Josep Puig i Cadafalch in the nordic countries: transferring art historical knowledge between north and south in the interwar period

Abstract

This essay interrogates the transmission of art historical knowledge and methodologies between Catalonia and the Nordic countries during the 1920s and 1930s. It addresses the work and travels of the architect, politician and art historian Josep Puig i Cadafalch who, for over a decade, corresponded with various Nordic scholars and travelled in Norway, Denmark and Sweden. Puig's ventures in the North show that, in the interwar period, art historical knowledge was not only produced transnationally but did so from periphery to periphery. It also shows that, beyond creatively contributing to the world¿s system of knowledge, cultural and political peripheries also engaged in significant and fruitful academic exchanges with one another. While the North has conventionally appeared as a cultural model for the South, academic insights and methodological inputs were also transferred from south to north. Puig and his Nordic colleagues engaged in an approach to art history writing that looked beyond strictly national narratives and searched for regional dynamics. In doing so, they were among the first to develop geographical approaches to the history of art.