So not really totally out of my beloved Spain, even if some posts still pending from my last trip to sunny Spain. Let me bring you up to date with the fantastic cultural season coming up and some goodies! Right now I am sunny and windy at 16C or about 62F while my beloved Madrid is at 20C or about 70F and cloudy. But let’s get in into the real deal !
The musical A Chorus Line, which will serve to inaugurate in a few weeks , they estimate it will be in November. The Soho Caixabank Theater, the project promoted by Antonio Banderas in Malaga, his hometown. The show can also be seen later in Bilbao, Barcelona and Madrid. I saw him on the practice routines and shoud be wonderful lots of energy and choreography! He is involved personally in the theater with private funds! And ,also trying to bring more arts away from the better known cities in Spain. More here: https://teatrodelsoho.com/
Just 200 years ago, Francisco de Goya gave the first strokes of his black paintings, a series of 14 murals among which are some of his best-known works: Saturno devorando a su hijo,( Saturn devouring his son ) Perro semihundido,( Semi-sunken dog) Duelo a garrotazos (Duel with sticks), Dos viejos (Two old men) , El aquelarre (the Covern)… He painted them on the walls of his house, Quinta del Sordo, a farm he bought in 1819 on the outskirts of Madrid to escape social life, already completely deaf, sick and increasingly elusive of the convulsive political situation, presaging perhaps his future exile in Bordeaux. Maybe that’s why they came out so dark and violent. There, in Bordeaux, the painter died in 1828. At the Fernán Gómez Center ,Plaza de Colon, has built an ambitious project that includes the premiere of a theatrical piece by José Sanchis Sinisterra, written expressly for the commemoration, and a large exhibition with a hundred works by 58 contemporary artists in which the Aragonese (Goya) footprint is appreciated: Antonio Saura, Antoni Tàpies, Rafael and Daniel Canogar, Cristina Iglesias, Luis Gordillo, Carmen Calvo, Eva Lootz, William Kentridge, Jorge Galindo and Rogelio López Cuenca, among others. In the main one there are works that reinterpret Goya’s titles: there are some canvases of the famous series Goya de Saura’s dog; a Saturn by Pablo Serrano (1974) and another by Robert Longo (2012), as well as a Chronicle Team Leocadia and an installation by Pilar Albarracín that materializes the print 39 of Los Caprichos (whims) by placing a large donkey on a mountain of books. Goya’s imprint on contemporary art, which can be visited until November 24 2019. More info here: https://www.teatrofernangomez.es/
Don Carlo, in the Teatro Real , Plaza de Isabel II ,in the last four years, the final operatic tetralogy of Giuseppe Verdi has been seen in the Teatro Real (Royal Theater), with leaps back and forth: two lucrative commissions from abroad and his two calm collaborations with Arrigo Boito inspired by Shakespeare. Music by Giuseppe Verdi. Maria Agresta, Marcelo Puente, Ekaterina Semenchuk, Dmitri Belosselskiy and Luca Salsi, among others. Royal Choir and Orchestra of the Teatro Real. Musical direction: Nicola Luisotti. Stage direction: David McVicar. Until October 6, 2019. More info here:https://www.teatroreal.es/en
Theater companies such as Matarile, Mal Pelo or Imaginary Numbers will alternate in the next edition with great international figures such as Milo Rau, Alain Platel and Maja Kleczewska and the Théâtre Vidy-Lausanne are some of the great names of the international theater that will participate in the 37th edition of the Fall Festival of the Community of Madrid, which will be held between November 15 and December 1 2019. Also, the Chilean company La Re-Sentida, which already performed last year at the Festival de Otoño (Autumn Festival), returns this year with Landscapes to avoid coloring. From Argentina come a unique performance by Fernando Rubio, entitled Everything that is next to me, in which viewers are invited to share a conversation in a bed with seven Spanish actresses: Susi Sánchez, María Morales, Nerea Barros, Mónica Bardem , Marta Poveda, Elena Seguí and Conchi Espejo. And also from Argentina, the well-known Claudio Tolcachir will present Proximo (Next). More info here: http://www.madrid.org/fo/2019/
CaixaForum proposes a trip through more than 200 treasures from the Assyrian empire to that of Alexander the Great: the exhibition Lujos (Luxury). From the Assyrians to Alexander the Great. The 217 precious objects that are exhibited in CaixaForum ,Paseo del Prado, 36 from September 20 to January 12, 2020. From the Assyrians, through the Phoenicians, the exhibition discovers the luxuries of the Babylonians or the great influence of the Achaemenids. It ends with the arrival of Alexander the Great, who changed everything. All the objects in the exhibition, which belong to the British Museum, constitute a journey through the history of conquests, incessant struggles and looting; but they are also proof of the great commercial and cultural exchange of empires that occupied an area between the Iberian Peninsula and India. The oldest object dates from 1,000 B.C. It is a belt carved with such care that remembers the will of humans to create and possess beautiful things. Then and now. More info here: https://caixaforum.es/es/madrid/p/lujo-de-los-asirios-a-alejandro-magno_a9279631
The towers of the Evangelists of the Sagrada Familia (Holy Family) Barcelona, will be crowned by the four figures that represent them: an angel to Matthew; a lion to Marcos; an ox to Lucas, and an eagle to John, with sculptures by Xavier Medina Campeny that will measure about nine meters each. The tower of Mary will also end predictably in 2021, and that of Jesus will be the last to end, in 2022. The four Evangelists have reached 106 meters and are only one to match the towers that Gaudí built for the Nativity facade before he died in 1926. Yesterday the prototypes of the terminals of this tetramorphous were presented, which will have the shape of a man, Lion, bull and eagle. They will end up at 135 meters high, weigh 14 tons and measure nine meters high, 6.5 of them will be huge wings. The base of these figures will house powerful spotlights that will illuminate the tallest tower, that of Jesus Christ, of 172.5 meters.
The Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) has admitted for processing the appeal raised by the Platform of People Affected by the Sagrada Familia against the special urban plan approved by the City Council of Barcelona in February 2019 and promoted by the temple board. The approval of the aforementioned plan implies, de facto, the construction of a platform 57 meters long and five meters wide on the facade of Calle Mallorca, a first part of a cantilever that would compromise the future of the houses located in that strip. The City Council undertook to summon the neighbors and all those interested in participating in that debate in which, among other things, the following should be addressed: the legitimacy of the stairway project that the Board assures was of Gaudí, how the expropriation of the floors and businesses affected, the quantification of what it would entail and, most importantly, who should face this millionaire expense. So I guess to be continue… More on the renovation/construction in Spanish here: https://sagradafamilia.org/es/hacia-el-2026
Daniel Landi, member of Comando G ( G of Garnacha), is a master in the art of extracting the old Castilian Grenache from Gredos its glorious singularity. and it has been doing it for a few years in the designation of origin Vinos de Madrid. Always using surprising red names for its red wines, such as La Mujer Cañón, Reina de los Deseos, Hombre Bala o este, La Bruja de Rozas,(the witch of Rozas) por Rozas de Puerto Real, where its nine hectares are located with vineyards between 50 and 90 years old; settled on soils degraded granites that bring freshness and finesse. It is a forested enclave, on the slopes of the Sierra de Gredos, almost 900 meters high. Biodynamic philosophy and fermentations separately in wooden vats and aging for 10 months in French oak vats. They thus obtain a complex red wine, where the compiled wild fruit maintains its aromatic chromaticism, and the discreet imprint of the wood allows the presence of floral and spicy nuances, together with the dreamy memory of balsamic herbs. Long, fresh and tasty, it conquers you without boasting body and color.Another Spanish innovation in winemaking. More info on contact here: http://comandog.es/
And this on the wine La Bruja de Rozaz from one of my all time favorites Jancis Robinson: https://www.jancisrobinson.com/articles/comando-g-la-bruja-de-rozas-201617-vinos-de-madrid
Something exotic from the land of Quixote’s dreams Castilla La Mancha! For millennia, the waters of this Xuq river have been scratching the ground of this part of the region of La Manchuela of Albacete creating an amazing vertical landscape of canyons of white and yellowish earth crossed by a green artery of poplars, ash trees, fig trees and willows, to those that were added productive orchards that take advantage of the rich silt left by the river course century after century. In that environment is XUQ, which takes its name, precisely, from the old Arabic denomination of Júcar: Xuquer. Enterprises folks have turned these old cave-houses into tremendously attractive accommodations, mixing the exotic rusticity of the caves with design furniture and modern decorative elements, creating environments where traditional and artisanal coexist with industrial and avant-garde. The eight suites are different from each other. Its interior aspect has changed but they are still bioclimatic houses in which the temperature is constant throughout the year (between 18 and 20ºC). A great idea for a get away and dream on! More here: https://www.xuq.es/grupo_de_alojamiento_turistico/
And there you for this edition of Some news from Spain, which is everything under the Sun! or where La vida es chula (life is beautiful). Hope you have enjoy it. I will continue with Madrid!!
And remember, happy travels, good health, and many cheers to all!!!
Paris1972-Versailles2003 