Barcelona miscellaneous

Well, here is the last of my Barcelona pics, with some random photos.

Last night dinner at a delightful vibey restaurant, with Sean and Marta. I was sure great to see them again after so many years! One thing you don't want to do is try and find parking in this area of Barcelona at night. What a mission!

Yum, the local speciality, rabbit with mega garlic and onions. Methinks I should go into food photography!

Funky sculpture

Down at the local varsity hangout, I thought I would try my hand at sports photography. My action shots didn't come out too well, so you'll have to make do with this one.

Another Gaudi building, but there is only so many you can look at, so I never went inside this one.

Good grief, what on earth is going on here!

Dali Museum

Salvador Dali is one of my favourite artists, so I was pleased to take a day trip to his home town in Figueres, and visit the famous Dali museum.

Ah, who could forget the old big egg on the roof decor!

The dome above the main hall and courtyard.

I had heard that Dali is buried below this car.

A peek inside the car.

Dali's tomb somewhere under the car.

errr, what can one say about such a thing!

This painting of Dali's eponymous wife, Gala, was very impressive, due to its massive size!

An example of Dali's jewellery. I didn't know he did that! Of couse, his wife Gala has to be a part of it in the small photo up top.

Please have a look at this video:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=mAEUnaaEetc

It is the most amazing heart jewellery, with a realistic ruby heart that actually beats like a proper heart. Pretty freaky really!! There was also a nice angel with slowly flapping wings.

My feeble attempt at abstract art, entitled "Self-portrait with the ghost of Monroe's liptick"

This is not much to look at in a photo, but is an example of Dali's stereoscopic works, or 3D paintings. It consists of 2 almost identical, but slightly different paintings, which would be positioned on either side of this photo, coming out at 45 degrees. Then there are 2 45 degree mirrors, meeting at the line you see in the centre of the photo. Putting your nose up to the mirror joint and squinting just right allows you to see the painting as one 3d image. What a genius that man was!

Nose and ear swap

The famous Mae West room. For the best view, one walks up a staircase and looks through a convex glass sphere to get the hair to fit nicely. A lot of fun!

The great man himself!

There was also some art by a few other artists. I really enjoyed this fellows work, which consists pretty much of either rocks looking like people, or people made of rocks, depending on your view of the world. He reminded me a fair bit of Beverly Doolittle, another of my favourite artists.

Dali's equivalent of the sistine chapel. Pretty impressive too!

Not sure what this is doing here, but I liked it.

This is highly interesting. I didn't think much of this painting of Gala looking over the meditteranean at first.

However, a few hours later, after having gone through the museum, I ended up on the other side of the room, and looking through a reverse telescope, the painting suddenly became Abraham Lincoln. One can't quite get the full effect in a photo as through the telescope, but you can get a rough idea below

Montserrat

Next I spent a day in Montserrat about 1.5 hours outside Barcelona.
Montserrat is known for its fantastic climbing, and its famous Jesuit monastery.
One can either take a cable car up, or the funicular. I opted for the cable car, as from the monastery, there are 2 more funiculars going further up.
It was nice to do some geocaching in mountainous terrain again for a change.

Some of the rock formations, which individually did not come out as great photos, but make a nice collage. As you can see, I have a new photo editing software, so you'll have to forgive me as I experiment with it.

Very interesting. I have never seen Jesus hanging on cords before, at a delightful little chapel on the edge of a cliff.

Some more experimenting with photo effects back home.

The monastery from above.

Ditto

Chapel of St Joan

Ditto

The Via del Cruces was a walk filled with various representation of Jesus on the cross, including some very interesting modern art style metal sheet reliefs

At the bottom, I was freezing in the mist, cursing myself for not bringing warmer clothes, but as the cable car went up, we got through the clouds and its was sunny up top, with great views over the clouds.

Some more interesting scenes in the clouds

An angel appears before Jesus

Barcelona, Casa Batlló

After Sagrada Familia, it was off to another Gaudi masterpiece, Casa Batlló, also known as House of Bones, due to the way that many of the designs resemble bones.

The facade of the building. See how the pillars resemble bones!

The balconies all look like some weird cat skulls!

Inside the Piano Nobile room.

Light in the bathroom.

Looking down in the central foyer.

Looking through the glass in the landings.

Weird pattern on the ceiling.

Mushroom shaped fireplace.

Superb lighting, with some amazing swirls on the ceiling.

Staircase modelled on a fishy style spine, with the walls and ceiling having a scaly patterning.

Room modelled on the rib cage of a whale. Many of the passages have the same design.

Inside the water chamber. Some form of laser/lighting method reflects the water flowing down the ball all over the rounded walls and ceiling of this room, while soothing water dripping effects play. All very relaxing!

On the roof, with the dragon's back visible behind the chimneys

Barcelona, Sagrada Familia

I went down to Barcelona for 3 days to visit my old mate Sean and his lovely wife Marta.
First up was a visit to the Sagrada Familia, Barcelona's most famous Gaudi cathedral, and a most amazing building.
Construction started in 1882, and it is expected to continue until at least 2041! Now thats a lot of work!


Front of the building, with the Nativity Facade. These 4 towers are repeated at the back, and when finished there will be 18 towers!

The Nativity facade

Baby Jesus

The 3 wise men bring 2 pigeons as a gift - not so wise after all!

Angel in my Harp

Inside the building, its chaos! Here we see some fine examples of Authentic Spanish style scaffolding, circa 2008

A model of the finished inside. Most of gaudi's designs were inspired by nature. The columns are inspired by trees, and you can see the joints are modelled on tree joints, and the top of the columns branch out like a tree.

He also models parts on shells, rosebuds, flowers, waves and all sorts of incredible things. A most amazing man!

Part of the ceiling
One can go up to the top of the towers for a panoramic view, but it can currently only be done by a tiny lift, so with a wait of over an hour, I thought I would give that a miss. Pity!

Stained glass

At the other side of the Nativity facade is the Passion Facade. The sculptures were added to this in 1987, and they came in for a lot of stick, as the abstract style was so different from Gaudi's style. Personally, I loved them!

2 mourners at the crucifiction

Soldier on horseback

Soldiers at the crucifiction

Quite odd this, as the cross comes out at a great angle over you in the facade, instead of being upright

I must be honest here, I did not take this photo. This is the finished look of the church, which will be able to fit 13 000 people!

The central spire will be 50m taller than the current towers, and at night beams of light will shine out of the armsof the cross up top.

A 3rd facade is currently being worked on, the Glory Facade, about the life and death of mankind.

Sadly, Gaudi died in 1926, so missed out on seeing a lot of his masterpiece!