In 1962 I passed through the Costa Brava on a six month hitch hiking trip that took me from London to Johannesburg. In those days, long before the mass marketing of cheap package tours, traveling along the Spanish coast was like being in paradise. Not so today.
Almost forty years later we had a family gathering of the clans to celebrate my sixtieth birthday and we chose Cadaques. It’s still a great place. But not for long.
It’s relative isolation and the torturous road to the coast have protected the village from development for longer than most parts of the Costa Brava. Unfortunately, the tell tale signs of change are apparent everywhere. The most ominous of these is the large scale housing development and ubiquitous building cranes to the east - on the way to Dali’s house at Port Lligat.
Perhaps one small positive result of the international financial crisis is that these projects will be arrested. Time will tell.
Salvadore Dali is probably Cadaques’s most famous son, and he painted this beautiful Mediterranean port many times.
Vicky and Matt, who live in Toulouse, both love Cadaques. So they commissioned a triptych for the apartment they are renovating.
The embryonic early stages of it’s development are shown in the photos above. Each panel is 110 cms x 50 cms. The bottom one shows a very rough painted sketch (which looks almost as messy as the studio where the pic was taken). This is the 'just to get the basic idea' down stage. Then next is probably when I was about half finished. And the third is when I'm heading for home - but you can't see this one on my blog.
Anyone who lives near Mezin in southwest France can see the original in an exhibition above the tourist office.
But anyone who wants to see the finished 'Cadaques Triptych' should click on the link below to go my online gallery.
rayjohnstone.co.uk
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