Ghosts of Fascist Past
November 6, 2007
The Guardian has a really haunting article about a photographic exhibition that is dealing with Spain’s fascist past:
The skull and the feet belonged to men who were executed here by the Falange, supporters of Francisco Franco in the early days of the Spanish civil war. They were thrown in this unmarked grave – one of hundreds like it still scattered across Spain – purposefully placed at the foot of the church, explained Javier Ortiz, the head forensic archaeologist, “So everyone would walk on them, forever desecrating them”.
….
“When you see an open grave you know, if you did not before, that it is absolutely necessary to recover the victims, to take them out of the gutters, the dumps, the wells, and the mines, all anonymous holes they were thrown into like animals. Some of these common graves are now underneath new housing developments, sports centres or supermarkets where people live, play and shop ignorantly… an open grave is a book with pages of earth where words are written with the letters of bodies, bones, fractures, bullet holes, Mauser bullet shells, hand gun shells, buttons, buckles, clothes, shoes, pencils, glasses, watches, and rings.”
