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Abstract
Since 1900, the Maxam Group (formerly Unión Española de Explosivos) has published an annual almanac, with each edition illustrated by a Spanish painter commissioned to produce a work thematically related to the company’s activity. Focusing on what was popularly known as “the museum for those who do not go to museums” or the “explosive women calendar,” this article analyzes the iconographic program of this unique archive from a cultural and historical perspective, with special attention to the Francoist period. The dynamics of the representation of women, the tensions between bourgeois and popular culture, as well as the questions it inspires with respect to the almanac’s life in society and on the institutional level invite the reader to consider this collection, little esteemed for its artistic quality, as a complex cultural mechanism, useful for the analysis of the aesthetic continuities and discontinuities associated with Spanish modernity.
Notes
1 Pedro Gil Paradela, “Federica Montseny,” Mujeres, RTVE (1991).
2 Juan Gil-Albert, Drama patrio. Testimonio 1968 (Barcelona: Tusquets, 1977), 23.
3 Cf. Ticio Escobar, El mito del arte y el mito del pueblo (Santiago de Chile: ediciones/metales pesados, 1986).
4 Cf. María García Alonso, “Necesitamos un pueblo. Genealogía de las Misiones Pedagógicas,” in Val del Omar y las Misiones Pedagógicas (Madrid: Residencia de Estudiantes, 2003), 75–97.
5 Gilles Deleuze, Two Regimes of Madness. Texts and Interviews 1975–1995 (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2006), 324.
6 With respect to the years of the Spanish Civil War, the Maxam Foundation states: “we are not aware of the existence of either original works or calendars. This might be due to the circumstances of the moment. Nevertheless, there remains a doubt about whether they did exist, given that the company's activity was not interrupted. If they were published, it is possible that upon the end of the military conflict, the new management eliminated them for reasons logical at that time.” Fundación Maxam, 1995, 69.
7 Valeriano Bozal, “Una historia del gusto: la Colección UEE,” Colección UEE (Madrid: Fundación UEE, 2006), 41–67.
8 Cf. Gabriel Pinto, Amalio Garrido, “Ciencia y arte: las pinturas de los calendarios MAXAM (antes Unión Española de Explosivos) como recurso para la difusión y la enseñanza de la química,” Anales de Química 111, 2 (2015), 104–108.
9 Luis Carandell, “Nuestro almanaque,” Colección UEE (Madrid: Mapfre, 1995), 13.
10 Luis Carandell, “Nuestro almanaque,” 13.
11 Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, “La poética de los calendarios, 1999,” Colección UEE, Fundación UEE (2006), 12.
12 Vázquez Montalbán, “La poética de los calendarios, 1999,” 12.
13 Ibid., 15.
14 In Spanish, the expression is commonly used to refer to women who are fierce and have a temper; who are brave and persistent, take risks, but who are, above all, dangerous.
15 A term coined by Germán Labrador so as to refer to the popular poetics of a specific context.
16 Bozal, “Una historia del gusto: la Colección UEE,” 55.
17 The entire family worked on the development of new and emerging energies. In the service of the Russian Zar Nicolas I, Immanuel Nobel manufactured explosives and improved naval mines. In the last third of the nineteenth century, his sons Robert and Ludvig came to produce fifty percent of the world’s oil in Baku, Azerbaijan, and stood out for the innovative nature of their systems for refining, storage and distribution, as well as for the industrial and military application of their inventions.
18 Ascanio Sobrero, NobelPrize.org. https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/ascanio-sobrero/ (accessed December 26, 2019).
19 Alfred Nobel, “Will,” NobelPrize.org (accessed December 26, 2019).
20 Cf. Ana Julia Gómez, Galdakao: Alfred Nobel - La dinamita - Tximelarre (Bilbao: BBK. Col. Temas vizcaínos 325–326, 2002).
21 Cabanes in Girona and Granollers in Barcelona; La Cervera and El Caleyo in Asturias; Bonanza in Cádiz, and Arrigorriaga and Barakaldo in Vizcaya. Cf. José María González García, La industria de explosivos en España: 1896–1936 (Madrid: Programa de Historia Económica, Fundación Empresa Pública, 2000).
