How was Gaudí's funeral?

BarcelonaThe accident in which Antoni Gaudí was struck by a tram on June 7, 1926, at the intersection of Bailèn and Gran Via streets, is well-known and forms part of the popular myth surrounding the brilliant architect, as does the fact that those who initially came to his aid thought he was a beggar. His simplicity and austerity were thus reinforced. Three days later, Gaudí died at the Hospital de la Santa Creu, the hospital for the poor, where he had been taken because of his appearance and where he chose to remain. So far, so well known.

But what was the funeral like? What image was intended to be conveyed to the crowds that followed? What necropolitics lay behind it? Within the framework of the congress Gaudí: art, beauty, mysteryIn the first event commemorating the centenary, organized by the Sant Pacià University Athenaeum, Professor Joaquim M. Puigvert (University of Girona) revealed details of Gaudí's farewell, funeral procession, and obsequies on June 12, 1926, including the ideological tensions and motivations at play. The fatal incident occurred just eight months after Gaudí had moved into the Sagrada Família. It was his life's work, his obsession, based on the conviction that "my client, God, is in no hurry." But this didn't mean he was unaware of the risks involved in ensuring the project's continuity after his death. The year before, for example, the first bell tower of the Nativity façade had been completed—"a marketing ploy," says Puigvert, since, structurally, the norm was for any building to be erected around its perimeter. But by 1914, the project was in jeopardy, and a decisive move was needed. This option allowed the project to be relaunched and definitively transformed the expiatory temple into Barcelona's most emblematic monument: "It was what tourists were already coming to see in Barcelona in the 1920s." Gaudí had become an international figure: at the turn of the century, the poet Joan Maragall had portrayed him as a solitary and visionary artist. And in 1910, an exhibition dedicated to him had been held in Paris. Meanwhile, in a skillful operation, overlooking the architect's religious fundamentalism, modern conservative Catalan nationalism had adopted the architect and his Sagrada Familia as its own cause. On September 11, 1923, three years before his death, Gaudí had been arrested while attempting to attend the mass commemorating the martyrs of 1714, convened by the Spiritual League of the Virgin of Montserrat.

This is the context of his death and burial. From there, what exactly happened in the days between the hit-and-run and the funeral? How was the farewell experienced in the city streets? The Temple Board took charge. While he lay dying, artists like Renart and Opisso were allowed to illustrate the ailing man, and his collaborator, the sculptor Joan Matamala, made a death mask and a mold of his entire head from the corpse to preserve what was understood as the "image of his soul." These were common practices. After his death, he was dressed in the habit of a member of the Congregation of Our Lady of Sorrows.

The Barcelona City Council, headed during those years of Primo de Rivera's dictatorship by Dàrius Romeu, offered to cover the costs of the funeral, but the Junta, while grateful, declined and, moreover, demanded that "any officialdom" be prohibited. Thus, the lying-in-state was held in the hospital itself, where extremely long queues formed in the courtyard. At five o'clock in the afternoon of the 12th, the austere coffin left on a simple hearse pulled by only two horses. The procession was long. The burial ceremony in the crypt of the Sagrada Família did not take place until nine o'clock that night.

The farewell drew some 30,000 people, according to newspaper accounts of the time. Many shops closed as the procession passed, a sign of mourning. The church bells tolled. The coffin paused inside the cathedral. As it passed Casa Calvet on Casp Street, there was also a pause: a large black ribbon adorned the facade. At one point on Casp Street, a boy placed a sprig of broom on the coffin, a subliminal symbol of Catalan identity. It had been expressly requested that there be no wreaths.

The closer one got to the Expiatory Temple, the more black cloths hung from the balconies: many men, women, and children from the neighborhood had served as models for the sculptures on the Nativity façade. As many as 76 organizations joined the procession, led by Lluís Serrahima (Círculo Artístico de San Lucas), Vicent de Moragas (Amigos del Arte Litúrgico), Francesc Maspons Anglasell (Centro Excursionista de Catalunya), and Lluís Millet (Orfeó Català). But above all, it was the core group of young architects who had helped Gaudí overcome the impasse of 1914. These included Lluís Bonet i Garí (who continued the work after the war and was the father of Lluís Bonet Armengol, who would follow in his footsteps), Francesc Ràfols (his first biographer), and Iledre Pujor. "Their prominence is a statement that foreshadows the future: during Gaudí's lifetime, the Sagrada Família sparked great controversy, and it has continued to do so, but construction has continued to this day," Puigvert notes. The spell cast by Gaudí's followers worked.

Behind the members of the various organizations and the architects, all of whom held the ribbons extending from the coffin, walked the religious, civil, military, and political authorities, especially those from the Regionalist League, the party with which Gaudí sympathized. Its leader, Francisco Cambó, who was out of the country, sent his condolences from Brussels. But Catalan symbols were conspicuously absent because of the dictatorship.

Beyond the buried Catalanist sentiment, Puigvert points out that, within the cultural war of the time between clericalism and anticlericalism, the funeral was seen by the Church as an opportunity "to reconquer public space." From The Bell of GraceA few days later, the libertarian Freemason Ángel Samblancat responded: "Gaudí was a formidable lyricist and a formidable clergyman. He spent his life chewing on rosaries. He has too much divinity, but not enough humanity... Lord who art in heaven, thank you for giving us Gaudí. He's a laborer." Finally, he ended up sending tourists by the truckload, "with whose money—and with the help of new technologies—now no one doubts that the Sagrada Família will be finished," Puigvert concludes.