Chapter 2 Findings and problems of previous research, and objective of the present study

In this chapter, by classifying the principal studies and articles devoted to Jujol and his work published from his death to the present day, the genealogy of Jujol scholarship is clarified, the problems inherent in previous research are identified, and the objective and scope of the present study are defined.

The works and articles published after Jujol's death in 1949 that address his person and his work were collected and selected through research conducted at the Càtedra Gaudí of the Barcelona School of Architecture and at the library of the Architects' Association of Catalonia. All such materials were compiled exhaustively; those sharing the same authorship or the same argumentative orientation were grouped together and classified into two periods. Around the first half of the 1980s, significant differences in argumentative tendency are observed, influenced also by the social situation — the advance of democratisation in Spain and the consequent rehabilitation of Catalanism. Whereas studies on Jujol prior to the first half of the 1980s confine themselves to situating him within Catalan Modernisme centred on his relationship with Gaudí, from the second half of the 1980s onwards numerous articles with a different orientation appear, and these are therefore treated separately.

2.1 Studies on Jujol situated within Catalan Modernisme, from the 1950s to the first half of the 1980s

2.1.1 On the obituary article "Jujol" by Josep F. Ràfols (1950)

In June 1950, shortly after Jujol's death in 1949, an obituary article by Ràfols was published in Cuadernos, the journal of the Architects' Association of Catalonia. This is the first article on Jujol published after his death. In it, Ràfols begins by recounting his personal memories and then describes Jujol's life in separate sections: on Jujol as a pupil, on the body of his architectural and decorative works, and on Jujol's drawings. In the section on Jujol as a pupil, Ràfols mentions the names of three masters: Antoni Maria Gallissà, Josep Font, and Antoni Gaudí; of Gallissà and Font he states that Jujol was more a collaborator than a pupil, and that Jujol's participation brought their works a level of artistic diversity they had never previously attained. Regarding his relationship with Gaudí, by contrast, Ràfols emphasises that it was a more reciprocal and active relationship, owing to the fact that Jujol originally felt a profound veneration for Gaudí, and he situates its beginning at the time of the construction of the <Casa Batlló>. In the section on the body of architectural and decorative works, he traces the genealogy of Jujol's architectural works; and in the section on Jujol's drawings, he affirms that what particularly distinguished Jujol among Gaudí's pupils was his outstanding draughtsmanship.

2.1.2 On the article "Architectural guide to Jujol" (1972) and the study "Gaudí, Jujol y el Modernismo catalán" (1982) by Carlos Flores

In the article published in the July–August 1972 issue of the journal Hogar y Arquitectura under the title "Architectural guide to Jujol", Flores argues that if one intends to situate with historical precision the drawings and architectural works that Jujol left behind, it is necessary to attend both to his personality and to the context of his work, and that only with these two factors can one understand how Jujol, departing from Gaudíism and Catalan Modernisme, subsequently succeeded in achieving an entirely personal world of expression. According to him, Jujol is not a mere imitator of Gaudí and should not be categorised simply as a Modernista or Gaudíist. In the relationship with Gaudí as well, influences were mutual, and at the foundation of each work there existed a personal artistry, according to Flores.

Flores then emphasises that Catalan Modernisme had two strands, which he defines respectively as: (1) Modernisme as historicism, and (2) Modernisme as mannerism, and argues that, although it is difficult to distinguish them strictly, it was evident that Modernisme was a mixture of these two aspects. In this article, Flores contends that Modernisme should not be regarded as something exclusive to architecture, but as a social phenomenon of diffuse scope, and that in reality its origins must be sought in the interaction and confluence of diverse factors, the primary cause being the various transformations of Barcelona's society at the time, and that in its initial period it was evidently enormously influenced by the political situation of the moment — that is, by the emergence of Catalanism.

According to Flores, Modernisme as historicism was clearly influenced by the archaeological tendency of the late nineteenth century and by eclecticism, and may be regarded as the creative sublimation of nostalgia for the medieval glory of Catalonia; Modernisme as mannerism, by contrast, began fundamentally when eclecticism appeared to have exhausted the forms borrowed from historical models. Flores asserts categorically that Jujol had nothing to do with the nostalgia of Modernisme as historicism, and that in Jujol's works there are no references to or traces of inspiration from examples of the past. He therefore concludes that the stylistic rupture observable in Jujol's works does not merely signify a break with imitation, but pointed beyond Modernisme, and affirms that Jujol discovered a world of free expression remote from the reconstruction of historical design.

