Introduction

Visual Index (Entire Poster Collection)

Catalogue

Chronology of the War

Acknowledgements

Lists of References

Afterword: Herbert R. Southworth Collection

Homenaje a Madrid

[Homage to Madrid]. . Junta de Defensa de Madrid, Ministerio de Propaganda Lithograph and photoprint, 3 colors; 100 x 86 cm.

This poster (1937) contains an excerpt from the same speech that is excerpted on poster 9 (El Presidente de la República Ha Dicho) and poster 46 (El Presidente Ha Dicho) in this exhibit. Manual Azaña, president of the Republic, gave this speech in Valencia on January 21, 1937. The text is bordered by the outline of a crest and imposed over the outline of the Iberian Peninsula. Beneath the text is a photograph of two stone lions - symbols for Spain. In the larger scope of the speech, Azaña addressed key themes such as the aid Franco was receiving Italy and Germany and the importance of recognizing the Spanish Republic as the only legitimate government of Spain. Here, he speaks of the resilience of the residents of Madrid in resisting Franco's troops and sets their effort in a wider historical framework. It reads as follows:

In Madrid, where nothing has ever happened, [there] now [occurs] the greatest [events] of contemporary Spanish History, and it will be necessary that time passes in order that our own madrileños, not yet murdered, happily comfortable with their tremendous fate, can perceive the repercussions that their limitless resistance is going to have on the fortunes of Spain.

Azaña was born in Alcalá de Henares in 1880 and educated as a lawyer. Prior to his entry into Spanish politics, he showed skill at writing fiction. Until 1931, when he became the Ministry of Defense of the Spanish Republic, Azaña had been agitating for various political and social changes. In 1925, he founded a political party, Acción Republicana, signaling his dedication to republicanism after concluding that the furtherance of individual liberty could not be achieved under the monarchy. After moderate political success in the early 1930s, Azaña was imprisoned in 1934 on unfounded charges regarding his involvement in uprising in Barcelona and Asturias in October of that year. Azaña fused his political part with others to create the political party, the Popular Front. This new party was victorious in the elections of February 16, 1936 and Azaña became president of the republic in October 1936. He held the position until the end of the war in 1939 when he fled to France, where he died of a heart attack in 1940.