| The return to the Spanish village |
The motorway stretched itself out, like a string of liquorice dotted with stripes of icing sugar, along the plain countryside of Extremadura cutting through the occasional industrial estates with their display of idle farming gear. On top of a rusty crane a stork, flapping its large wings against the pale blue February sky, had put together a nest of dry branches and sticks gearing itself for a spring of family life. We travelled in a straight line towards the horizon passing, now and again, a slow moving truck on its way to Madrid. Finally, after a tedious drive, the medieval castle of Trujillo emerged on top of precipitous cliff taking the history inspired traveller back to the age of the “conquistadores” and the era of cavalry. My wife, Vivienne, and I were heading for the “Parador de cruz de Tejeda” in Trujillo where we planned to spend a couple of days in order to study the nearby village of Deleitosa in the spirit of the American photographer W. Eugene Smith. W. Eugene Smith was, in 1950, given the assignment by his employer, Life magazine, to create a report with images and text relating to the agricultural state of affairs in Spain. Spain was at the time under the austere dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, which was, on the whole, internationally blacklisted, with a large part of the population enduring poverty and oppression. The country was in a desperate state and General Franco made a frantic attempt to obtain from the US support, by means of food and money, to alleviate the situation. With the intention of smoothing the way, Eugene Smith was granted a visa and an official blessing to take photos in the countryside, with the objective of portraying any progress made so far in the area of crop growing. Eugene Smith arrived in Madrid on 5 May 1950 together with an assistant and an interpreter and in the course of two months covered long distances and turned out 2,500 negatives. Along the lines of his personality of “non compliance” Smith centred his attention on the contemporary political, economic and social situation rather than any propaganda in collaboration with the regime. The centerpiece for his efforts became the village of Deleitosa in Extremadura. In the text, accompanying his images from “The Spanish village”, Eugene Smith wrote: “Deleitosa, in the province of Caceres in Extremadura, was neither the richest nor poorest society I visited on my journey”. The village, situated 227 kilometers southwest of Madrid, had in May 1950 between 2600 – 3000 inhabitants dependent on the infertile land surrounding the community for their existence. During his adjournment in Deleitosa, Eugene Smith made painstaking notes and observations of the customs in the village which were later to support his images. The final report, a passionate criticism of the dictatorship under General Franco, was published on 9th April 1951 in Life magazine, which enjoyed at that time, a circulation of 20 million copies thus making it a powerful channel on the international media scene. The Spanish government was furious over its contents and the incident caused a minor temporary diplomatic dispute between the US and Spain. Eugene Smith came across a Spain under the influence of the landowners, the church and the army who guarded their long outlived autocratic privileges with zest. Until the economic revolution in the 1960’s, which changed the demographical landscape, the Spanish masses were bound to a rural, agricultural oligarchy. General Franco introduced into his government in 1959 professional economists, to replace some of the old guard generals, with instructions to implement radical economic reforms. Among the new ministers selected was Manuel Fraga Tribarne, Minister of Information, who initiated many of the economic and social changes rising at that time. For example, he was the driving force behind the introduction of mass tourism in Spain. However, the most significant aspect of the transformation was the movement of the rural population from the countryside into towns and cities. Furthermore, many Spanish men moved abroad to industrial countries in Europe with the prospect of improving their own and their families’ living standards. General Franco died, after a long and painful illness, on 20th November 1975 and Prince Juan Carlos was declared “Head of State” with the title of King before “Las Cortes” (The Parliament) on 22nd November the same year. He commenced the process of transition from dictatorship to democracy with the help of the Prime Minister, Adolfo Suarez Gonzalez, who in spite of being, as a politician, closely associated with Francoism proved to be a champion for the introduction of democracy, which was generally referred to as the “Transition”. The period from July 1976 to June 1977 may be considered as the peak of the Transition with the dismantling of the political systems of the past and their replacement by two elected Chambers, the Congress and the Senate. The Transition was formalised in the Constitution of 1978 which commences with the following words: “Spain is a democratic state in search of freedom, justice, and equality for all who live there”. The Spain in which my wife and I travelled in February 2009 is, as explained above, a very different country from that of Eugene Smith in 1950. I believe that it is essential to appreciate the political, social and economical changes which have taken place nationally in Spain, during the last 59 years, in order to know how to understand and fully value the village of Deleitosa as it is at present. I had, prior to my journey, closely analysed some of Eugene Smith’s images from “The Spanish village” with the intention of discovering some of the mystery behind the magic of his photography. All his images have been taken in monochrome and subsequently been printed with a resemblance of a painting by Rembrandt. The motifs show one or several person/s performing a task or an action which may be very basic but relevant to life in the community. The foregrounds and backgrounds are simple and reflect a landscape of stones and mud against a clear sky. The contrasts are strong and at times displaying the subjects as silhouettes. Black is the predominant hue. I approached Deleitosa, mentally and physically, with an open mind but without a clear perception of what I was about to encounter. As the car descended from a rise in the road, the village revealed itself in front of me in the form of murky tiled roofs and tall chimneys with a church tower only just visible in the distance. Nostalgia filled me for a short time until a silver coloured Mercedes, of the latest model, notified me in no uncertain terms that I was obstructing the traffic and ought to move on. I parked by a roadside café, for our morning coffee, to find, to my amazement, inside the establishment, hanging on the wall, three well-known prints by Eugene Smith. A lady