Allegory of abundance or of gluttony

“The Allegory of Abundance or of the Throat” was another of the topics chosen by Pere Jou i Francisco (Barcelona, 1891 – Sitges, 1964) to decorate one of the capitals of the windows of Palau Maricel.

Here the main character is a fat man dressed with medieval clothing, represented standing between a pig and a wine wooden cask and eating with his hands. Filling the gaps, a vine with tendrils and large grape berries, there were popular patterns in the ornamental Romanesque and pre - Romanesque sculpture. M. Urgellés, responsible of the Maricel electrical system inspired Jou for the man figure.

It seems that both happened to meet in the inn at lunch time, the sculptor watched him carefully, to the point that Urgellés annoyed and intrigued asked Utrillo, the project manager, if the sculptor had any problem. When he knew that Jou’s interest was to take him as a model for the capital devoted to the abundance, in which he was working, Urgellés proposed one of his assistants to be the model of the capital devoted to the privation or hunger, that should be his couple."