Coinciding with the centenary of her birth, Fundació Vila Casas presents an anthological exhibition of Maria Girona (Barcelona, 1923–2015), curated by Victoria Combalía and Àlex Susanna, which aims to help us discover her work and contribute to giving her the recognition she deserves, not just a non-academic rereading of Noucentisme but also an extraordinarily refined expression of a Mediterranean imaginary focused on visual stimuli from her magic triangle: Barcelona, Cadaqués and Calaceite.
Whilst it is true that Maria Girona’s rise is wholly nouncentista – she was after all the niece of the painter and critic Rafael Benet –, it is her stay in Paris from 1950 to 1954 (thanks to a grant from the Cercle Maillol at the Institut Français in Barcelona) that marks a turning point in her career because she had the opportunity to really get to know artwork by Cézanne, Matisse, Bonnard, Picasso, Braque and Juan Gris. To a certain extent, her painting, from a starting point of Fauvism, draws upon many lessons from Cubism before becoming fully contemporary in its own right through a very personal, stylized and effective lyricism: “My painting is very emotional, but despite the apparent simplicity, it is quite complicated. I search for a simplicity so that it as a clear emotional richness”.
© Maria Girona: Les garotes, 1975. Fundació Carmen i Lluís Bassat. Foto: Gasull
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