A walk through the woods and artworks
MANILA, Philippines - One day I dreamt of a utopia: finding a space where my sculptures could rest and where people could walk among them as if walking through the woods. — Eduardo Chillida
Being an aficionado of Eduardo Chillida’s work since art school, I told myself I would set out to meet him one day. Through college, career and motherhood, I encountered his work in different places and each time felt the same riveting aspiration to meet him. As if to remind me of that intention, I was jolted by a powerful wooden sculpture by Chillida at the lobby of Fernando Zobel’s Museum, one of the casas colgadas (hanging houses) on the edge of the gorge of the river Huécar in Cuenca, Spain.
In 2001, I decided to embark on my mission to meet him but Chillida’s health was not stable. In 2002, he passed on, but I still pursued to bring my mortal being within the sphere of his creation: Chillida-leku in San Sebastian, Spain. In March of this year, I met with the master’s son, Luis Chillida, who graciously took me around the museum that his father so lovingly built.
The Museum of Chillida-Leku is a vast verdant landscape of gardens and old trees with a refurbished farmhouse, where world-renowned and much-loved Basque sculptor Eduardo Chillida installed for display a majority of his works spanning a 50-year career.
The open-garden museum spreads over an area of 13 hectares where beautiful beech and oak trees, including magnolias, intermingle with 40 pieces of sculpture of varying shapes and sizes ranging from life-size pieces to humongous (50 feet high) mostly made of corten steel. Some of the large sculptures can weigh from an already impressive nine tons to a colossal load of 60 tons. The massive ones look somewhat diminutive from afar but walking towards them makes one feel like a child approaching some immobile giants so tall that they appear to aim towards being one with the sky.
Far and apart from the monumental steel structures are stunning stone sculptures that invite touching and contemplation. Textures and grooves form the composition and the artist carved these stones in such a way that they look like they are levitating from the ground. Other stone pieces with linear grooves appear to have specific parts of the work disengaging from its main body — looking like they were given a new life force to gently set themselves free and be on their own.
Luis graciously explained that this style has been recognized as a unique trademark of his father. He also added that “all visitors are allowed to touch the sculptures to feel the strength of the materials and quite naturally, the spirit of the artist.”
At the center of the property is the Zabalaga farmhouse, built in 1543 and discovered and purchased by Chillida and his wife Pilar Belzunce in 1984. The structure was in a rundown state of ruin but with the help of an architect, Chillida set about to restore and rebuild what has now become a large and charming art gallery. Accented by fieldstone and rough-hewn timber, the renovated venue is divided into two floors.
It has been said that the sculptor would often talk to the structure as he worked. “I would ask the house what it wanted to look like,” one quote cited by Museo Chillida-Leku has it. “As I walked through the interior, I would ask it if it wanted to keep this or that wall or floor, and the house turned out according to its own indications.”
The rustic character of the place featuring a classic stone archway lends a dramatic but cozy sanctuary to the indoor artworks that comprise a magnificent collection of delicate freestanding sculptures and wall reliefs in corten steel, alabaster, granite, terracotta, plaster, wood and paper. In addition, there is a small collection of rare photographs of Chillida at work.
It was a welcome revelation to find out a bit more about Chillida’s wife, Pilar Belzunce. According to Luis Chillida, his mother Pilar was born in a hacienda in Iloilo, Philippines, and lived on the island until she was 14 years old prior to returning to her hometown of San Sebastian, Spain.
Chillida-Leku is a large sculptural composition in itself — another work of art in which the sculptor perfectly captures and renders his vision of shape, space and the passing of time. The sculptor with his wife Pilar and their eight children spent many years searching for just the right spot to bring his dream to fruition. It did not happen overnight as the project was funded exclusively by family assets. However, this being the case, it gave Chilllida full artistic freedom to work as he envisioned his dream. “We’ve turned the utopia into something concrete, and we’ve managed to do so with no outside funding, relying solely on our own effort and means,” stated Pilar Belzunce in a quote from Museo Chillida-Leku.
On a human level, Chillida-Leku makes the artist come alive. It is a symbol of a gifted artist’s creative zeal for art and his quest for tranquility to share with all of us forever.
“Boundaries are the true protagonists of space, just like the present, another boundary, is the true protagonist of time,” said Eduardo Chillida.
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Museo Chillida-Leku is at Bº Jáuregui 66, 20120 Hernani. Call 943-336006; fax to 943-335959
