La Movida Madrileña flows to Cádiz, Spain

In the UK, you know that you can judge a street to have ‘arrived’ when a Starbucks or a cupcake tea room opens its doors somewhere along its length. You can tell when a town has arrived when it opens a contemporary art gallery.  For this I thank the Ayuntamiento de Cádiz for creating Espacio de Creación Contemporánea (ECCO).

Courtyard at ECCO
 

Visiting Cádiz and ECCO in July, I wandered in reverie through the permanent exhibition ‘Costus: En Valle de Los Caidos’ (The Valley of the Fallen).  The Valley of the Fallen monument is one of Spain’s most controversial monuments, commissioned by Franco in 1940 to supposedly honour both sides of the fallen in the Spanish Civil War.

A quick skip through an important phase of Spain's modern history will put Costus into context and explain a parallel happening that was occurring in Spain at the same time as Britain’s New Wave and New Romantic successor.
 
‘Costus’, the partnership in life and as artists between Enrique Naya Igueravide from Cádiz & José Carrero Galofré from Malaga, was enveloped in and was instrumental in La Movida Madrileña.

A simple definition of La Movida might be: a cultural explosion of events and freedom of expression of Spanish people after years of repression and regulation by public laws and the traditional church – the Franco era.   Think Pedro Almodóvar making films such as Pepi, Luci y Bom (1980), a post-Franco vision of Spain in transition, people breaking society’s rules and basically, catching up with the rest of Europe.   There was Costus putting into ‘picture’ the liberalisation and spirit of the epoch.
 
There are nineteen works from the series forming ‘En Valle de Los Caidos’ arranged in six aisles and the feeling of walking along by them and viewing them is like viewing the frescoes in a basilica.  In Carmen “Patron Saint of Fishermen and Sailors”, Bibí Andersen represents Carmen.

Each work is composed of luminous acrylic paint on board, different kinds of light for illumination varying the appearance of each painting, a symphony of efflorescent colour that radiates the baroque iconographic splendour of Andalucian religious themes while overlain and played by friends of Costus and contemporary persons emblematic of the hedonistic La Movida.

Completed in the 1980s and in the Post-Modern taste, these paintings have a unique energy that demands reverence and not just admiration.  The permanent exhibition at ECCO celebrates the cultural inheritance of unique art created by two sons of Cádiz.
 
Your choice, either wander around in reverent silence or maybe view while listening to Mecano on your iphone; either way, for a few minutes you will feel La Movida coursing through your veins.

Shades of Summer 

At last we have been enveloped in Summer.  My selection of stock represents a celebration of all things verdant.

Wishing you all much enjoyment of the balmy days.
 
 
Johanna