Jaume Plensa

Jaume Plensa (born Barcelona, 1955) was commissioned by Hortensia Herrero to create an art intervention in the apse of the Palacio Valeriola, an area that connects the building to the garden courtyard. Plensa himself dubbed this place the melic (‘navel’ in Catalan) of the museum, since like that part of the human body it is small in size but placed centrally. He chose to inundate the walls of this semicircular space with a series of letters from very different alphabets, with which he is trying to create a universal message. To Plensa, each letter has a unique beauty, but all together they signify the diversity of the world and the coexistence of different cultures. He has previously used letters in a great variety of ways, including on curtains, gongs and the human body, but this art intervention at the Hortensia Herrero Art Centre is the first time he has installed them on a wall.