Josefa Tolrà

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In this Catalan name, the first or paternal surname is Tolrà and the second or maternal family name is Abril; both are generally joined by the conjunction "i".

Josefa Tolrà i Abril (6 January 1880 – 15 October 1959) was a Spanish Catalan medium and artist, known for her drawings, writings and embroideries made during her trance state.

Her work is categorised within naïve art and have been exhibited in major Spanish museums such as the Queen Sofía National Museum Art Centre and Prado Museum in Madrid, and the National Museum of Art of Catalonia (MNAC) and Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (MACBA) in Barcelona, as well as in the 59th Venice Biennale and the Pompidou Center in Paris.

Biography

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Tolrà was born on 6 January 1880 in Cabrils, Catalonia, Spain in a family of peasants. As a young woman, she had a very limited education and worked in a textile factory, where she met revolutionaries and spiritists.[1][2]

After the death of two of her three children, one of them during the Spanish Civil War, Tolrà began to practise as a medium and healer in the 1940s after hearing voices and seeing faces result of the depression she fell into.[2][3] According to Tolrà, her drawings and writings were the work of spirits and "beings of light" who dictated them to her, and while in a mediumistic trance.[3][4][2][5][6] In fact, she did not recognise her works as her own.[7] She referred to her drawings as Dibujo fuerza fluídica ("I draw fluidic force" in English).[8][5]

As a medium, Tolrà was able to communicate with deceased figures such as the Catalan poet Jacint Verdaguer, the French scientist Louis Pasteur, and the Spanish mystic Santa Teresa de Jesús and could see people's aura.[1][5]

Her works attracted avant-garde Catalan artistic groups like Dau al Set.[2] One of these, Club Cobalto 49, exhibited Tolrà's works for the first time at the Sala Gaspar in Barcelona on the evening of 18 January 1956 at a private event.[2][5] The works were chosen by psychiatrist Joan Obiols i Vié [es] and evaluated by art critic Alexandre Cirici [es].[5] Tolrà had agreed to the exhibition, although she did not attend, as she rarely left her hometown.[3]

Tolrà soon became popular among artists and renowned artists visited her at her home in Cabrils such as Antoni Tàpies, Joan Brossa, Modest Cuixart and Moisès Villèlia i Sanmartín.[5][2]

In almost 20 years, Tolrà produced a total of nearly a hundred drawings and even wrote a novel.[5] Meanwhile, she also practised as a healer with her neighbours.[5] She never sold her works, but gave them as gifts.[4][5] Her main and most representative work is La gran teòsofa (1953), which is listed as part of the collection of the Prado Museum.[9][3]

Tolrà died on 15 October 1959 at the age of 79 at her home in her native Cabrils.[4] Her legacy was preserved by her family, overall by her daughter Maria, and was not recovered until 1998, when the Association for Culture and Contemporary Art in Mataró organised an exhibition of her works, including drawings owned by Joan Brossa.[2][5] The chair in which she sat to create has also been preserved and has been displayed in exhibitions.[8]

Style

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Her work is categorised within naïve art.[2] Tolrà began by doodling and ended up painting spiritual beings.[3] She also embroidered.[4]

The art historian and professor at the University of Barcelona Pilar Bonet considers that there are three types of themes in Tolrà's work:[3]

  • Drawings with figures, scenes and landscapes depicting local customs, evocations of the world or his surroundings, and stories from the past.
  • Religious themes.
  • Characters and visions related to the occult world, such as figures of female seers, theosophists, astral beings or planetary visions.

The characters are characterised by large, open eyes and an expression of surprise. They gravitate towards the viewer and are mostly incorporeal, without hands or feet and using exotic dresses.[3][8] Despite having difficulty representing volume, anatomical rigour and depth, Tolrà's lines are very controlled and tend towards horro vacui, detail and chromaticism.[3] The design is made with small stitches and short lines, a technique similar to the embroidery she learned as a child.[9] Tolrà did not use templates, sketches or models.[9]

Tolrà painted on low-quality paper and notebooks with simple materials such as pencil and felt-tip pens, and embroidered on fabric.[3]

She also wrote poems and transcribed messages that she included in her drawings thanks to something or someone "guiding her hand".[3][4][6] Although she was illiterate and knew practically only the Catalan language, her transcribed writings were in Spanish, albeit with grammatical and spelling errors, and covered geography, history, philosophy, mysticism, religion and art.[3][6][8]

Selected works

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  • Astro Sol, Tierra, Marte, Venus (1944)
  • Personajes y animales (1945)
  • Mujer con abalorios (1948)
  • Dibujo gracia del siglo III (1948)
  • Dibujo método fluídico representa César Augusto con su carro (1950)
  • Paisaje del Congo Indio joven (1951)
  • La gran teósofa (1953)
  • Adán y Eva (1953)
  • Musa coreana (1953)
  • Dibujo fuerza fluídica. Última cena (1953)
  • El alma de la fantasía (1959)
  • Jardín del Eden

Source:[3][5]

Exhibits

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Permanent exhibitions

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Temporal exhibitions

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d "La mà guiada" (PDF). National Museum of Art of Catalonia. 2023.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h "Josefa Tolrà i Abril". Great Catalan Encyclopedia.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Mora Sánchez, Josefa M. Josefa Tolrà y el dibujo mediúmnico. "El genio maligno, revista de humanidades y ciencias sociales", 2017.
  4. ^ a b c d e Vallina, Alicia (1 July 2023). "Pepeta, la mujer que dibujaba "el más allá" (y que adoraban los más vanguardistas del arte en Cataluña tras la guerra)". El Mundo.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Bonet, Pilar (15 January 2014). "Josefa Tolrà, médium y artista". La Vanguardia.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Sesé, Teresa (7 July 2023). "Mujeres que pintaron al dictado del más allá". La Vanguardia.
  7. ^ Cedó, Fede (19 January 2014). "El arte de los espíritus". La Vanguardia.
  8. ^ a b c d Parramon, Pere (1 March 2014). "Arte desde el otro lado". Huffington Post.
  9. ^ a b c ""La gran teòsofa"". National Museum of Art of Catalonia. 8 September 2023.
  10. ^ "Tolrà, Josefa". Queen Sofía National Museum Art Centre.
  11. ^ "La Bienal de Venecia expone la obra de Josefa Tolrà que estuvo en 2016 en el Moll de Costa del Port de Tarragona". Diari de Tarragona. 28 July 2022.
  12. ^ "Campo cerrado Arte y poder en la posguerra española. 1939-1953". Queen Sofía National Museum Art Centre.
  13. ^ a b "L'artista Josefa Tolrà, al MNAC i a París". Mataró City Council through Tribuna Maresme. 2015.