In his 1982 book "Gaudí, Jujol y el Modernismo catalán", Flores carries his earlier ideas still further, arguing that Gaudí's expression did not come to full flowering until after he had turned fifty, and that until that point, although Gaudí retained an undeniable originality, it cannot be denied that he also presented marked aspects of historicism and eclecticism. Flores argues that Jujol played an important role in the process of transformation of this "historicist-eclectic" Gaudí. Flores states: "Gaudí's expression blossoms in its full plenitude around 1904–1906, with the <Casa Batlló>. At that moment, for the first time, he abandons the various historical meanings and begins to create works of creative impression", reiterating that the collaboration between Gaudí and Jujol began precisely with the construction of the <Casa Batlló>. Flores cites the three-period classification of the evolution of Gaudí's works elaborated by Salvador Tarragó: the First Period, from 1876 with the <Casa Vicens> to 1900 with the <Casa Calvet>, in which various historicist styles predominate; the Second Period, from 1900 to 1914, a period of maturity in which Gaudí flourished as an architect with his own style, encompassing the <Parque Güell>, the <Casa Batlló>, the <Casa Milà>, the <Escuela de la Colonia Güell>, the church of the <Colonia Güell>, and the "second solution" of the <Sagrada Família>; and the Third Period, from 1915 to 1926, in which he devoted himself exclusively to the <Sagrada Família>, making extensive use of ruled surfaces as the "third solution" of that cathedral. Flores argues that the transition from the First to the Second Period was achieved thanks to Jujol's participation, emphasising with greater insistence that the relationship between the two was one of mutual influence.

2.1.3 On the study "La arquitectura de J. Mª. Jujol" (1974) by the architect's son

"La arquitectura de J. Mª. Jujol" is the first biography to offer a panoramic view of the entirety of Jujol's architectural activity, written by his son Josep Maria Jujol i Jover, who bears the same name as the architect. It divides Jujol's life into four stages: childhood; youth at the Barcelona School of Architecture; the period as a collaborator of Gaudí; the period as an independent architect; and the post-war period.

In this work, the author, Josep Maria Jujol i Jover, placing the analysis of Jujol's personality at the centre of his inquiry, endeavours to situate Jujol within the Catalan architectural thought of the early twentieth century. Jujol i Jover argues that Jujol's mode of expression was, in overall terms, consistent throughout his entire life, regardless of whether he was collaborating with Gaudí or not, and that influences, where they existed, were mutual. From a global perspective, Jujol's work, from his youth onwards, maintained its own coherent personality, establishing what Jujol i Jover terms the "Jujol style". Jujol's style existed in parallel to that of Gaudí and was never derived from it. Gaudí himself thought in the same way, as demonstrated by the anecdote that Jujol i Jover recounts of when the Archbishop of Tarragona, the priest Vidal i Barraquer, visited Gaudí at the <Sagrada Família> accompanied by Jujol. When the priest said to Jujol: "You are a pupil of Gaudí", Gaudí immediately interrupted: "No, father, he is not a pupil. He is a brother."

Thus, acknowledging that Jujol received a great influence from Gaudí, the arguments common to the works and articles mentioned thus far are: the fact that this relationship was not unilateral but one of mutual influence, and that in his activity as an independent architect Jujol also departed from Gaudí's influence to arrive at an expression of his own.

