of Bellmunt del Priorat, Gratallops, El Lloar, La Morera de Montsant, Poboleda, Porrera, Torroja del Priorat, La Vilella Alta, La Vilella Baixa and some of the villages of Falset and El Molar.

Back in 1932, El Priorato was recognized as a protected wine-growing area and, in 1954, the first rules of procedure for the Designation of Origin were approved. Given the quality of its wines, it is currently recognised as a Qualified Designation of Origin.

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CATALONIA The white wines are made using garnacha blanca and pedro ximénez varieties and are mature and penetrating. They also produce rosés, mature and sweet wines.

In general, the wines of El Priorato undergo a long fermentation process. Those aged in oak are particularly popular.

The best way to get to know them is to visit the wine cellars where they are made.

The Designation of Origin has 28 wine cellars which can be visited and which offer varying experiences with wine.

For example, the Buil & Giné wine cellar in Gratallops offers visits to the vineyards by segway, a two-wheeled electric vehicle. The Burgos-Porta wine cellar makes organic wine in Mas Sinén, a stone country house from the 17th century.

Cal Pla, in Porrera, is a family-run wine cellar, over than two hundred years old, which has ancient inscirptions in relation to interesting facts from the world of wine.

The Els Cups wine cellar, founded in 1800, includes an exhibition of ancient winemaking tools and makes a mature wine, the oldest of which is ninety years old.

The Joan Simó wine cellar is located in a manor house on the façade of which an ancient sundial can be seen, typical of the village of Porrera and which dates back to 1887. The Masia Duch wine cellar is set in a building dating back to the 12th century and on an estate, El Tancat, which belonged to the Carthusian Monastery of Escaladei.

The village of Escaladei with the Montsant mountains in the background. Photo by Joan GGK

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EN CATALÀ

CATALONIA EN CATALÀ

Barcelona & Catalonia Startup Hub La Generalitat de Catalunya, a través d’ACCIÓ, ha presentat la plataforma Barcelona & Catalonia Startup Hub, una eina virtual que identifica més de 1.000 start-ups catalanes amb un alt potencial de creixement. Aquest hub neix amb l’objectiu d’impulsar la projecció internacional de l’ecosistema start-up català i de contribuir a la captació d’inversions per part d’aquestes empreses.

La plataforma startups.catalonia.com és fruit d’un treball d’anàlisi de més d’un any per seleccionar i obtenir una fotografia clara del col·lectiu start-up a Catalunya, un dels més dinàmics a Europa: de fet, Barcelona és la 5a regió europea en termes d’start-ups d’acord amb diversos rànquings internacionals, com EU-Startups o Startup Heatmap Europe. Les start-ups són, a més, un clar factor d’impuls a la innovació per a Catalunya, ja que són les empreses que concentren una major activitat innovadora (el 74,1% de les empreses de menys de 5 anys innoven, segons el Baròmetre de la Innovació 2015).

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Barcelona&Catalonia Startup Hub funcionarà com un nou punt de connexió de tots els agents de l’ecosistema start-up (inversors, acceleradores, mentors, incubadores, empreses i altres plataformes de finançament) i permetrà, a més, orientar de manera més efectiva les polítiques de suport al seu creixement, englobades actualment en el programa Startup Catalonia d’ACCIÓ.

Quines start-ups inclou la plataforma?

ACCIÓ ha identificat en el directori aquelles empreses emergents ja constituïdes, que tenen un màxim de 10 anys de vida, amb un model de negoci escalable (és a dir, amb una capacitat per generar ingressos sense haver d’incrementar els recursos en la mateixa proporció), repetible i aplicable a entorns globals, orientada a un creixement ràpid i fundada per emprenedors (no per corporacions).

Radiografia de les start-ups incorporades Segons dades del Barcelona & Catalonia Startup Hub, les start-ups catalanes sumen prop de 10.000 treballadors a Catalunya, amb una mitjana de 12 professionals per empresa. El 48% té d’1 a 5 treballadors, el 22% de 6 a 10, el 14% d’11 a 20, el 14% de 21 a 50, i el 2% més de 50.

Les start-ups incloses a la plataforma sumen una facturació propera als 1.300 milions d’euros. El 50% facturen menys de 250.000€, el 29% entre 250.000 i 1 milió d’euros, el 18% entre 1 i 5 milions, i el 3% més de 5 milions d’euros.

El 78% de les start-ups tenen menys de 6 anys de vida, i operen principalment en els sectors de software d’Internet i de mòbil, comerç electrònic, turisme i oci, big data i eHealth.

El Barcelonès és la comarca amb més start-ups, ja que en concentra el 62% del total.

La segueixen el Vallès Occidental (14%) i el Baix Llobregat (6%). Els models de negoci més populars són la llicència de software i la subscripció.

startups.catalonia.com

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AMERICAN INSTITUTE FOR CATALAN STUDIES SINCE 1979 CONNECTING NORTH AMERICA TO CATALONIA

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