The Museums are growing
Sitges Museums received 1,382 works by acquisition, loan or donation, since the reopening of Cau Ferrat and Maricel Museum, in December 2014. This is a set of works - some of remarkable and accentuated artistic and heritage value - which have allowed the collections to be expanded and complement the stories and circuits. The exhibition Museums are growing. New additions to the fund – curated by the head of Sitges Museum Collections, Ignasi Domènech – presents a selection of 300 pieces from this set of works added to the Museums' fund.
Picasso, Casas, Rusiñol, Nonell... The exhibition allows works from different periods, styles and formats to interact in the rooms on the ground floor of Maricel, which have been conveniently grouped by collections. There are exhibited pieces of remarkable artistic value, such as La vídua, a large-format oil painting by Isidre Nonell (1905-06), which coexists with other works from the turn of the century by artists such as Ramon Casas (Granada, c.1883 or Manola, c.1887, among others), Santiago Rusiñol (La drecera, 1885), Ignacio Zuloaga (Portrait of Jane Seymour, Queen of England), Darío de Regoyos (Procession, c.1904) and Joaquim Sunyer (Woman in a cafe, 1900), among others.
The exhibition also presents pieces by Olga Saharoff (Portrait of Maria Rosa Reventós as a young woman, dressed in black, c.1952) Feliu Elias (Still life [tea service], 1936), Alfred Sisquella (Portrait of Josep Sisquella, son of artist, 1939), Artur Carbonell (Still life with fruit, 1934) and a collection of paintings and drawings by Francesc Llorens (as Dry cleaner’s interior, 1873).
In addition to oils and drawings, the exhibition also presents sculptures by Ismael Smith (Salome, 1910), Gustau Violet (Bust of Juli Carsalade du Pont, bishop of Elna, c.1905) or Pere Jou (Reclining Nude with hands on the head, 1951), among others. There is also a complete display of photographs in which Santiago Rusiñol appears and a collection of dolls from the end of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th.
The glass collection. One of the highlights of The museums grow. New additions to the fund is the exhibition of glass pieces by Alfons Macaya, which has been deposited at the Maricel Museum. It is one of the most important private glass collections in Catalonia and has not been exhibited until now. It brings together works that go from the eighth century before Christ to the modern era and offers an interesting journey through history, through necklaces, jugs, trays, lamps, fruit bowls, glasses or servers.
The pieces exhibited in The museums grow. New additions to the funds are a selection of the 1,382 works received by Sitges Museums in the last eight years. Of these, 108 are own acquisitions by the Sitges Heritage Consortium, 812 come from donations and 462 have been received on deposit. With this exhibition, the Sitges Museums want to publicly thank the people, some of whom prefer to remain anonymous, who have donated or shared their works.