2.1.4 On the "Prologue" by Salvador Tarragó in the study "La arquitectura de J. Mª. Jujol" (1974)

In S. Tarragó's prologue to the aforementioned work "La arquitectura de J. Mª. Jujol", the following topics are addressed: the significance of the body of works from Jujol's 1908–1926 period, the surrealist aspect of Jujol within the world of Gaudí, the manner of defining Gaudíism, Jujol's position as a draughtsman, among others. Tarragó identifies as the reason for focusing attention on the works of the 1908–1926 period the fact that in 1908 Jujol completed his first work as an independent architect following the collaboration with Gaudí — the <Teatro de la Asociación Obrera> — and that from 1926 Jujol abandoned Modernisme and moved towards classicism. Tarragó also argues that the works of the 1908–1926 period possess a spatially coherent quality in their interior. He furthermore asserts that Gaudíism was not for Jujol a style of the past, but something that Jujol himself had absorbed through his collaboration with Gaudí, and that it is therefore unfair to claim that Jujol's work is an imitation of Gaudí without a legitimate understanding of Gaudíism. He states that Jujol carried the surrealist aspect of Gaudíism still further, and that this may be set against the fact that Rubió, another pupil of Gaudí, carried the structural rationalist aspect of Gaudíism still further. Tarragó describes Jujol as a versatile artist and affirms that the foundation of his expression was his talent as a draughtsman.

2.1.5 Other studies on Jujol between 1950 and the first half of the 1980s

These include the work by Oriol Bohigas of 1976, "Josep Maria Jujol", and the work by G. R. Collins of 1983, "Introduction and guide to the architecture of Jujol". Both are works that present and comment upon Jujol's principal works within the framework of Catalan Modernisme centred on Gaudí.

2.2 Studies on Jujol from the second half of the 1980s onwards

2.2.1 Studies on Jujol relating to the landscape and traditional construction techniques of Catalonia, initiated by the work "Jujol en Sant Joan Despí" (1987) by Montserrat Duran

The 1987 work by Montserrat Duran, "Jujol en Sant Joan Despí", offers a panoramic survey of the residences that Jujol built in the municipality of Sant Joan Despí, on the outskirts of Barcelona, where he served as consulting architect from 1926 until his death. The subsequent work by the same author, "La arquitectura desconocida de Josep Maria Jujol" (2003), aims to present Jujol's works scattered across the plain of Tarragona — today almost unknown to the general public — and to introduce the landscape and culture of his native Tarragona, which appear to constitute the substratum of Jujol's artistry.

The 2002 work by Antonio Salcedo, "Jujol en la provincia de Tarragona — Presentación fotográfica por Joan Alberich", focuses particularly on Jujol's works in the province of Tarragona, presenting a summary of them with photographs. The 2004 work by Josep Baig, "Jujol en Valls — Restauración de la iglesia de El Roser (1925–1927)", is the record of the restoration of the church of the small town of Valls on the plain of Tarragona, destroyed during the Civil War, and describes with precision even the specific constructional details, with illustrations.

These articles present a new perspective on Jujol — his relationship with the landscape and traditional construction techniques of Catalonia — a perspective that had previously been discussed mainly within the framework of Catalan Modernisme.

2.2.2 Studies on Jujol relating to modern artistic movements, initiated by the work "Jujol" (1990) by Ignasi de Solà-Morales

In his 1990 work "Jujol", Ignasi de Solà-Morales refers to the influence of the modern artistic movements of early twentieth-century Barcelona — such as those of Picasso and Miró — upon Jujol. According to Solà-Morales, the criticality discernible in Jujol's work is shared with that observable in the works of Joan Miró and Max Ernst, and constitutes a precedent of Dadaism and Surrealism by virtue of its capacity to embody the contradictions of modernity. Solà-Morales states: "Jujol's methodology must find its specificity in that it carefully avoids systematisation, and in that its characteristic features are extravagance and self-generation." He also notes that, whereas in modern art the work demands the decoding of a ciphered meaning, Jujol's work, rather than presenting keys to be deciphered, proposes a mechanism of permanent decipherment that incorporates the diversity of the circumstances involved. He affirms that if Jujol's work can on occasion appear unfinished, it is because the work itself includes the process of decipherment, always preserving the possibility of new interpretations.

