The politician, lawyer and cultural activist Josep Espar Ticó has died this Saturday at the age of 94, as confirmed via Twitter by the Fundació Congrés de Cultura Catalana, an entity of which he was a lifetime patron.
Ticó, born in Barcelona in 1927, was one of the founders of Convergència Democràtica de Catalunya and received the Medal of Honor of Barcelona, the Creu de Sant Jordi, in 1984, and the Canigó Award, in 2020.
He also participated in the creation of the newspaper Avui, the magazine Cavall Fort, the distributor of books in Catalan L'Arc de Berà, the Fundación Universal de la Sardana and the record label Edigsa. In fact, he was at the forefront of many initiatives aimed at the political and cultural normalization of the country.
Shortly after learning of the death, the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, lamented the loss on his Twitter account. "We are left by a man committed to the Catalan language, culture and nation, who made appreciation for Catalonia his reason for living".
Shortly before, the Minister of Culture, Natàlia Garriga, did the same and recalled that in 1984 she was awarded the Creu de Sant Jordi for her defense of Catalan culture and language, "which she has promoted throughout her life with conviction and firmness ".
The former president of the Generalitat Carles Puigdemont also expressed himself in laudatory terms: "Espar and his generation milled paths that seemed impassable, in very adverse conditions and without the means or institutions. There were not many but they were enough to reverse the disaster predicted by the victors. A homenot, to whom we owe a lot."
