The walls of countless buildings, from temples to banks and sports facilities, display the work of the artist Antonio Hernández Carpe (Espinardo, 1921-Madrid, 1977), which a foundation has already begun to catalog in order to guarantee its conservation. . His daughter Celina Hernández-Carpe, the architects Edith Aroca and José María López, the director of the Museum of Fine Arts of Murcia (Mubam), Juan García Sandoval, and the restorer and art historian Loreto López Martínez guide this urban tour for LA VERDAD by the legacy of the painter and muralist, which sometimes goes unnoticed, and reveals some secrets.
Gym class at IES Alfonso X
Despite his early death, at the age of 56, Antonio Hernández Carpe left an extensive production throughout a good part of the national geography thanks to his genius and immense capacity for work. And although he also mastered easel painting – three of his paintings are kept in the funds of the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid – he stood out for his facet as a muralist. From the mid-50s to the early 70s, he attended countless commissions to decorate the architecture of the time. His compositions of tiles, mosaics, wall paintings and stained glass windows give color and character to churches, administrative headquarters, educational centers (in the photo, the IES Alfonso X in Murcia), residential blocks and sports complexes. The recently created El Mural Foundation has set itself the mission of cataloging all of his work in order to make it known and ensure his protection.
A marine landscape next to the Segura
From the second half of the 20th century, public architecture undertook a renovation at the hands of the technocrats of the Franco regime. In an effort to project a more modern image, these institutional projects follow the guideline that their decoration is completed with works by contemporary artists, according to the architect and professor at the Polytechnic University of Cartagena (UPCT) José María López. In the Region of Murcia, those years of developmentalism leave complexes such as the Espinardo residential complex, the current headquarters of the Ministry of Health, both designed by Enrique Sancho Ruano, and the Civil Government building, the work of Francisco Prieto-Moreno, today become the Government Delegation. In one of his offices, in front of the Segura urban façade, a mural by Carpe that reproduces a marine scene is preserved.
The largest mosaic Way of the Cross in Europe
Commissioned by Enrique Sancho Ruano, the artist from Espinardo decorated two of the most avant-garde churches designed by the architect in the 1960s: the El Palmar psychiatric hospital and the Barranda church (Caravaca de la Cruz). But Hernández Carpe contributes to magnify with his work other temples both in the Region and outside of it. For the Asunción de Alcantarilla (in the image) he makes “the largest mosaic Stations of the Cross in Europe,” recalls his daughter Celina de él. He dedicated a year to this project in the studio that the muralist had on Calle María Moliner in Madrid and that he shared with another local artist, the sculptor Antonio Campillo. Celina Hernández-Carpe still keeps in her childhood memory the image of her father cutting “the tesserae with a pair of pliers. It was a craft, everything he did with his hands while listening to classical music.
Seahorses swim at the Tennis Club
Antonio Hernández Carpe’s mastery was already recognized in his time by writers, critics and colleagues, and numerous contemporary architects and builders turned to him to complete their designs. With Eugenio Bañón he collaborated in the decoration of the Murcia Tennis Club. A ceramic mural, with the scene of a seabed in which there is no shortage of seahorses, runs along the semicircular bar on the terrace of the pool of the sports complex. His originality went beyond regional borders. He worked with Fernández del Amo in the so-called colonization towns, which during the Franco regime spread mainly through Andalusia and Extremadura. For Aguas Nuevas (Albacete) he painted a sundial that is still preserved on the façade of the Town Hall. His murals can also be admired in the labor universities of La Rioja, Salamanca, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Toledo and Málaga, and in several residence halls in Madrid and Cuenca.
Four works of art in the middle of the Gran Vía
Carpe’s work can also be admired in the hallways of residential blocks. Thus, the four portals of the Torre de Murcia building, in Gran Vía 8, are decorated in different techniques with pieces by the artist (in the photograph, protected by a glass partition, a painting that evokes the landscape of the Mar Menor). “His figurative style of him is very relatable and peculiar. And his cheerfully colored compositions convey a certain optimism », explains the restorer Loreto López. The expert and member of the board of trustees of the El Mural Foundation assesses that, in general, “Hernández Carpe’s production has remained in good condition”, although some already irreparable losses must be regretted. This is the case of some paintings dedicated to the history of the book that decorated the National Library, in Madrid, and which were destroyed in 1988 during remodeling works. “Something like this can’t happen again.”