The contemporary Catalan artist Pere Jaume, in an article included in the catalogue of the exhibition "Jujol Dissenyador" held in 2002, emphasised the aspect of Jujol's work as a precursor of twentieth-century art, citing the names of Joan Miró and Antoni Tàpies. The central argument of his article is the interest in Jujol from a surrealist perspective. Pere Jaume contends that when perceiving Jujol's works, the individual parts give an impression of incoherence and confusion, while the overall impression is one of unity. According to Pere Jaume, if one contemplates Jujol's work from a distance, the overall image can be clearly perceived, but if the parts are observed individually, they subdivide into minimal points and are perceived as disintegrated into endless fragments. This tendency Pere Jaume terms "casual unity" as a type of unity different from the conventional one. He argues that a similar tendency exists as a common feature in Catalan art of the first half of the twentieth century, and that Jujol's work precedes it. In Jujol's architectural works there are torsions, oscillations, and curvatures — which might be termed baroque — founded solely on the artist's inner inspiration. Although they appear to arise spontaneously from Jujol's originality, the spatial quality they generate is coherent, according to Pere Jaume.

These articles present a new perspective on Jujol — his relationship with modern artistic movements — that had until then been treated within the framework of architectural currents centred on Catalan Modernisme.

2.2.3 Studies on Jujol relating to contemporary architecture, initiated by the work "Las cinco obras principales de Jujol (1913–1923)" (1994) by Dennis Dollens

Dennis Dollens and Ronald Christ, members of the American art and architecture critical and editorial group <Sites>, published a series of articles on Jujol in the 1990s. Dollens, in his 1994 work "Las cinco obras principales de Jujol (1913–1923)", clarifies the characteristics of Jujol's own world of architectural expression. Christ wrote the English translation of the biography of Jujol written by his son, "La arquitectura de Jujol", setting forth the entirety of Jujol's architectural activity and the genealogy of all his works. Thanks to the presentation by <Sites>, the surrealist expression of Jujol's architecture once again attracted attention, and focus was placed on Jujol's architecture as a precursor of the activity of modern and contemporary Catalan artists such as A. Tàpies. In an article published in the catalogue of the 1998 exhibition "El mundo de Jujol", Dollens, under the title "Re-surface", addresses the characteristics of Jujol's work from a contemporary perspective, without confining himself to the relationship with Gaudí. In this article, Dollens draws attention to the use of distorted surfaces detached from the structure, and presents a new perspective: Jujol had already anticipated at the beginning of the twentieth century the attempts at plastic forms with curved membranes that today have become a central theme thanks to the development of computer technology.

Thus, from the 1990s onwards, articles appear that address Jujol from a perspective related to contemporary architecture, which may be regarded as an extension of the arguments that attend to his relationship with modern artistic movements.

2.2.4 The article "La iglesia de Vistabella como precedente de la iglesia de Montferri" (1995) by Jos Tomlow, from a structural rationalist perspective

The German structural engineer Jos Tomlow situates Jujol within the structural rationalist genealogy that connects with Gaudí, and focuses on Jujol's works in which the catenary arch serves as the principal structure, such as the <Iglesia de Vistabella> and the <Iglesia de Montferri>. In his 1995 work "La iglesia de Vistabella como precedente de la iglesia de Montferri", Tomlow situates the <Iglesia de Vistabella> as a precursor to the <Iglesia de Montferri> and analyses its structural characteristics and originality. This article provides a new perspective on Jujol's works, which had until then been discussed with a primary focus on decorative expression and surface treatment.

Tomlow's principal point of interest is the catenary arch dome common to both churches. In studying the construction process of the <Iglesia de Vistabella>, designed and supervised by Jujol between 1917 and 1923, Tomlow notices the fact that the window of the central dome that appears in the 1917 plan was ultimately not built. In 1990 Tomlow obtained testimony from an elderly villager that the central dome of the <Iglesia de Vistabella> had been destroyed by wind during construction and subsequently rebuilt. According to him, in this reconstruction Jujol used iron cables for reinforcement for the first time in his work — a system that was also adopted in the construction of the <Iglesia de Montferri>. Tomlow also notes that the form of the bell tower rising above the central dome corresponds to the geometric tangent at the lowest point of the catenary arch, and points out that this bell tower, in the static state, generates no bending stresses in the catenary arch itself, but fulfils the function of restraining the arch's behaviour under horizontal forces such as wind pressure. Tomlow clarified that Jujol, building upon the inverted funicular model design method inherited from Gaudí, developed this method through trial and error in the actual construction process.