22 Cristina Angulo, “El fuerte de Zuazo,” El País (April 26, 1998). https://elpais.com/diario/1998/04/27/paisvasco/893706010_850215.html.
23 Cf. Agustín Marco, “Un pelotazo explosivo de los ilustres señores del capital riesgo,” El Confidencial (May 5, 2011). https://blogs.elconfidencial.com/economia/a-corazon-abierto/2011-11-05/un-pelotazo-explosivo-de-los-ilustres-senores-del-capital-riesgo_436256/.
24 Maxam, “1896–1994. From UEE to UEE,” Shaping. The New Maxam Magazine 17, 140 Anniversary Special Edition (2012), 20–21.
25 “The Spanish arms trade continues to be fairly opaque despite the advances that have taken place in the last few years, and it is impossible to know whether the government has authorised sales to other countries and, if so, to which. However, the companies associated with the production of cluster bombs are Expal Explosivos, property of Grupo Maxam, and Instalaza SA. In the last four years, the Spanish government has allocated 3.18 million euros to the processes of acquisition of maintenance of munition of this type through awards to these companies.” Mabel González Bustelo, La prohibición de las bombas de racimo (Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto, Instituto de Derechos Humanos. Cuadernos Deusto de Derechos Humanos, 56, 2009), 14–15.
26 Cf. Gasteizkoak, Mercaderes de la muerte made in Euskadi. La industria militar en Euskal Herria. (Gasteiz: Zapateneo, 2008) and Carlos del Castillo, “10.700 millones al año: los rostros de la pujante industria militar española,” Diario Público (August 21, 2017). https://www.publico.es/economia/10700-millones-ano-rostros-pujante-industria-militar-espanola.html.
27 Juan Cruz Peña, “Explosivos Alaveses ficha a Bardají, gurú de Vox y hombre de Steve Bannon en España,” El Confidencial (September 9, 2019). https://www.elconfidencial.com/empresas/2019-09-19/explosivos-alaveses-ficha-bardaji-guru-vox-steve-bannon_2240239/.
28 Cf. Bozal, “Una historia del gusto: la Colección UEE.”
29 An aesthetic category that, in its origin, referred to belonging to a colonial lineage (Castilian + mestizo = castizo), but has generally come to refer to the self-assured, funny, and genuine nature of Spaniards.
30 The photography exhibition “Emakume dinamitariak – Las Dinamiteras” [Women dynamite workers, in Basque and in Spanish], presented in 2018 by the Town Council of Galdakao and the Maxam Foundation, seeks to give visibility to the visual memory of the dynamite and cartridge workers; there is also a square named after them in the town.
31 According to the certificate issued in the name of the resident of Galdakao Isabel Uriarte Urruticoechea by the Military Committee for Industrial Enlistment and Mobilization (Militarization of factories) [Comisión Militar de incorporación y movilización industrial (Militarización de fábricas)] on July 25, 1937 (a month after Bilbao fell [to fascist forces]): “You are hereby notified that on being assimilated into the category of soldier, you have been mobilized for all purposes associated with the performance of your mission in the shops of the Sociedad Anónima Española de la Dinamita-Galdakao-Vizcaya, which are in the service of the National Army. This notice shall not have the effect of a personal background certificate.” Galdakao Udala, “Un documento recuperado en Galdakao muestra cómo el ejército franquista convertía en «soldados» a trabajadoras de La Dinamita,” Ayuntamiento de Galdakao (May 21st, 2018). https://www.galdakao.eus/ampliar/un-documento-recuperado-en-galdakao-muestra-como-el-ejercito-franquista-convertia-en-soldados-a-trabajadoras-de-la-dinamita/1000831/395.
32 Europa Press, “Galdakao hará sonar este viernes la sirena que hace 76 años avisaba a la población civil de los bombardeos” (May 16, 2013).
33 Carlos Fonseca, “La mujer dinamitera,” El País (February 12, 2006). https://elpais.com/diario/2006/02/12/eps/1139729208_850215.html.
