Said
a friend of the Borja lady (Cecilia) who botched the restoration of
the church's Ecce Homo
fresco – “She's better at landscapes.” A sentiment with which
there can be no arguing. Media attention continues and the mayor has
had to put security round the fresco, as people queue to have their
foto taken next to it. Back in Madrid, a few of Spain's cultural
elite have called for it to be left as it is, since Cecilia has
“turned a stuffy academic piece into an icon of our time”.
In doing so she has “dared to take a step that even Picasso never
took by adapting a classic by intervening directly onto the canvas
and converting one work of art into another”. A second voice says
that “the painting now represents 'an act of love' and
'intelligence' that reflects the contemporary social and political
environment, intelligently combining the primitive
expressionism of Goya with figures such as Ensor, Munch, Modigliani
and the German expressionist movement, the Die Brücke group”. So,
there you have it – A modern classic. So modern, it makes me laugh
just to glimpse it. Here, incidentally, is a brilliant graphic which
shows how the fresco has changed as you move your cursor over it,
left and right. Scroll down the page.
Talking
of culture . . . As always happens here, a change of government late
last year meant an immediate ousting of the board of the public TV
service, TVE. In a not-very-surprising development, the new
management has decided to allow bullfighting back onto the box. Which
will be welcomed by an industry suffering from a fall in ticket sales and
the effective banning of the fiesta nacional in both Barcelona
and San Sebastian.
I
was intrigued by an article on the hardest and easiest languages to
learn. I would have guessed at Arabic, Chinese, Korean and Japanese
being among the hardest – but why not Farsi? - though I found the
easiest language to be rather more tendentious, especially as English
took the palm, followed by Spanish and Italian, if I recall
correctly. Hungarian was in the top five hard tongues, though not
Finnish, of the same Magyar group. Anyone interested in knowing why should click here.
Listening
to a BBC podcast on the Italian family and how much strain it's being
put under by the return home of unemployed kids, I was reminded of
the Spanish scene. Specifically of an announcement made this week by
the government that they are, effectively, going to 'means test' the
monthly payment of 400 euros given to the unemployed when their dole
finishes. Anyone who's then living with a family whose monthly income
is more than 480 euros per capita won't be get the payment. I
assume the family's income will be gauged via their income tax
declarations. So any family not submitting or merely diluting these
won't be hit, I guess. Moral hazard anyone?
In
the UK, people on the street with collection boxes are called
chuggers (Deriv: charity muggers). Here in Pontevedra, the only people
more annoying are the bloody accordion players, one of whom came into
the restaurant we were in last night. And almost got a plate of smoked
salmon on his head.
Finally
. . . Still more culture. Here's a bit of verse in Gallego, put out
by the Xunta of Galicia. If you're a Portuguese – or even Spanish -
speaker, you should be able to translate. As for me, I think I get it
but am not totally sure of Coida do teu. With your help?
O
porvir de Galicia fiase agora.
Porque
a nosa paisaxe, as nosas casas,
as
nosas rúas e negocios
son
o reflexo do noso futuro.
Coida
do teu. Dálle valor.
Paisaxe
Galicia, unha tarefa de todos.
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