The Museum

El Centre de Desenvolupament Rural (The Rural Development Centre) – Museu de la Pauma of Mas de Barberans (Montsiá, in the south of Catalonia) was created in 2010 with the goal of generating actions aimed at economic development of the population, and by extension, of the region. With the objective to boost local initiative, the museum is also responsible of highlighting and disseminating the ethnological heritage linked to the craft of the palm.

Within the regular programme of activities, the museum is committed to make partnerships with artisans / organizations which work with natural fibres, both nationally and internationally. The collaboration of the English artist and basketmaker Tim Johnson, internationally renowned, and the Associació de Cistellers de Catalunya (Association of Basketmakers of Catalonia) started for the first time within the framework of workshops aimed at creating contemporary structures with local materials and traditional techniques. The fruit of this joint work resulted in the projects Fent Rafal (2012), Jardí Teixit (2013) and l’Era teixida (2014). These projects are carried out during the first week of August, just before the Monographic Fair of Vegetal Fibres, which is highly appreciated by the public and the media.

We consider that activities and exhibitions at local level should have impact on more holistic facts. In this sense, the museum is committed to projects that can become an innovation strategy in a global world. Ports i Mans project lies fully in line with this will of internationalisation.

Taking advantage of Racó dels Artesans. Fira Monogràfica de les Fibres Vegetals , which was held as usual during the first weekend of August, the exhibition Ports i Mans by Monica Guilera and Tim Johnson was opened at the Museu de la Pauma. The exhibition is composed of different areas that express emotions and experiences through various works. The storyline is the biodiversity as inspiring element of the creative process and of almost endless and surprising combinations among tradition, modernity, innovation, design, crafts, art, fleeting, permanent, and everything in relation to fibres of the immediate environment.

This work was created with the aim of providing users a complementary discourse to the exhibition. This is a web project that includes a series of images of the creative process, inspiration, from the gathering of raw material and the work processes, until the culmination in the final work. Each area is complemented by other materials that complete the artistic research. Botanicum comprises sheets of plants that have been used in every area, and that everyone can locate in the Plana and in the Ports Natural Park. In addition, some areas include also articles written ex professo that expand knowledge about the land and the use of natural fibres.

We hope you enjoy this visual experience.