Tomlow's article on Jujol from a structural rationalist perspective is significant in that it draws attention to an aspect of the relationship between Jujol and Gaudí that had not previously been treated in detail. However, according to Jujol's own account of the <Iglesia de Vistabella>, the catenary arch was used as a means of creating a smooth wall surface on which to apply decoration, so that the structural rationalist perspective on Jujol must be complemented by reflections on design and decoration.

2.2.5 The article by Aldo van Eyck (1996), which suggests new possibilities for the contemporary evaluation of Jujol

In the prologue to the work "Josep M. Jujol" by Vincent Lightelijn and Rein Saariste, published in 1996, the Dutch architect Aldo van Eyck affirms that "attending to the decorative details in Jujol's architecture not only complements what Modernism has excluded, but contributes to regenerating a vivid spatial quality", and argues that the details of Jujol's works carry a significance that transcends their scale. Van Eyck then states: "Jujol as architect created spaces according to use and function, while Jujol as decorator transformed them into entirely unexpected environments", and argues that Jujol rescued spaces from the univocality of use and function through decoration, leading them towards a polysemic dimension. Thus, van Eyck's article attempts to advance, from a contemporary perspective, arguments concerning decoration — a topic rarely treated in the context of contemporary architectural thought — and represents a possibility for the contemporary evaluation of Jujol beyond the historical context of Catalan Modernisme.

2.2.6 Other studies on Jujol from the second half of the 1980s onwards

The 1984 work by J. Bassegoda, "Homenaje al gran arquitecto tarraconense — Colección de dibujos de Jujol", presents drawings by Jujol's own hand; the 1990 work by the same author, "Jujol (colección Gent Nostra, vol. 77)", offers a summary of Jujol's life and principal works. In 1992, J. Llinàs and J. Saura published the works catalogue "Josep Maria Jujol", which comments on the principal works with photographs and appends a chronology. The 2001 work by J. Bassegoda, "La Casa Batlló", presents arguments supporting the position that denies Jujol's participation in Gaudí's <Casa Batlló>.

2.3 Synthesis of the arguments in previous research

In this chapter, the works and articles devoted to Jujol and his work published from his death in 1949 to the present day were collected, ordered, and classified according to the arguments underpinning them, and the position of each article and its mutual relationships were examined.

From 1950 to the first half of the 1980s, it was established that, in addition to the perspective that regards Jujol as a pupil of Gaudí, there appear positions that recognise that mutual influences operated in both directions and even positions that regard Jujol as a representative of Catalan Modernisme, and that the discussion centred primarily on the nature of the relationship of influence between Jujol and Gaudí.

From the second half of the 1980s onwards, there emerged arguments that, without being subordinated to the relationship with Gaudí or Catalan Modernisme, treat Jujol as a precursor of modern artistic movements; also arguments that situate Jujol not only in the context of modern and contemporary architectural currents in Catalonia, but in that of the landscape and tradition of the Catalonia region centred on Tarragona; and articles that situate Jujol within the genealogy of structural expressionism inherited from Gaudí and that approach him from contemporary perspectives of architectural design.

2.4 Objective and significance of the present study

As already noted, Jujol was recognised and treated in his native country of Spain — particularly in the autonomous community of Catalonia centred on Barcelona — as one of the architects who played a leading role in Spanish and Catalan architecture in the first half of the twentieth century.

In Japan, however, despite being one of the representatives of Spanish Catalan Modernisme, his name appears in only a small number of monographic publications in architecture journals, and no research has been conducted that directly analyses his person and work from an architectural and academic standpoint. For this reason, in this chapter the principal reflections on Jujol published from his death to the present day were collected, ordered, and classified according to the arguments underpinning them, with the aim of clarifying the evolution of those arguments and of examining the relationships among the various articles.

The objective of the present study is, departing from the genealogy of Jujol scholarship to date, to reflect first on the primary sources that Jujol left — such as his writings and plans — and subsequently on Jujol's architectural works, with the aim of elucidating his architectural ideas and the aesthetic characteristics of his work.

The perspectives of studies on Jujol are the following two. The first is that, since Jujol was an architect who practised during the final period of Catalan Modernisme in the early twentieth century, the advancement of research into him will make it possible to reflect on the continuity of architectural thought between the Modernisme period and the period that followed. The second is the possibility that research into the extensive body of plans that Jujol left may complement the lacunae that existed in research on Spanish and Catalan architectural currents centred on the study of Antoni Gaudí.

