For the past couple of years Nigel has been threatening to
arrange a Spanish Puzzle Party.
This year he made good on those threats and invited a few of
us to his neck of the woods for some sunshine and some puzzling-related stuff. Having
established that he was licensed to drive a 9-seater bus, he duly invited 8 of
us over for a long weekend. We were briefed to fly into Malaga airport on the Thursday
evening in order to give us a few days’ worth of puzzling before heading home
on the Sunday afternoon / evening from Alicante or Murcia.
Nigel had a serious road-trip planned for us, and our most
excellent of hosts was there to collect us at Malaga airport on the Thursday evening…
or at least he was, along with everyone else when our delayed Ryanair flight
arrived in the early hours of Friday morning – in spite of the fact that some of
them had already spent about 5 hours in the airport, they all seemed glad to
see Gill and I arrive from Brum. Nigel handed me the obligatory SPP polo shirt
before a short hike to the bus. Nigel took us to our hotel for the next two
evenings where we promptly checked in and crashed.
We gathered at the appointed, designated by the
official spreadsheet, for breakfast before sitting in the hotel’s courtyard for
a few gift exchanges… Steve presented Nigel with a giant tongue depressor box (Lord
knows how he got that inside his Ryanair carry-on!) containing a pair of giant
inflatable bananas – that tone for the weekend was duly set. (Nigel also
received some puzzles, a bottle of something and some shortbread in a tin
commemorating the royal wedding… the previous one – because he’s not that much of a royalist!).
After a bit of puzzling we headed out in our trusty bus to
the Berrocal Foundation’s workshop in Villanueva de Algaidas. On the way there
Big-Steve produced a few more inflatable bananas and the back row of the bus
almost passed out with the exertion of inflating 15 rather large bananas –
sadly one did not make it and it was ceremonially turned into a cap-cover for
moi – quite a fashion statement judging from the looks of some passing
motorists.
At the workshop we’re met by Beltran and Carlos, Miguel
Berrocal’s sons – Nigel is greeted like an old friend. Beltran and Carlos kick
off the tour of the workshop with a couple of huge posters in the waiting area:
one shows hundreds of Mini Davids (jaw-drops) and the other a personalised
bonnet ornament in Berrocal’s Mercedes -a Mini David that would rotate 360
degrees every time the car was started.
In the workshop space proper Beltran begins by describing
the beginnings of his dad’s artistic development, talking passionately about
the process, his inspiration and his use of both space and form – how he found
various materials and elements to include in his work and why he started out
making his sculptures in pieces that could be assembled (literally so that he
could pop them in the boot of the car and cart them around… humble beginnings for
the eventual pinnacle of his puzzle creations at least!).
We walk around the workshop following a natural progression
with Beltran guiding the discussion and showing us pictures and illustrations
on his tablet when the works he wants to talk about aren’t actually in front of
us (like Citius Altius Fortius which is at the Olympic Museum in Lausanne… although
there are a couple of copies of that in the workshop too!) and Carlos chipping in with
occasional anecdotes and further explanations.
Now I’m not ashamed to admit I’m a bit of a Philistine, but
the guys work their magic on me and the tour turns into quite a moving
experience for me.
Halfway through the tour we get to play with a copy of
Torero casually left out on a workbench… next to a set of pieces that will make
up Omaggio Ad Arcimboldo when they’ve been properly cleaned up and reassembled…
a nearby trolley has a complete set of Richelieu bits, all beautifully polished
before heading back to a lucky collector.
It doesn’t take a bunch of puzzlers too long to take it
apart, mixing up the pieces along the way just for a laugh and then reassembling
it – under the watchful eye of Beltran who offers the occasional bit of advice
and points out some of the subtleties of the design and the manufacturing
process… off to one side there’s a grubby-looking plastic container with a set
of bits in it – a set of unfinished pieces of Torero straight out of the
moulds, ready to be finished off and packaged up, one day. (The guys explained
that most of the casting of the multiples was completed in one go years and
years ago and then the pieces were finished off when they were needed. For some
that was the entire edition of 300, 1000 or 10 000. For others, only a subset
was cast and further copies can still be cast today within the original edition.)
When we’re finished with that we head upstairs to the
mock-up (the studio and workshop have been moved from their original home in fair Verona, back to Spain) of the design studio, wandering past a bunch of Berrocal’s tooling and
machinery – one of which has a signed sticker on it – I find myself wondering what
that sticker would be worth, let alone the machines and the sculptures in this
workshop…!
