Palau de Casavells
LOCATION BAIX EMPORDÁ GIRONA CATALONIA PALAU DE CASAVELLS @PALAUDECASAVELLS.ALZUETA WWW.ALZUETAGALLERY.COM @ALZUETA_GALLERY PAINTINGS BY JAMES RIELLY @JAMESMRIELLY WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY MANOLO DA COSTA
Those places between borders always give me the feeling of no man’s land. Wild places of people forged by slow fire, who live in villages and houses with special character, like the so-called “masies” in Catalonia. In one of these masies, located in the Baix Empordà, in a privileged place between the Mediterranean Sea and the Pyrenees, we find a contemporary art gallery called “Palau de Casavells”, managed by the Alzueta Gallery.
It is a palace built in the sixteenth century, renovated more than 15 years ago to host exhibitions in which a dialogue between contemporary painting, design, photography, sculpture and architecture was proposed. Now, with the generational change of management, the gallery is proposing three major annual exhibitions, which will occupy the entire Palace, dedicated to a single artist and lasting three months each. In the first exhibition of this new era, we can see the work of the artist James Rielly, as in the photographs of this report.
This exhibition can be visited until mid-June 2023. It is the first of the British artist in the art gallery, covering the last two decades of his artistic creation. From 24 June, in the second exhibition of the season, it will be the turn of the French sculptor Laurent Martin Lo, also based in Baix Empordà, who is the subject of an interesting article included in the following pages.
The choice of special places in which to show art is a priority for any self- respecting gallery and makes what is observed within that space raise the viewer to a timelier sensitivity, in order to emotionally value what they see. In this magazine, we will begin to visit these special places where unique architecture is mixed with the exhibition of contemporary art, especially places where the new and the old come together, as in the case of Palau de Casavells, a place with an ancient history that shows contemporary ideas, perhaps a nice comparison of the reasons why an artist does what they do, for their history, for their family, their experience or perhaps feeling as if they are in no man’s land when it comes to expressing their emotions and only being able to do so through their work.