This research aims to demonstrate that Jujol was an exceptional figure who, as Gaudí's right-hand man, immersed himself fully in his creative activity deploying therein the entirety of his creative capacity, and who was also an architect who, working independently, produced works of sufficient quality to participate in the Catalan artistic movement; and it aims to situate Jujol within the broad category of the history of modern and contemporary architecture, including Catalan Modernisme, as something more than a mere pupil of Gaudí.

2.5 Research methodology and location of primary sources

It was noted in the Introduction that, despite being one of the representatives of Catalan Modernisme, no research has been conducted that directly analyses his person and work from an architectural and academic standpoint. For this reason, in the preceding chapter of the Introduction, the works and articles published from his death to the present day that are devoted to Jujol and his work were exhaustively collected and ordered, thereby clarifying the genealogy of Jujol scholarship.

In the Main Part, the historical and social context of Jujol's creative activity will first be confirmed, his writings will be examined, and — taken together with the content of Chapter 2 of the Introduction — a twofold reflection on the person and work of the architect Jujol will be carried out, both from the outside and from the inside. Subsequently, detailed investigation and study of the body of plans he left will be undertaken, and his principal architectural works will also be examined, centring the analysis on the <Casa Bofarull>, for which a detailed measured survey was carried out in 2004, scrutinising meticulously its correspondence with the autograph plan material.

Jujol's writings are compiled in a list held at the Biblioteca Pública de Tarragona. Jujol's plans and drawings as primary sources are stored principally in the library of the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, in the archive of the Architects' Association of Catalonia, and in the archive under the custody of Jujol's son. In this research, the materials held in the library of the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya were verified during fieldwork conducted in September 2003; those held in the archive of the Architects' Association of Catalonia were verified during research conducted in October 2003; those exhibited in the exhibition <Arquitectura viva: exposición de Gaudí y Jujol> and those held in the archive under the custody of Jujol's son were verified during fieldwork conducted in February 2004.

2.6 Summary

In Chapter 2 of the Introduction, the articles on Jujol published from his death in 1949 to the present day were exhaustively collected and ordered, classified according to the arguments underpinning them, and the position of each article and its mutual relationships were examined.

From 1950 to the first half of the 1980s, it was confirmed that, in addition to the perspective that regards Jujol as a pupil of Gaudí, there appear positions that recognise that mutual influences operated in both directions and even positions that regard Jujol as a representative of Catalan Modernisme, and that the discussion centred primarily on the nature of the relationship of influence between Jujol and Gaudí.

From the second half of the 1980s onwards, it was confirmed that there emerged arguments that, without being subordinated to the relationship with Gaudí or Catalan Modernisme, treat Jujol as a precursor of modern artistic movements; also arguments that situate Jujol not only in the context of the modern and contemporary architectural currents as a whole, but in that of the landscape and tradition of the Catalonia region centred on Tarragona; articles that situate Jujol within the genealogy of structural expressionism inherited from Gaudí; and articles that approach Jujol from contemporary perspectives of architectural design.

Departing from the genealogy of Jujol scholarship to date, the objective of the present study was defined as: to reflect first on the primary sources that Jujol left — such as his writings and plans — and subsequently on Jujol's architectural works, with the aim of elucidating his architectural ideas and the aesthetic characteristics of his work.

As perspectives of studies on Jujol, two points were identified: the first is that, since Jujol was an architect who practised during the final period of Catalan Modernisme in the early twentieth century, the advancement of research into him will make it possible to reflect on the continuity of architectural thought between the Modernisme period and the period that followed; the second is the possibility that research into the extensive body of plans that Jujol left may complement the lacunae that existed in research on Spanish and Catalan architectural currents from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth century, centred on the study of Antoni Gaudí.

The research methodology and the content and location of the primary sources were subsequently indicated, noting that the complete content of Jujol's writings is compiled at the Biblioteca Pública de Tarragona, and that the autograph plans and drawings are stored, divided among the library of the Escola Tècnica Superior d'Arquitectura of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, the archive of the Architects' Association of Catalonia, and the archive under the custody of Jujol's son, with their principal portions having been verified through fieldwork and presented together with the list.