John Hassall (Walmer, 1868 - London, 1948)
"Barcelone Sejour d'Hiver" (Winter stay in Barcelona)
Original poster made in 1906. 130 x 98,5 cm.
Published by "Affiches Barral Hermanos". 94, Paseo de Gracia, Barcelona.
It bears the stamp of the "Syndicat d'Initiative" of Barcelona, which, according to the Arxiu històric de la Ciutat de Barcelona (The City of Barcelona’s historic Archive): "With the name of Sociedad de Atracción de Forasteros (Syndicat d'Initiative or Society for Attracting Foreigners) of Barcelona, the organisation was founded on the 1st April 1908, its objective being to promote tourism in Barcelona and the Province of Catalonia. It provided "forasteros" -foreign visitors- information of touristic and cultural interest in Barcelona. The promotors wanted to contribute to the modernisation and cultural and economic enrichment of the city and the country through encouraging tourism."
The poster we are auctioning was published, as we can see, in a context in which tourism was beginning to be promoted in the Catalan capital, "as a strategy for transforming Barcelona and, by extension, Catalonia, which has been hit hard since 1898, when, with the loss of the colonies, the large overseas market for its industry also disappeared", as Carles Geli comments in his article for El País "Barcelona, ‘atracción de forasteros’" (Barcelona, ​​​​'attracting foreigners'). At that time, the city of Barcelona was "difficult to get to [and] the prices of the few hotels that existed were expensive." Barcelona was far behind the other large European cities such as Paris, London or Berlin, which in 1908 had 900,000, 600,000 and 500,000 visitors respectively, according to Geli’s article, which concludes that, for these reasons, the dominant political party of the time in Catalonia, the "Lliga Regionalista" used tourism "as an arsenal for its regenerationist project, due to the desire for Europeanisation, to jump from being a provincial city […] to a metropolitan city, capable of combining its nature as an industrial hub with that of a tourist hub".
The Biblioteca Nacional de Catalunya (National Library of Catalonia), has an example of this poster in its collection.
Bibliographic references:
- Arxiu Històric de la Ciutat de Barcelona. (2021, July 07). "Revista Barcelona atracción. La Sociedad de Atracción de Forasteros y la promoción del turismo". Https://ajuntament.barcelona.cat/arxiumunicipal/arxiuhistoric/es/documentos-del-mes/revista-barcelona-atraccion-la-sociedad-de-atraccion-de-forasteros-y-la-promocion
- Geni, C. (2019, June 27). "Barcelona, “atracción de forasteros”". Quadern. El País. Https://cat.elpais.com/cat/2019/06/27/catalunya/1561624482_806398.html