Visualizing Spanish Modernity

Description

While the simultaneously creative and destructive forces of modernity in Western Europe have been well studied, the case of Spain has often been overlooked. Visualizing Spanish Modernity concentrates on the time period of 1868-1939, which marks not only the beginning of the formation of a modern economy and the consolidation of the liberal state, but also the growth of urban centres and spaces made possible by electricity, transportation, mass production and the emergence of an entertainment industry. The authors examine how mass print culture, early cinema, popular drama, photography, fashion, painting, museums and urban planning played a role in the way that Spanish society saw itself and was in turn seen by the rest of the world. Assessing how new cultural forms were instrumental in shaping Spaniards into citizens of the modern world, the authors consider such subjects as the spectacle of the body, notions of race and gender, the changing meanings of time, space and motion, the relationship between technology and everyday life and popular culture.

Susan Larson is Assistant Professor of Spanish at the University of Kentucky. Eva Maria Woods is Assistant Professor of Hispanic Studies at Vassar College.

"No-one who cares about modern peninsular Spanish studies can afford to overlook this expertly marshalled collection, which stands out as a landmark in the study of Spanish visual culture 1830-1939. The delineation of a conflicted modernity is a particular strength, which results in a re-definition of Spanish modernism and post-modernism." Robin Fiddian, Professor of Spanish, Fellow of Wadham College, University of Oxford "Just glancing over the Contents of Visualizing Spanish Modernity whets the curiosity and quickens the pulse. The essays themselves convey the thirst for and the anxiety surrounding the modernity that was inexorably defining Spain as she set on the turbulent path that led to the post-Civil War years. An important book." Selma Holo, Professor of Museum Studies, Department of Art History, University of Southern California "This book focuses on the fructiferous field of international Hispanism leading the area of humanistic research. Drawing on essays written about film and other iconic media, this book avoids common stereotypes and is destined to set a precedent in the study of Spanish reality through the "visualization" of its Modernity." Javier Herrera, Filmoteca Espanola, Madrid 'If it can be said that those who read Borges will never read a book in the same way after reading his fiction, than those who read Larson and Woods will find that they just may not see modernity in the same way after entering into the wide-ranging criticism provided by the authors of each chapter.' David Walker, Unversity of Colorado at Boulder 'Visualizing Spanish Modernity paints a vivid picture of the development over little more than a century of a Spanish modernity that was shot through with cultural conflict and anxiety, and as such will appeal particularly to scholars and students of modern Spanish studies.' British Bulletin of Publications on Latin America, the Caribbean, Portugal and Spain