The studio is laid out with a single table in the centre
running the entire length of the long room – this would allow the artist to
have several projects on the go at any one time and enable him to scoot from
one project to another as the urge took him… literally. One side of the room is
taken up entirely with a massively long bookshelf containing all manner of
inspiration and exposition… and one shelf is given up to a set of glass cabinets
containing an example of each of Berrocal’s multiples – his puzzle sculptures.
Beltran and Carlos pick out a few of them and talk about
them, their development, the puzzling elements, their various phallic
references (it had to get at least a nod!). We start with Romeo e Giulietta, one of the
earlier multiples, completed in 1967. We wend our way through the classic
Mini’s and spend a while on Paloma Jet with its fantastical folly before diving
back into the real puzzles.
From there we head down into the basement and we all agree
that it feels a lot like a scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indy heads
into the mysterious warehouse that contains all the treasures.
Carlos shows us
around, showing us the moulds for one of Berrocal’s grand pieces of public
sculpture, and below them several sets of moulds for the Mini’s, Il Cofanetto
and several other recognisable multiples – we’re all dragging our jaws along
the ground by now… but when Carlos takes us over to bins piled high with raw,
cast pieces of Il Cofanetto awaiting finishing, treatment and plating, we’re
all seriously slain.
Back upstairs Gill and I have a short conversation about the
fact that we like to collect art on our holidays rather than the usual tourist
tat and we then decide that we really should support the lads and buy a (very!)
little bit of their dad’s work. We pose for pictures beside some of the
Almogavares – big brutish torsos with actual anvils at their hearts – now there’s
an image to conjure with - before signing the guest book.
From there we follow Carlos to the family home in the
village for lunch with the lads and their mom – served with a complete set of
Il Cofanetto cutlery, of course. We have a truly wonderful lunch while
listening to stories of their time in Italy, of visits from artists and stories
behind various photographs and pieces of art in the rooms – which would put
several serious art galleries to absolute shame. The family are warm and engaging
and treat us like friends in spite of being just a bunch of weird Midlands Puzzlers!
That evening we head into Antequera for a bit of a wander –
things go badly wrong when Nigel decides he’s had enough of leading the walking
tour and insists that someone else take the lead… so Frank and I head up the
nearest hill – which turns out to have a lovely view of the town below, a rather grand old church and a pub on top of it – so we settle down and have a
few rounds of drinks while chatting about the Berrocal visit… when hunger
drives us onward we begin to head downhill, but not before there’s a bit of a
La-La Land tribute (or perhaps a Sound of Music retrospective – it was hard to
tell to be honest!) and some shenanigans on the way down - all of which make
for some great photographs.
Back down in town we line up a suitable-looking tapas joint
and take up a small alcove for the evening… we feast on stuff that Nigel orders
for us (he’s slipped back into tour guide mode) and have a really superb meal –
before collapsing back into our beds at the hotel on the outskirts of town.
SPP Day one was a pretty darn memorable day!
Then things changed... no I didn't suddenly come into a large volume of cash; a couple of weeks ago Gill and I were fortunate to visit the
Berrocal Foundation in Villanueva de Algaidas. 
We spent several hours listening
to Carlos and Beltran talk about their dad’s work while wandering around the
recreated workshop and studio – and it’s probably fair to say that we fell
under their spell a little bit – in a good way. By the end of the tour Gill and
I had decided that we should continue our tradition of bringing back a new
piece of art from our holidays – and a mini Berrocal would class as art… we
duly selected Mini Maria as the one most likely to fit in with the other stuff in
the lounge and maxed out the credit card. (I hadn’t realised my friendly travel
agent had just billed all our holidays for the rest of the year to the card on
the same day!) 
Open the polystyrene casing and you find Mini Maria nestling
in a moulded black plastic stand – complete with a little display plinth to use
while you continue unpacking…lift that stand and beneath it you’ll find the
instruction / background booklet that will help you take her apart (and
reassemble her) while you read about her creation. Under the book there’s a moulded
tray for laying out all of the parts neatly while she’s disassembled… a rather
lovely surprise for someone who was literally expecting a carboard box!
It doesn’t take long for me to fiddle around and dismantle her
– it’s a pretty fun process, with some brilliant engineering, a solid locking
piece and more than a little smut thrown in for good measure. 
It doesn’t take long for me to fiddle around and dismantle her
– it’s a pretty fun process, with some brilliant engineering, a solid locking
piece and more than a little smut thrown in for good measure. 
I resorted to putting together sub-assemblies and then
collecting them into something that vaguely resembled the lovely little statue
I’d started with. 
It’s fun experimenting with these wonderfully organic shapes,
coaxing them into something bigger and beautiful. 
