Ibiza Culture
During the 1930s, Ibiza experienced a singular period of cultural and artistic effervescence. People from all over Europe, many of them fleeing political upheavals on the continent, sought a safe haven on an island that seemed safely anchored in the distant past and which was economically within reach of their distressed circumstances.
Representatives of the European avant-garde such as Raoul Hausmann and Walter Benjamin were drawn to an island that was open-minded, attractive, and had aspects that many of the great minds associated with the Modern Movement found fascinating, such as the peasant house, casa pagesa, which so intrigued architect Josep Lluís Sert.
These distinguished intellectuals were the pioneers of what has now become a major industry, but above all they helped make island the cosmopolitan place it is today, as well as attracting successive waves of artists who began arriving here at the end of the 1950s. Here, too, was where the Hippie movement marshalled its international flower power brigades; and even today their lingering influence can be seen in the fashion scene and in the wide range of hand-crafted leather goods and jewellery still being produced on the island.
All of these doings contributed to what remains
to this day an extremely tolerant and remarkably variegated cultural
scene, which is what has attracted so many famous artists and
writers to settle here and take part in island life.
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Ibiza guide