What proposals can be submitted?

Applications related to Bachelor’s final projects, master’s or postgraduate final projects, works associated with a doctoral thesis, or any research related to the subject of this call can be submitted.

Research proposals must not yet be developed. The development of the project will be carried out once the grant has been awarded.

Candidacies from any nationality are accepted.

Consult all the requirements in the rules.

Each granted research project will receive the amount of €2,000.

In addition to the financial aid, the Pau Casals UNESCO Chair offers:

• Support and assistance in the development of the project by the selection committee, the Pau Casals Foundation team and the UOC team.
• Dissemination and publication of the project through the communication media of the Chair, the Pau Casals Foundation and the UOC.
• Access to the Pablo Casals Collection located at the Nacional Archive of Catalonia.
• Publication of the research work in the form of a digital publication within the “Chair Papers collection” accessible online on the Chair’s website with the ability to publish it in digital repositories of Catalan libraries and universities.
• Support and advice in possible job publications.

A selection committee shall evaluate the applications submitted by applying the assessment criteria set out in these rules and shall draw up the respective report. The members of the selection committee are:

Alfons Martinell 

Doctor in Pedagogy by the UdG and graduated in Philosophy and Letters by the UAB. Member of the Spanish Network for Sustainable Development (SDSN). Former Director-General for Cultural and Scientific Relations of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Spain. Honorary Director of the UNESCO Chair: Cultural Policies and Cooperation. Professor emeritus of the UdG. Co-Director of the Pau Casals UNESCO Chair. Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts (2024).

Bernard Meillat 

Musical advisor to the Pau Casals Foundation and artistic director of the Pau Casals International Music Festival. He has been director of Radio Classique in Paris (1991-2005) and Musiq’3 RTBF in Brussels (2006-2012).

Joan Fuster-Sobrepere 

Senior Professor. Former Director of the Arts and Humanities Studies at the UOC. Doctor of History by the UPF, Bachelor of Philosophy by the UAB and Postgraduate in Management of Cultural Institutions by ESADE High Management. Founder and director of the Master in Humanities: contemporary art, literature and culture. He is part of the consolidated research group Identicat, and his research has focused on the political and cultural history of Catalonia in contemporary times and especially in the city of Barcelona. Co-director of the Pau Casals UNESCO Chair.

Marc Gil 

He holds a PhD in History from the UB and teaches Contemporary History and Current World at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the UOC. Specialist in contemporary history of the Spanish State (Francoism and transition) and in history of the current world (history of international relations). He has been awarded the Serra d’Or Criticism Prize for Research 2018 in the humanities category in recognition of his work Barcelona in the service of the “New State”. Depuration of the City Council during the first Franco regime. He is a member of the consolidated research group IdentiCat of the UOC.

Miguel Ángel Elizalde

Doctor in Public International Law from UPF and degree in Law (ELDC/ULE). Currently, he is director of the Master’s in Human Rights, Democracy and Globalization (UOC) and Collaborating Professor at the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, European Union and Cooperation.

Jordi Pardo

Cultural manager and General Director of Pau Casals Foundation. Graduate in Geography and History from the University of Barcelona; EMPA-MBA, Executive Master in Public Administration, and FGAP- Diploma in Management Function of Public Administrations from ESADE Business School, Diploma in Advanced Studies (DEA) at the University of Barcelona, Department of Social Sciences Didactics. He has been managing Director of the Centre for Contemporary Culture of Barcelona CCCB; Managing Director of the Empúries Museum and Archaeological Park. In the private sector he has directed and advised cultural projects, development and urban regeneration in different countries of Europe, America and Asia. He has been a member of the European Commission’s Committee of seven independent experts, who evaluate and select the European Cultural Capitals (European Capital of Culture. 2011-2016), and member of the UNESCO cultural policy expert group. UNESCO consultant for the Culture, Development and Governance program (2011-2015).

Núria Ballester 

Graduate in Art History from the UAB and Master in Cultural Heritage Management and Museology from the UB. She is the Director of the Pau Casals Museum and has extensive experience in the fields of heritage management, conservation, research and dissemination. She is responsible for the management of the collections and documentary collection of Pau Casals.

Pepe Reche 

Performer and researcher, teacher and disseminator, and manager of educational and cultural projects. French horn player specialized in early music (ESMUC) and PhD in Musicology (UAB) with the thesis The French horn quartet of the Pau Casals Orchestra. His fields of research interest are around the historical French horn players in Barcelona and their repertoires, as well as the study of the profession of musician between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. He has won the Musical Essay Prize of Juventudes Musicales de Cataluña (JM Catalonia) and FICTA Ediciones.

The cultural diplomacy of Pau Casals through El Pesebre: Puerto Rico as a node (hub) in an international circuit of peace and “politics of reception” (1957–1973)

Project submitted by Haruko Hosoda Kawase

Research context

The project combines archival research and comparative reception analysis. First, the chronology of El Pessebre and the actors involved will be reconstructed through the systematic examination of letters, programs, ceremonial documents, graphic materials, etc. Second, this evidence will be contrasted in order to situate Spanish cultural policy and Francoist perceptions of Casals within the framework of the Cold War. Third, declassified documentation from the United States (CIA, USIA, Department of State) will be incorporated to analyze how governments and public agencies reinterpreted the Oratorio’s message of peace. Finally, a comparative analysis of media framing (press from Mexico, Puerto Rico, the U.S., and Europe) will be conducted to identify variations in the “politics of reception.” This approach makes it possible to articulate:

This archival and documentary research will help answer the following questions:

1. When and why did the message of peace in El Pessebre function as a “political language” during the Cold War?
2. Who framed it, and through which channels (governments/UN, media, and cultural institutions)?
3. How did Puerto Rico— a non-sovereign space— act as a hub for circulation and legitimization?

Objectives

The aim of this research is to reconstruct, through primary sources, the circulation and framing of the oratorio El Pessebre, a poem by Joan Alavedra composed by Pau Casals between 1943 and 1946 and orchestrated by his brother Enric, and to explain the role of Puerto Rico as a “border space,” comparing Mexico (government and Republic in exile), Spain (Francoism), and the United States.

The reception of Pau Casals in Buenos Aires: event, networks of sociability, and cultural memory (1937–c.1960)

Project sumbmitted by Guillermo Eduardo Dellmans

Research context

Although numerous studies exist on the figure of Casals at the international level, his reception in Argentina has yet to be systematically examined. In this regard, the project aims to reconstruct his connection with the Argentine context, addressing both its symbolic dimensions and the social networks that may have enabled his integration into the local cultural field.

The research seeks to contribute to a more complex understanding of the relationship between music and politics, articulating reception, networks of sociability, and cultural memory within a historically situated context.

Objectives

The project proposes to analyze the reception of Pau Casals in Buenos Aires from his 1937 visit to its possible later reinterpretations, within the framework of the Spanish Civil War and the impact of Republican exile in Argentina. It aims to reconstruct the visit as a political-cultural event and to examine its circulation within Buenos Aires’ cultural field. Likewise, it seeks to identify the networks of sociability that may have mediated his reception—including concerts, correspondence, musical dedications, and institutional actions—as well as transformations in his image as a performer and public figure. Finally, the project aims to contribute to an understanding of musical reception as a dynamic historical process, shaped by ideological disputes and practices of cultural memory.