From Cenajo to Murcia
The director of the Museum of Fine Arts (Mubam) defines Antonio Hernández Carpe, attached to the so-called Puente Generation, as “a key artist of the 20th century, known but not valued enough.” “Integral and multifaceted, he brought modern language to his work from a renewed tradition,” he comments. For official commissions, which were many throughout the country, his designs “were adapted to the space where they were located,” remarks Juan García Sandoval. Thus, destined for the facilities of the Cenajo reservoir, one of the great public works of the Franco regime to promote the modernization of irrigation systems in the basin, he devised a tribute to the peasants (in the image) that today can be seen in the entrance to the headquarters of the Segura Hydrographic Confederation (CHS), in Murcia. At a difficult time in recent history, dominated by censorship, he showed himself as a painter “committed but without coming into conflict with the system.”
roosters in black and red
The El Mural Foundation calls for the owners of the Carpe work to collaborate in its cataloging and is considering promoting a line of patronage so that companies that wish to can collaborate in the restoration of this heritage that is part of history region of. This group affirms that the conservation of murals, paintings and stained glass windows by the artist from Espinardo contributes to value the spaces where they are located. In the spotlight of the recently created board of trustees are the compositions that decorate the premises of the Jesús María de Murcia school and the facilities of Radio Nacional de España (RNE) in the so-called Parque de la Antena, in Las Torres de Cotillas. An important part of the painter’s production is in private hands, distributed in lobbies of residential buildings. In the photograph, an animalist mural, with the characteristic Carpe roosters, at the entrance to the block of flats at number 7 Jaime I street in the Murcian capital.
Italian influence
Trained at the Murcia School of Arts and Crafts and at the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts (Madrid), his trips to Italy inspired his large-format works. Hernández Carpe was fascinated by contemplating the murals of the Renaissance masters in Assisi, Florence, Siena and Rome. García Sandoval sees a clear influence from authors such as Fra Angelico, Giotto, Masaccio or Paolo Ucello in the monumentality of his compositions, the flat colors and «the robust and sculptural character of his figures. In Italy, he is imbued with a unitary art, with an integral plastic ». Some of this appears in the murals that the Murcian artist created for the Pharmaceutical Brotherhood and which are now kept at the headquarters of the Murcia Chamber of Commerce (in the photograph). They were part of the exhibition that the Mubam dedicated to him on the occasion of the centenary of his birth.
Light in religious spaces
The Second Vatican Council marked religious architecture in the 1960s. The rites change (the masses will no longer be in Latin and with their backs to the faithful), but also the religious spaces, which adapt to contemporary language. The architect and teacher Edith Aroca explains that the new churches are designed as places at the service of the community, open-plan and without added ornamentation. The architects rely on artists of the time to express the religiousness of the moment, with light playing a prominent role. Hence the prominence that stained glass windows once again acquire. Carpe makes a set of ten colorful pieces for the parish of the Sacred Heart of Molina de Segura (in the image). For the deconsecrated church of the Espinardo complex, Sancho Ruano relies on other local artists such as the sculptors González Moreno and Francisco Toledo.
A particular creative universe
Customary prints, allegories of family and home, tributes to traditional trades, a fauna of roosters, partridges and doves (in the photograph, birds in a tree in a building on Calle González Adalid in Murcia) Murcian landscapes, saints and Angels populate the figurative work of Carpe, who also ventures into abstract art on occasions. Celina Hernández-Carpe recounts that her father “nobody told her what to paint. He imagined and made his own designs, without assistants ». However, the artist used to take into account the locations where the commissioned pieces were going to be installed. Thus, for the Pharmaceutical Brotherhood he painted the medical saints Cosme and Damián, which later went to the Chamber of Commerce of Murcia. Among the projects promoted by the foundation, the recovery of the monumental murals of the old Provincial Hospital will soon see the light of day.
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