Ex ungue leonem. Marble heads by the Master of Cabestany, Barcelona, Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, 4 April – 28 September 2014.
The four marble heads displayed in Room 4 of the Museum are fragments from the doorway of Sant Pere de Rodes, carved in the second third of the twelfth century, a masterpiece attributed to the Romanesque sculptor the ‘Master of Cabestany’. His work has been found in several places in southern Europe, from Tuscany (Italy) to Navarre, although most of the examples conserved are to be found in northern Catalonia and Languedoc. The doorway they once belonged to was destroyed sometime between 1800 and 1825. The four heads are on loan from private collections, and from the museums of Girona and the Fitzwilliam, Cambridge.