Modernisme was a cultural movement led by deeply individualistic and anti-traditionalist intellectuals who, roughly from 1888 (the First International Exposition of Barcelona) to 1911 (the death of Joan Maragall, the most important Modernista poet), attempted to update Catalan arts and ideas so as to uplift Catalan culture to a par with other European cultures. Such renewal included a distinctive style of Art Nouveau in architecture and plastic arts, but also the introduction of Symbolism, Decadence, Nietzschean Vitalism, Parnassianism and other contemporaneous movements into Catalan literature and philosophy, a modernizing transformation of Catalan traditional music, and so forth.

Although the Catalan word modernisme has a wider sense, in the arts it usually refers to the currents known in other countries as Art Nouveau, Modern Style, Jugendstil, Stile Liberty, Sezessionstil, etc. It is a style basically derived from the English Arts and Crafts movement, the Pre-Raphaelite movement, the Gothic revival and the Aesthetic Movement (a restrained prelude to Art Nouveau), as well as from Symbolism. It is characterized by the predominance of the curve over the straight line, by rich decoration and detail, by the frequent use of vegetal and other organic motifs, the taste for asymmetry, a refined aestheticism, and the dynamic shapes.

Antoni Gaudí is the best-known architect of this movement. Other influential architects were Lluís Domènech i Montaner and Josep Puig i Cadafalch, and later Josep Maria Jujol. Notable painters from the movement include the abovementioned Santiago Rusiñol and Ramon Casas.

Links

• Modernisme – Wikipedia