at a nearby table let me know, with certain pride, that the old lady on one of the prints was her Great-grandmother. To me it was comforting to recognize that the remembrance of Eugene Smith was still alive in Deleitosa. Vivienne and I spent four precious days in Deleitosa meandering through the narrow lanes, peeking through the gaping windows of the derelict mud and stone cottages and listening to the orchestra of clapping beaks from the hundreds of storks on the church roof. Many pilgrims of social history before me have done the same in the aspiration to capture some moments of bliss from Eugene Smith’s anthropological epic. It is now, although, not the time for me to venture into the details of present-day life in Deleitosa except for making some brief notes of my insight from talking to some of the people living there. Appraising the images from Eugene Smith`s “The Spanish Village” the impression of sadness and sorrow in the individual’s faces is apparent. Predominantly they depict a sentiment of endurance in a world of adversity. In contrast, I encountered, 59 years later, a populace of contented smiles in a modern and prosperous society. It was pointed out to me, by individuals who had lived in the village at the time that Eugene Smith had been, to some extent, selective in his approach to his subjects . Existence was difficult but in spite of everything filled with the carefree joy of living inside the entities of families and friends. An elderly man made the discreet comment: “Some aspects of life are better today but, on the other hand, others are worse”. In the 1960’s many of the inhabitants of Deleitosa took the opportunity to leave the village to seek their fortunes abroad or in other parts of Spain which could offer employment and an improved standard of living. I understand that nowadays there are between 800 – 900 permanent residents in Deleitosa but this figure increases steeply during the summer months and at festivities when past village emigrants and their offspring return for their vacations. Many of these individuals have maintained the old family homes which have been rebuilt and renovated beyond recognition. The old mud and stone cottages can still be found but are now used for storage or are just disintegrating as the municipal landscape is being transformed. In the past wheat farming and goat breeding were the principal agricultural occupations with inadequate gains as a result of the barren soil in the enclosed countryside. Eugene Smith describes in words and images the complex process of wheat farming and the hardship endured to acquire an adequate amount of wheat to provide for the populace. At present livestock farming in conjunction with supporting industrial units for processing the produce of dairy products and meat gives the community a stable economical base. The products are of high quality and are sold mostly at local market level in Extremadura. The village is surrounded by a landscape of wilderness and wildlife making it an attractive spot for national and international tourism which may provide an additional source of income in the future. Deleitosa, thanks to Eugene Smith, has already attained a space in the hall of global fame. Until the time of the Transition the Spanish people were under the powerful influence of the Catholic Church. Deleitosa was no exception. Nevertheless, Eugene Smith found the Priest, Don Manuel, to be an affable man who performed his responsibilities without an excess of authority. The church building, which originates from the 17th century, is constructed with the same rudimentary materials as the cottages of days gone by and blends in comfortably with the surroundings. The roof is the nesting quarter for numerous storks, which cause extensive damage to the building, but award the visitor with an impression of idyllic paradise. After Sunday mass Vivienne and I were greeted affectionately by Father Don Domingo, the successor to Don Manuel, who shields four parishes under his pastoral care. He was curious to find out if we intended to establish ourselves in the rural area adjacent to Deleitosa. Maybe not a bad idea considering the majestic view of the snow capped “Sierra Gredos”. “Chiki, Chiki”, the children of Deleitosa, dressed in fancy costume, moved rhythmically to the latest disco craze in readiness for the Carnival which was to be celebrated the following Saturday. Suddenly the dance burst into a display of confetti accompanied by screams and laughter. The atmosphere was filled with enjoyment and happiness, a far cry from the despondency expressed in Eugene Smith’s images. As the public left the square, Hermiona, a friendly local lady of 62 years, escorted us on a guided tour of the village. The silhouette of a slender girl, like a ghost dressed in black, carrying a tray of bread on her head vanished into a roughly made up empty lane, a woman squatting on the ground weaving a thread of linen transpires into a working lad empting his wheel barrow of building waste into a tip. In the “Spanish Village” the reality of the present survives hand in hand with the spirits of what went before. Eugene Smith presents, in his essay, a long-winded account of politics in the local council office. His picture of the office portrays the Mayor and his Secretary seated at a desk. The Mayor is smoking, with a somewhat arrogant expression, whilst the Secretary performs clerical duties. The office gives the impression of being orderly but a bit old fashioned by modern standards. What renders the ambience are two photographs, one of General Franco and the other of the fascist leader, Antonio Primo de Rivera, whose frosty gazes of suppression symbolize the image. In contrast my own image of the council office, taken on our last day, pictures an efficient looking lady, Jara Duran Gomez, encircled by up to date IT equipment. Jara informed me of the attention generated in Spain by Eugene Smith’s report within the disciplines of social science and economy making Deleitosa a bit of a show case in the academic world. I also received excellent advice, in anticipation, on how to progress further with my own project. Eugene Smith wrote in a letter to his mother in December 1936, when he was only 18 years old: “My aspiration is to capture the action of life, life in our world with its humour and tragedies, in other words, life as it is”. In the “Spanish Village” his photography has fulfilled this ambition, like Pablo Picasso with his brush of fire in the mural “Guernica” and Federico Garcia Lorca with his pen of blood in the poems “Gipsy Ballads”. There are very few men and women who are bestowed the divine ability to create through their art the sword of convictions to be used in the battle against aggression and discrimination. In my estimation Eugene Smith has definitely established himself within this distinctive elite. Copyright: Bjorn Engstrom
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