Fundacion Cesar Manrique, Lanzarote (Opus 16) - Cesar Manrique

Text in English, German and Spanish. Over the last decade the island of Lanzarote has become one of the favourite tourism destinations in the Canary Islands. However, our interest is more one of artistic than of touristic discovery, and this would be virtually unthinkable without the work of an artist who fell in love with this wonderful paradise. We refer to César Manrique (1919-1992), who was able to see and reveal to us the unique beauties arising out of the happy marriage of the four elements believed by the Greeks to form the whole of creation: air, earth, fire and water. In fact, after returning to his island in 1968 after a period spent in New York, Manrique dedicated himself passionately to realising his utopia, to renew Lanzarote out of his own sources. Among Manrique''s best known works on Lanzarote are the Casa Museo del Campesino, the Jameos del Agua, the Mirador del Río, the Cactus Garden and his own house in the Taro de Tahíche. Manrique''s house in Taro de Tahíche, which nowadays houses the César Manrique Foundation, can be considered as a ''work in progress'' as it was built over a period of almost 25 years and was still not completed upon the artist''s death. Arising out of the five interconnected volcanic bubbles of the underground storey, it has become a metaphor for the amorous meeting of man with Mother Earth, the latter being understood, to use Bruno Taut''s expression, as ''a fine home for living''. The spaces on the upper floor can be vi
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