8 | 9 . Fernando Sánchez Castillo explaining his artistic piece and a group of students visiting the exhibition ( EUROM )
8 9 between popular struggles to expand their rights and freedoms on the one hand and the repression imposed through the modern state on the other . It was El Tragaluz ( The Skylight ”), the powerful device created by Antonio Buero Vallejo in his science fiction story — a machine that allowed people in the 25th century to see post-war Spain — the allegorical door that introduced visitors to the exhibition , where they would see pieces of their past projected onto their present .
The ability to connect all these pieces to create a complex and powerful story only lies within few people ’ s reach , and to listen to Germán Labrador explain his construction process is to behold a cascade of subtle ideas and images that speak to each other , complement each other , intertwine and confront each other throughout the exhibition . In June , EUROM wanted to interview Labrador , who is also a professor at Princeton University and director of public activities at the Queen Sofía National Museum Art Centre ( MNCARS ). He recently gave us the opportunity to film a report that can be seen in the different videos found on our website and our YouTube channel .
The exhibition was divided into four major sections . The first started with the civic struggles of 1868 and the Sexenio Democrático until 1936 ; the second focused on the years of the Spanish Civil War ( 1936-1939 ); the third was primarily about Franco ’ s dictatorship ; and the fourth and final section was
dedicated to the origins of the democratic transition . There was a firm and determined commitment to begin chronologically with one of the various democratising moments that the country underwent as far back as the 19th century , when several of the demands that form the basis of current freedoms originated : the abolition of the death penalty , the end of slavery , demands for women ’ s rights , secularism and religious freedom , freedom of the press , rights of association and many , many more . The construction of the modern state and all its repressive machinery , which it would develop in the colonies and in the Iberian peninsula itself , assembled under a powerful nationalism with a Catholic legacy , leaves a deep mark throughout the exhibition . In fact , one of its strengths is how it weaves colonial violence in Cuba , the Philippines , Puerto Rico , the Rif and Guinea into the Spanish historical narrative . In one of our interviews , CSIC anthropologist Francisco Ferrándiz , an advisor to the State Secretariat for Democratic Memory ( SEMD ) and the promoter of the exhibition , told us how this portrait of colonial violence had been rejected by certain parts of current public opinion . The exhibition hit the nail on the head because it explained “ that in some way we are educated with this idea of the civilisational empire , etcetera , etcetera . And if you question it or take the point of view of the victims of colonisation , there are people who find that ... unsettling ”. It was foreseeable that this exhibition would collide head-on with the conservative and far-right wave that is currently
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Observing Memories Issue 7