34 Cf. Carlos Sáenz de Tejada, et al. Tejada y la pintura: un relato desvelado, 1914-1925 (Segovia: Caja Segovia, Obra Social y Cultural, 2003), Carlos Sáenz de Tejada: Los Años de La Libertad (Madrid: Mapfre, 1998). and Juan Manuel Bonet, “Sáenz de Tejada: genio sin tópicos,” Periódico ABC (March 2, 2008). https://www.abc.es/espana/abci-saenz-tejada-genio-sin-topicos-2008 03020300-1641690314216_noticia.html.
35 Arte Nuevo, or “new art” is a Spanish art trend of the first third of the twentieth century, initiated in response to the European modern movement, not to be confused with art nouveau.
36 Cf. María Rosón, “Cuerpo, mujeres y campo en el primer franquismo,” in Campo cerrado. Arte y poder en la posguerra española 1939–1943. (Madrid: Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid, 2016), 124–127.
37 1947, 1948, 1950, 1951, 1954, 1956, 1959, 1962, 1963, 1975, 1976 and 1977.
38 “Paco Ribera's stance during the civil war is shocking: so much so that Carlos Fontserè defines him as a man of the right, close to the CEDA [Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas, or the Spanish Confederation of Autonomous Rights], and even his colleagues considered him a 'philofascist of the good sort, honest and incapable of evil'.” Santi Barjau, “Paco Ribera,” Els “meus” cartellistes (February 21, 2017). http://cartellistes.blogspot.com/2017/02/paco-ribera-per-santi-barjau.html
39 Cf. Barjau, “Paco Ribera.”
40 Signed “Paco Ribera” and printed in Barcelona, possibly before the Victory Parade of 19 May 1939, the work is not mentioned by Ángel Llorente in his article “La construcción de un mito: La imagen de Franco en las artes plásticas en el primer franquismo 1936–1945,” Archivos de la Filmoteca 42/43 (October 2002–February 2003), 46–75; nor by Jesusa Vega, “Franco, sus retratos y los años cuarenta: revisitar el archivo visual,” Hispanic Research Journal 19, Issue 5: Visual Arts XII (2018): 513–536.
41 The painter Eduardo Úrculo wrote: “I remember [a calendar] from the fifties […] My uncle Julián, who was a chemist, kept a framed copy of that image, and I painted my own version in oils with the same passion displayed by the copyists at the Prado Museum. For me, it was a great exercise during my early days as a budding artist.” Maxam, Caja España and Caja Duero, Colección UEE. Los calendarios de explosivos (Valladolid: Sala de Exposiciones del Teatro Calderón, 2010–2011), 88.
42 With respect to the popular context and quoting Hegel (Aesthetics, Pt. III, Sect. 2, chapter 2.), Gombrich states that "piety is also satisfied with poor images and will always worship Christ, Mary or any other saint in the most abject daub.” E. H. Gombrich, “The Edge of Delusion,” The New York Review of Books, XXXVII, No. 2, (February 15, 1990), 7.
43 Vázquez Montalbán, “La poética de los calendarios, 1999,” 12.
44 Maxam, Caja España and Caja Duero, Colección UEE. Los calendarios de explosivos, 86.
45 “MAXAM's professio nals in the field face complicated and extremely differing environments such as a mine in Siberia in −40 degrees, underwater blasting machines in Panama, or projects in sub-Saharan Africa in over 40 degrees of heat. It is they who quickly detect any new challenge to improve the security and efficiency of operations. Thanks to them, to the nonconformist, innovative spirit of our teams, some significant technological advances that respond to the specific needs of our customers have emerged from Santa Barbara,” Miguel Ángel Flórez, Maxam's Chief Technology Officer (CTO). Interempresas, “Maxam celebra 25 años premiando la innovación,” Interempresas 5 (December 5, 2018). https://www.interempresas.net/ObrasPublicas/Articulos/230385-Maxam-celebra-25-anos-premiando-la-innovacion.html.
47 Rafael Sánchez-Mateos Paniagua, “Primeiros apuntamentos para unha «arte fandiña.» sobre memoria colectiva, arte popular e subalteridade no Estado Español,” Grial: revista galega de cultura, Vol. 57, 222 (2019), 60.
48 Sanja Perovic, The Calendar in Revolutionary France: Perceptions of Time in Literature, Culture, Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012).