The Building

The Building of the Biblioteca Museo was designed between the years 1882-1884 by the architect Jeroni Granell who constructed the building as a classical temple, crowned with a central dome and with two symmetrical wings destined respectively to the library and the picture gallery. It was one of the first public buildings in Catalonia with the propose of becoming a museum. The decorative style corresponds to a period of historical search pertaining to the European architecture of the end of the XIX century, with neoegiptian and neogreek ornamental repertoires with an electrical aesthetic impact characteristic of public Catalonian architecture of the time, right before the appearance of modernism.

The façade is presided over by four columns and a semicircular tympanum. Below the narthex there is an inlaid inscription in Latin that says “surge et ambula” stand up and walk. In front of the entrance there are two monumental sculptures of two illustrious personalities from Vilanova; the romantic poet Manuel de Cabanyes (by the sculptor Josep Campeny) and the bishop Francesc Armanyá (by the sculptor Manuel Fuxá). The base relief that decorates the frontal and lateral façades are fabrications by the artist Josep Mirabent i Gatell. In them one can see the different allegorical scenes about art and science with some details of clear mason like ambiguity.

The building is situated in the centre of a spacious XIX century garden created by Josep Piera and is encircled by a perimeter of terro torjat which exquisitely reproduces the form of papyrus, continuing with the Egyptian influence throughout.

HISTORY
The Library Museum Víctor Balaguer emerged at the end of the XIX century with the intention of offering its public the opportunity to see multiple collections of art, books and ethnography that Víctor Balaguer had accumulated during his lifetime. The collection consisted of objects proceeding from Catalonia as well as other places around the world, some places very distant, ya que convertía parte de las salas en muestra de curiosidades para los ojos de la gente de aquellos momentos.

Balaguer ordered a new building to be constructed expressively for the reason of making the museum public. This extraordinary building process contributed to the advancement of the country since Balaguer was convinced that culture was the base for progress in a community.

Its foundation in the year 1884 coincided with the decade known as the Gold Fever which, in the arts and museologia corresponded to a period of search and revalorization of industrial arts and design which would lead to the immediate birth of Catalonian modernism.

From there the collections that Balaguer treasured throughout his life were not embraced by an accumulation of art and literature but agglutinates an important fund of archaeology, ethnology, ethnography, artistry, decorative and industrial arts… that configure a valuable, diverse, disperse, and extraordinarily interesting mixture of objects. In this small cosmos of objects he wanted to imagine his fellow citizens in the University of Knowledge.