Els Quatre Gats
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Els Quatre Gats ("The Four Cats") was a cafe in Barcelona opened on 12 June 1897. It also worked as a hostel, a cabaret, a pub and a restaurant. Active until 1903, Els Quatre Gats became one of the main centers of Modernisme in Barcelona. The artist Ramon Casas i Carbó largely financed this bar on the ground floor of Casa Martí (1896), a building by Architect Josep Puig i Cadafalch in Montsió Street near the center of Barcelona. Els Quatre Gats was reconstructed during the transition to democracy, in 1978.
[edit] A Modernisme center
Other major artists who met in this cafe were Santiago Rusiñol i Prats, Miquel Utrillo as well as the sculptor Julio González.
Els Quatre Gats was the inheritor of a legacy of tertulias and art reunions specific to Barcelona, but also inspired itself of the Parisian cabaret Le Chat Noir. Art exhibitions, literary and musical meetings, marionettes shows and shadow plays were also done there.
Ramon Casas' partners in the enterprise were Pere Romeu, who largely played host to the bar, as well as Rusiñol and Miquel Utrillo. The bar hosted revolving art exhibits, including one of the first one-man shows by Pablo Picasso; the most prominent piece in its permanent collection was a lighthearted Casas self-portrait, depicting him smoking a pipe while pedaling a tandem bicycle with Romeu as his stoker.[1].
[edit] The review
Like Le Chat Noir, Els 4 Gats attempted in 1899 its own literary and artistic magazine, to which Casas was a major contributor. That was short-lived (fifteen issues), but was soon followed by Pèl & Ploma, which would slightly outlast the bar itself, and Forma (1904–1908), to which Casas also contributed. Pèl & Ploma sponsored several prominent art exhibitions, including Casas' own well-received first solo show (1899 at Sala Parés), which brought together a retrospective of his oil paintings as well as a set of charcoal sketches of contemporary figures prominent in Barcelona's cultural life.
