Stylite

From the 1950s and for almost thirty years, Saumells creates various figures which represent a curled-up man, sometimes on a plinth or a cylinder, which suggests a column and the so-called Stylites.  These works display an engrossed and introverted attitude, belonging to an anchorite who has chosen to live in silence, isolated, anxious, praying and depriving himself. Lluís M. Saumells Panadés (Gironella 1915-Tarragona 1999) He held his first exhibition in Tarragona, in 1934, at the Ateneu Tarraconense, and in 1945 moved to Paris with a scholarship from the French government. On his return from France, in 1949, he was appointed the Director of the Studio-School of Art of the Diputació of Tarragona, the city where he would make his home, except for occasional stays in Palma. The artist, using a defined volume presents a minimum of details, creating his own typology with which he would work constantly, with minor variations: expressionist figures of hands with long and thin fingers and angular faces. The same characteristics are also applied to his pictorial and paper production. His commitment to art would result in him becoming a true promoter of culture in the city. Text by Enric Baixeras