Virtual Visit

Retornos de lo vivo lejano is the fruit of the artistic collaboration between Antoni Tàpies and Rafael Alberti, published in 1977. Tàpies' artistic language is combined with the verses of the book of poems of the same name that Alberti composed during his Argentinean exile between 1948 and 1956. The fifteen original gouaches that Tàpies made to accompany the book of poems show his interest in endowing plastic art with the expressive force of poetry, using his own particular symbolic aesthetic.

The entire route of this exhibition shows the biography of Alberti in a unique chronological journey in which visitors can delve into the poet's legendary life, his literary and pictorial work and his ideology. The poet's captivating personality and his creative impetus are revealed in his drawings, handwritten poems, lyricographs, in the numerous photographs of his private and public life, and in other personal objects such as letters, awards and prizes.

The portfolio Il lirismo dell'alfabeto (The Lyricism of the Alphabet) is one of Alberti's most estimable artistic achievements as a painter-grapher: an alphabet in capital letters in which he linked poetry with calligraphic art, painting and even music. 

Printed in Rome in 1972, it consists of fifty-one plates (in various techniques such as lithography, silkscreen, etching and woodcut) and, as a portico, the poem of the same title, in the Italian version, by Ignacio Delogu. It was presented that same year as part of the exhibition ‘The Word and the Sign’ at the Rondanini Gallery in Rome.

This original and imaginative graphic creation is one of the poet's artistic collaborations with the gallery owner Rosanna Chiessi, published in Rome in 1972. It is a colour silkscreen on wood which, once unfolded, constitutes the game board. 

Alberti's creativity reinterprets the traditional game as a small bullfight with the hybrid animal OCA-TORO as the protagonist. An amusing chain of analogies emerges between the goose and the bull and an exact correspondence is established between the text and the engraving on the board.

This room pays a well-deserved tribute to María Teresa León, of extraordinary personality, intelligence and beauty. Alberti's life companion for fifty years, she had an incalculable influence on his life and artistic career. Photographs, books and documents reveal her intense literary activity, her courageous political participation and her happy coexistence with Rafael Alberti. Her versatility led her to direct theatre, write film scripts and collaborate in the press and on television. María Teresa León's narrative work stands out for her impeccable use of language, her profound knowledge of our literary history, her concern for social problems and, above all, for bearing witness to the exemplary struggle of the Spanish people during the War.

One of the most welcoming places visited by researchers and scholars of Alberti's work is the library. It consists of approximately seven thousand volumes, books from the donation made by the Alberti León couple to the city of El Puerto de Santa María. Among them there is a diversity of literary genres: poetry, essays, theatre, narrative... Copies from the 17th century, first and valuable editions by both Alberti and other authors and books dedicated by the most outstanding writers in 20th century literature, such as Pablo Neruda, Louis Aragon, Miguel Ángel Asturias or Vicente Aleixandre, among others.