An oral history project covering the lost voices of 20th-century women has been honoured by a special celebration in London. The project involved the creation of video postcards or “CartasVivas” to recover and preserve the legacies of prominent Spanish and Latin American women.
Academics, students and contributors to the project were invited to meet the Spanish ambassador and other important dignitaries at the Spanish Embassy last week. There, the project was celebrated for creating an online library of filmic capsules for educational institutions around the world.
The visit also marked the release of the three most recent CartasVivas portraits which focus on painters born in Madrid in the early 20th century. Delhy Tejero, Teresa Sanchez-Gavito and Amalia Avia brought the total number of CartasVivas up to 16 since the launch of the project in 2019.
The project is sponsored by the Santander Foundation and directed by Nuria Capdevila-Arguelles who is a professor of Hispanic Studies in the Department of Languages, Cultures and Visual Studies at Exeter. On the importance and the success of the project, Nuria said: “CartasVivas is about translating feminist memory into the present and making it stay with us. We need art, we need language and we need rigour to do that. We do not invent, we represent. We open closets and show discourses and voices that were there, waiting. This is a team effort and CartasVivas is a huge classroom as well as a growing project. Students learn from the project, true, but also from each other. It is a privilege to see them falling in love with and getting obsessed by Spanish authors like Carmen de Burgos or María Campo Alange or Elena Fortún or Mercedes Pinto or any of the authors in www.cartasvivas.org or in our module. And it was wonderful to see our efforts and the love we put in what we do recognised by the Spanish Embassy.”
“We open closets and show discourses and voices that were there, waiting”
Nuria Capdevila-Argüelles
At the reception that lasted two and and a half hours, 100 people were in attendance. It was introduced by José María Robles Fraga, the Minister Counsellor or Cultural and Scientific Affairs at the Embassy of Spain; and by Mr Borja Baselga, Director of the Satander Foundation. Leading a Q&A session was his Excellency Mr José Pascual Marco, Spanish Ambassador.
On the creation of the CartasVivas, teams developed the films through archival research of women’s letters, memoirs and interviews, and other memoralistic writings such as books they had written or journalistic articles.
The script is developed through the use of the University’s Digital Humanities Lab and the historical figures are played by professional actors.
The project has been embedded in the department’s teaching with a group project CartaViva, script and English translation of the script being part of the summative assessment of module MLS3037 – Women and Feminism in 20th Century Spain. Rosie Broadley, a student taking part in the project this year who attended the celebration in London, said: “I am so pleased to have been offered the opportunity to contribute to reviving the memories of these excellent feminists who truly deserve to be remembered and celebrated. I am currently helping with the Spanish to English translation of the video subtitles as part of the project and the trip to the Spanish embassy was an honour. It is certainly not something you do everyday and being able to meet the actresses who appeared in the CartasVivas was a real highlight! I hope that CartasVivas continues to get the recognition it deserves and becomes even more of a success across Spain and the UK in the future.”
“… the opportunity to contribute to reviving the memories of these excellent feminists who truly deserve to be remembered and celebrated”
Rosie Broadley, Fourth Year Spanish student
Also in attendance at the event were representatives from the Spanish media, partners and stakeholders of CartasVivas, including the British Spanish Society and the Instituto Cervantes of London.
José María Robles Fraga said: “CartasVivas invites us to rediscover the story of extraordinary women who participated in the social and literary context of Spain and Latin America. They played a pivotal role in the cultural development of the 20th century, but their testimonies are still relevant today.”
