Assignment 7

From December 2009 to April 2010 I was living in Valencia, Spain. Before living there, I did not know a lot about Spanish history but was vaguely familiar with the Spanish Civil War. Both my high school and college World History classes skipped over Spain as a whole, which I now find unbelievable after learning quite a bit about Franco, the civil war, and its connections to Hitler and fascism across Europe.


I was taking a friend through the Reina Sofía Modern Art Museum in Madrid and we spent a lot of time checking out an exhibit of Spanish Civil War posters. I was really taken with the imagery and the variation among political groups. There were many sides to the war and the different groups were represented through conflicting images and slogans. Some of the imagery was ambiguous and difficult to decipher at first, but upon close inspection it was usually clear whose side the artist was on. I was especially drawn to the anti-fascist posters. The struggle against Franco and the fascists is a tragic one, resulting in lost lives, forced conformity, hunger, and ultimately with the implementation of a strict dictatorship that lasted for around 40 years. I was deeply touched by the stories of those who resisted Franco, stories I heard through the children of those who lived it, through a 6 part documentary I watched, and even through first hand accounts of people I spoke with.


I will admit that finding a collection of posters is not what I originally set out to do while browsing the Library of Congress picture collection. I originally thought I would find some photos of Spain, or more specifically, of Valencia, during the war. However, I was not entirely impressed with the images that were available. The search terms I used were “Spain during civil war” and “Valencia civil war”.


The search results for “Valencia civil war” yielded several images of war posters. That is when I remembered my visit to the museum and decided to search for more of these posters. I then searched for “Spanish Civil War posters”. Here I found an entire collection of over 100 poster images. My only disappointment is that the posters were not able to be enlarged and therefore were kind of difficult to see. Despite that, I still really enjoyed browsing through the posters. I absolutely loved that the LOC provided lots of information about each poster, including a translation of the text, name of the creator(s), date and location of publication, summary, etc. It was really quite impressive that they were able to provide such detailed information about each individual poster. This really helped me narrow my choices down to mostly posters featuring anti-fascist messages.


Entire Collection of Spanish Civil War Posters:
Delicious
Library of Congress Collection

Individual posters that stood out to me:

Image 1
I chose this image because at first glance I thought it was anti-fascist. The text reads “Spain, now you are free”. Once I really studied the image I realized it is in fact the strong arm of a fascist holding three small political figures. The poster is implying that Spain is now free because it is fascist, which is a pretty hefty contradiction.


Image 2
This one is also a bit ambiguous. The message seems to read that those injured from war should be reading lots of books.


Image 3
This poster is calling for those in the regions of Asturias and Valencia (regions that opposed fascism) to take in and help refugees from the north. I liked the image of the hands reaching out to help the displaced.


Image 4
This was a very popular image, depicting Madrid’s attempt to defend their city against the fascists. Unfortunately, they failed at this attempt.


Image 5
I was very taken with the powerful message of this poster: “Ambitions, militarism, war. This is fascism. Destroy it, uniting your effort with others”


Image 6
F.A.I. was an anarchist group in Spain. For a short time, the region of Catalonia functioned successfully as a cooperative, anarchist state during the civil war.


Image 7
I liked this one because it implies that books can work as tools to fight fascism.


Image 8
This poster has a very hopeful message with the image of a soldier using a magnet to tear apart a swastika.


Image 9
This poster mentions the fight for the preservation of culture in all towns. The different regions of Spain are very dedicated to their own unique culture and customs. Franco wanted a united Spain and citizens were punished for taking part in local traditions and for speaking regional dialects.


Image 10
This poster features a heartbreaking image of a mother and child and text that reads “What are you doing to prevent this?”


I think the LOC picture archives are a great resource for academic or research purposes. I definitely do not think this source would have worked for my Assignment 6 project, which featured more current images. I found the images I wanted very easily; although that might have something to do with the fairly open and vague objective I had to begin with. I did not know what I was looking for, specifically. I let the results guide me.


I do feel that the LOC might be able to improve their search capabilities in some ways. They should offer more options in their “advanced search” such as dates, locations, etc. in order to narrow down results when someone happens to be looking for something very specific. When I searched for “Spain during civil war” I was given 24 different images, some of which had nothing to do with the Spanish Civil War, which was confusing to me. I was really impressed with the amount of historical images available. Even after I had settled on a topic, I continued browsing through some of the featured collections on the main page just for fun. These archives are full of fascinating historical images. I would love to see some of them in person some day.