The artist and poet Perejaume (Sant Pol de Mar, 1957) works at the National Art Museum of Catalonia on the first major exhibition dedicated to Josep Maria Jujol, following the donation of the architect’s entire documentary collection by his family to the COAC and the MNAC.
The Museum is organizing this exhibition within the framework of Barcelona’s designation as the World Capital of Architecture in 2026.
Josep Maria Jujol (Tarragona 1879–Barcelona 1949), to whom the MNAC has dedicated a permanent collection space since 2014, is one of the most brilliant and original figures in early 20th-century architecture. Equally architect, artist, and craftsman, the appeal of his work has grown steadily in recent decades.
In addition to works from Jujol’s legacy—comprising more than 10,000 documents, objects, and furniture—and numerous other public and private collections, the exhibition will feature works by architects such as Antoni Gaudí and Bruno Taut, and artists including Vladimir Tatlin and Henri Matisse. This exhibition continues the line of another artistic project by Perejaume at the National Museum, Mareperlers i ovaladors. Maniobra de Perejaume (2014). Paintings, drawings, sculptures, installations, photographs, videos, and books are just some of the media Perejaume has used in his projects since the late 1970s. His work constructs an artistic system of profound critical force, closely tied to forms of life rooted in rural experience. Through his practice, Perejaume creates a shared space where the human and non-human meet, conveyed through unconventional writing and a luminous irony.
In Perejaume’s own words:
"For about fifty years, Josep Maria Jujol has been a cult architect. The rather small scale and the multiple, dispersed nature of his interventions have kept his work in a state of continual discovery. Today, beyond his collaboration with Antoni Gaudí—which was fundamental for both architects—Jujol’s creations represent one of the most singular lyrical adventures in early 20th-century European architecture.
Facing anyone who engages with it, his work takes shape as a fact: at once powerful and delicate, it likes to be perceived and discreet in equal measure. Therefore, cautious as we are about a proposed exhibition, we want to both show and conceal it as it deserves. Knowing how to exhibit, and how not to overexpose, is not easy—but for a body of work so tied to the ideals of discretion and surprise, it is essential. Even more so today, because the fragile, dispersed, and vulnerable nature of these creations makes them ill-suited to the impact of a large public. In this context, certain assertive narratives that victimize the architect only fuel media vanity and undermine Jujol’s wisdom in knowing how to stay on the margins.
How to exhibit without overexposing? Having another artist act as the ‘manipulator’ of the exhibition might help provide Jujol’s work a protective shell. At least, that is our intention. We also believe this can be aided by opening the architect’s work to other worlds and names that interlace it: popular culture, the Baroque, Picasso, Miró, Matisse…
Our idea is to celebrate the fertile, imaginative, and festive quality of an exceptional creator, while preserving the genuine strength that remains in some of his constructions, drawings, furniture, ironwork, and sgraffito. Yet the question continues to challenge us: How to exhibit Jujol? How to avoid overexposing him? How to let the materials shine without diminishing their force?
On another note, we would like to highlight the compassionate intent present in all of Jujol’s buildings, beyond the explicitly liturgical. Jujol’s poetics unfold in a radical tension between boldness and fervor, between modernity and resistance, and, especially in his early creations, avant-garde and religiosity maintain absolute complicity.
One last point: In recent decades, there have been several exhibitions of Jujol’s work. This one has the joy of having access, for the first time, to the architect’s complete documentary collection—more than 10,000 documents, objects, and furniture, recently donated by the family to the College of Architects of Catalonia and the National Art Museum of Catalonia. It will be a privilege to begin, with the help of the entire exhibition team, a reading of these materials."*
The Manipulator
17-03-2025
