The articles presented in this issue constitute the second part of the special issue devoted to analyzing the links between culture, crisis, and renewal as part of the research project “Cultural Narratives of Crisis and Renewal (CRIC)” (European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation program, Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 645666). More specifically, this issue focuses on the consequences of the 2008 financial crisis for Spanish cultural production and the narratives developed as a way to explore the paths that culture can offer while pointing to the problems and opening debates for the search of renewal policies. As stated in the introduction to Part 1, our aim is to reflect on the particularities of the crisis in Spain so as to understand the multiple crises (not only economic but also social and political) that affect Western societies in search of solutions to a situation that affects the capitalist system itself. Thus the articles in the first part concentrated on interdisciplinary perspectives drawing on social anthropology; history and popular culture; music and cultural politics; and memory and politics. The articles in the second part focus on cultural production: literature; comics; documentary cinema; fiction cinema; and theater.
Pablo Valdivia opens with “Literature, Crisis, and Spanish Rural Space in the Context of the 2008 Financial Recession,” in which an analysis of the novel Caballos de labor (2012) by Antonio Castellote problematizes the ideological complexities of rural spaces. His article underlines the little attention that the countryside has received in scholarly publications, which have been traditionally more oriented to the urban context when analyzing finance and the economy. In this regard, Valdivia offers new paradigms to overcome this reductionist perspective. In “Neoliberal Expulsions, Crisis, and Graphic Reportage in Spanish Comics,” Jorge L. Catalá-Carrasco studies how the Spanish comics industry has adapted to new trends in consumption by examining the graphic reportage Barcelona. Los vagabundos de la chatarra (2015) by Jorge Carrión and Sagar. Drawing on recent scholarly literature tackling neoliberalism from below, Catalá-Carrasco analyzes the condition of living in perpetual crisis through this new genre in Spanish comics. Manuel de la Fuente writes about the depictions of social mobilization in documentary film after 2008 in his article “Documenting the Indignation: Responses to the 2008 Financial Crisis in Contemporary Spanish Cinema.” The study of the films Mercado de futuros (2011) by Mercedes Álvarez and No estamos solos (2015) by Pere Joan Ventura exposes the discursive strategies that documentaries use in involving audiences in renewal policies. For his part, Luis Martín-Estudillo moves to fiction film in “Pornoprecariedad: Crisis biopolítica, trabajo y régimen visual en Hermosa juventud (Jaime Rosales, 2014),” in which he links the notions of “precariousness” and “pornography” to explore how Rosales’ Hermosa juventud brings to the surface problems related to visual depiction, ethical responsibilities, and power relationships. Finally, Mauro Jiménez studies contemporary drama in “Teatro crítico contra la conciencia en crisis: Nada que perder.” In this play, the theater group Cuarta Pared reveals not only the responsibilities of the ruling class in the crisis but also the irresponsibility and lack of public conscience of ordinary people. To sum up, literature, graphic novels, cinema, and theater are just a few examples of the vitality and involvement of contemporary Spanish culture in developing expressive tools raising awareness of the crisis and envisioning solutions that must be found by all citizens.