Saint Raphael

Sculptor: Pere Sanglada (attrib.)
Materials: Stone from Montjuïc with bronze wings

The Gothic facade of the City of Barcelona Street in the City is headed by a monumental image of the Archangel San Rafael.

It is a remarkable sculpture, the author of which is unknown to us. However, because their broad wings bronze are documented work of Pedro Sanglada and because of their style, it has been attributed on the basis of this master, which is perhaps the most significant sculptor in the process of introduction of international gothic finger Barcelona, ​​through a work as representative as the choir stalls of the cathedral of this city.

The façade that frames the archangel, though mutilated the nineteenth century, is a very relevant sample of Catalan civil Gothic architecture and work of the great architect Arnau Bargués.

Documentary, consist discussions that took place on April 25, 1400, among the directors of Barcelona and a citizen "who does not want his name to be published" in order to decide where to locate the archangel that anonymous giving would make its coasts by the great devotion he had for her. The decision was to be "put on the biggest and out of the city house in the outside gate, that is, on the Reyal signal here since." the commitment not to move from place was also acquired.

The style of the sculpture is part of what is representative in the international Gothic: the virtuosic technician, a taste for decorativismo through the rhythm of the folds of clothing and curly hair that is not incompatible with a clear sense of monumentality and richness of chiaroscuro.

Although we must bear in mind in this case the particular devotion of the citizen who made the offering of sculpture, as decisive for the choice of representation of San Rafael, the fact that at this time the municipal councils often promoted the cult also converges the guardian angels and archangels, particularly St. Michael, because it was believed they had the gift of protecting the population of the terrible scourge of the plague. So the municipal chapels or doors of the old walls like Puerta del Angel Barcelona, ​​the memory of which still has a street dedicated today were sometimes wore them and their representations, which are often confused with each other for which the attributes are exchanged.