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The Exposición Internacional de Barcelona (International Exposition of Barcelona) which took place between 20 May 1929 and 15 January 1930 was developed in the Montjuïc Park.
It received official participation of dozens of countries such as Germany, Belgium, France or Romania, to name but a few, and constituted as a great event for the city, for the cultural and economic draft as well as the town planning and architecture.
The
Teatre Grec (Greek Theatre), the
Poble Espanyol (Spanish Village), the
Estadio Olímpico de Montjuïc (Olympic Stadium of Montjuïc) or the palaces of Alfonso XIII and Victoria Eugenia are some examples of the legacy the Exposition left in the city. On the contrary, other buildings disappeared along the years due the closing of the event, like the German Pavilion, designed by the architect
Mies van der Rohe, that was reconstructed between 1983 and 1986.
In 1905
Josep Puig i Cadafalch published an article in
La Veu de Catalunya, with the title “A votar! Per l´Exposició Universal" (Vote! For the Universal Exposition), in where he reclaimed a new city, to develop a new universal exposition, like the one that occurred in 1888 converting Barcelona in to a more modern city.
When the celebration of Exposition was approved, some places of where it could be celebrated were suggested, between those,
Plaça de les Glòries (Les Glòries Square),
Parc de la Ciutadella (Ciutadella Park) or Montjuïc, that finally in 1914 was designated and declared a public space of use, without missing out on the controversy.
The development of the project commenced in 1917 but it went so slow that, in the moment of inaugurating the event , many central elements of the Exposition still weren´t finished. In the first stage the area was gardened by the hands of French architect
Jean-Claude Nicolas Forestier and, from 1919, construction started in the Alfonso XIII and the Victoria Eugenia palaces, following the design of Josep Puig i Cadafalch, like the Urbanización de Miramar. Then between 1927 and 1929, the construction progressed in the rest of the buildings of the Juego de Agua y Luz (Water and Light Game) projected by
Carles Buïgas, one of the works that did not finish in time.
Finally, on 19 May 1929 the International Exposition of Barcelona was officially inaugurated, constructed with the intention of bringing the headquarters that configured the plaza Espanya and the National Palace, today converted in the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (
MNAC) – Catalonian National Museum of Art.