London Gallery Reprises 1937 Spanish Pavilion
Installation shots from the exhibit in London.
Set in the heart of London’s commercial art gallery district, Mayoral’s “Art Revolutionaries” is an homage to the Spanish Republic’s Pavilion in the famous Paris Exposition of 1937. The Spanish contribution deliberately and consciously expressed both the modernity of the Republic and the life and death struggle in which it was embroiled. The centrepiece, of course, was Picasso’s powerful depiction of the bombing of Guernica, prominently displayed at one end of a spacious, open auditorium.
Vivid Republican posters accompany a short film of the original 1937 exhibition.
View of exterior mural, Spanish Pavilion, 1937, Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques. Arxiu Historic del Collegi Oficial d’Arquitectes de Catalunya, Barcelona. Photo by Roness-Ruan.
This lovingly curated exhibition goes to great lengths to re-create the impression of the original pavilion. On the first floor, works by Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró, Alexander Calder and Julio González, many sourced from private collections, sit within a scale model of the original auditorium. Downstairs, interposed among detailed replicas of the original furniture, vivid Republican posters accompany a short film of the original 1937 exhibition, while helpful panels and displays of rich archival material recount the political and artistic context.
The exhibition has already been shown in Paris and Barcelona and when its time in London ends, there are no plans for it to go elsewhere. That, I think, is a shame. This (Mayoral’s wonderful catalogue aside) is the nearest most of us will get to experiencing the original Paris exposition. Based solely on what is on display here, it must surely have been a sight worth seeing.
Richard Baxell is the author of Unlikely Warriors, a history of the British volunteers in the Spanish Civil War.
