Madrid, qué bien resistes (Madrid, how well you resist)

The Spanish Civil War is a chapter in Spanish history that garners a lot of interest and curiosity among the youth and adults who didn’t physically live through it but experienced it through their parents’ or grandparents’ anecdotes.

Many believe that it’s a chapter that isn’t completely closed while others think it should never be opened again. As with every event in which there are two sides, in some ways it continues to slightly divide the population to this day, despite the fact that it’s been 80 years and this huge conflict should never have happened—a fact that both sides agree on.

In order to not forget and to remember the barbarism so that it doesn’t happen again, until 20 May next year the Sala de Bóvedas of Casa de la Panadería will host a photographic exposition in which the Madrid from the past will be compared to present day Madrid.

Through a display with different sections that photographer Javier Marquirie—who is also the curator of the exhibition—summarises in La Vida (Life), El Viaje (Travel), El Cascote (Rubble), La Guerra (War) and La Sangre (Blood), you can see the different siege scenes in Madrid during those 850 days.

Javier Marquirie, who comes from a family of photographers, has created photo montages of this sad episode, capturing photos from the exact location and at the same time they were taken 80 years prior. The light changes, the city changes, life changes and its perception changes.

During this exhibition, different points in time can been seen, from the first bombings in 1936, to lines of the defeated walking towards prison or the concentration camp in 1939. They are eerie images that show the same paths with different compositions, reminding us that something like this should never happen again.

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