Los Últimos / The Last Ones

Baltasar

Between 2015 and 2017, Luis Areñas visited towns and villages all over Spain trying to find answers to the questions raised by his wish to pay tribute to his grandfather Luis––and all the grandfathers––who died in the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939). He would have liked to have known him, and he knows that his mother and uncle would have wanted, needed, to live and grow up with him. It was not to be.

Mariano

Where are the survivors? Who are they? What did the war mean to them? Urged on by these questions, he was able to locate some of the last soldiers who took part in the war, and women who experienced life at the time.

Vicente Colin

The portraits presented in his exhibition are of those people, who are very old today, or who have died since being photographed, who were one day the youth of Spain. Most were barely out of their childhood when they went to war, aged 17 and 18 years.

This exhibition does not deal with the objective work of an historian, but the subjective memory of those who suffered the effects of the civil war first hand. Luis Areñas wanted to rescue those combatants from oblivion, give them a name and a face, and listen to their account, an oral testimony of a historic event that had collective repercussions and of a vital moment of great personal significance: the unavoidable approach of the end of their lives.

Baltasar

The testimonies of these fighters have been captured on a 46 min video presenting a number of extracts, fragments of the conversations held with them in front of the camera. Luis Areñas wanted each individual to tell their own story at their own pace. A memory altered by time, by emotion, and by their present circumstances.

Bonifacio

Time may have altered their memories, but their emotions and their intensity endure. Memories make us more human, and in light of the people who experienced them, allow us to understand this heinous war that destroyed entire families and whose disturbing reminders continue to haunt us today. 

José-Moreno

Paul Delmet

French composer and chansonnier Paul Delmet (1862–1904) is associated with the beret through a well-known portrait of him, though he is not exclusively defined by the headwear. The image of him in a beret, with his distinctive mustache and a cigarette, has become a representative depiction of his Belle Époque and Montmartre cabaret persona.

The famous depiction is an illustration by the Swiss-born French artist Théophile Steinlen, who often chronicled Parisian life. Steinlen created the drawing for the cover of Delmet's 1897 songbook, Chansons de femmes.

More Vintage from Hungary

Fishing in the Tamás Production Cooperative, 1981 

Autumn fishing in Tamási 1962

Autumn fishing at the Fornád State Farm, 1981

Barrel making at the Bátaszék Kádár and Woodworking Cooperative, 1962

Producers' cooperative brigade meeting in Dombóvár, 1966

Stezka Českem

Stezka Českem ("Trail through the Czech Republic) is a show on Czech Television ČT 2. Host Miroslav Vladyka enthusiasm for hiking in Czechia is contagious. 

This husband and wife fell for it and decided to follow the example, but, in retro gear wearing century old leather boots, the typical sweatpants of the era and of course a radiovka. 

"People had fun and laughed when they saw our equipment on the trail".

Angus McMillan

Angus McMillan (1810 –1865) was a Scottish-born explorer, pioneer pastoralist, and perpetrator of several of the Gippsland massacres of Gunai people.

Arriving first in New South Wales in 1838, McMillan rose swiftly in Australian colonial society as a skilled explorer. His explorations led to the opening of the Gippsland region for pastoralism, displacing the Gunai Aboriginal people who were the traditional owners of the land. McMillan organised an armed assault on the Gunai, leading to the massacre of between 60 and 150 Aboriginal people at Warrigal Creek. McMillan was the leader of the "Highland Brigade", a group of Gaelic-speaking men who undertook reprisal raids on the Gunaikurnai.

Nineteen monuments honouring McMillan exist in Gippsland, including at Wellington, Heyfield, Yarram, Omeo and Lucknow. After considering 240 community submissions in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement, which included about half in favour of removing two stone cairns dedicated to McMillan on land owned by the Wellington Shire Council, the Council voted against the move on 17 June 2020.

Claude Confortès

Claude Confortès was a French actor, playwright and director (1928-2016). He also wrote several plays under the pseudonym Claude Satèsen.

In 1964, he became assistant to Claude Berri, with whom he learned to direct on The Old Man and the Child (1966), Mazel Tov or the Marriage (1968) and The Pistoned (1970).

He met the cartoonist Georges Wolinski in 1968, whose album Je ne veux pas mourir idiot he adapted for the stage, becoming a pioneer of the genre. 

Americans

Chicago

New York

Washington DC

Seattle

Los Angeles

San Francisco

New Orleans 

Boineros

 

Needlework

Needlework encompasses decorative and constructive textile crafts that utilize a needle to apply thread or yarn to fabric, including sewing, embroidery, cross-stitch, needlepoint, and quilting. These crafts serve both practical and decorative purposes, adding luxury and beauty to garments and furnishings, and have been practiced across many cultures for centuries.

 

Germany 1937

A restored and colourized film of German cities in 1937. Scenes feature the cities of Eisenach, Leipzig, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Wetzlar and Berlin.

This footage captures the daily life of German people walking through city streets, driving along the German autobahn and attending church.

Other scenes highlight painters at work (with beret), factory workers and kayakers. Moments of joy and amusement offer a glimpse into the universal nature of human experiences that have remained unchanged over the decades, 2 years before WW2. 

Vintage Pyrenees

 Postcard. In front of the city hall of Arudy

 Hotel des Pyrénées in Artigues

Hotel of the Pass of Riou and the Monne, Cauterets

Party in Larrau, summer 1920

Mosaic Lourdes

Mosaic by JP. Demoisy after a drawing by F. Mengelatte, 1967, in the pedestrian tunnel of the Ophite neighborhood, Lourdes.

 

Hijab and Berets

 

Hijab refers to head coverings worn by Muslim women.

Similar to the mitpaḥat/tichel or snood worn by religiously observing married Jewish women, certain headcoverings worn by some Christian women, such as the hanging veil, apostolnik and kapp, and the dupatta favored by many Hindu and Sikh women, the hijab comes in various forms. 

The term describes a scarf that is wrapped around the head, covering the hair, neck, and ears while leaving the face visible.

The use of the hijab has grown globally since the 1970s, with many Muslims viewing it as a symbol of modesty and faith; it is also worn as a form of adornment.

There is consensus among mainstream Islamic religious scholars that covering the head is required. In practice, most Muslim women choose to wear it.

Classical fiqh have differed as how to understand Qur'anic verses on clothing; Sunni and Shia scholars say hijab is mandatory, while Ismaili, accounting for ~0.25% of all Muslims, do not.

Besides that traditional scholars had different opinions on covering the hands and face. Muslim scholars usually require women to cover everything but their hands and face in public, but do not require the niqab (a face covering worn by some Muslim women). 

In nearly all Muslim cultures, pre-pubescent girls are not required to wear a hijab.

In private, and in the presence of close relatives (mahrams), rules on dress relax. However, in the presence of the husband, most scholars stress the importance of mutual freedom and pleasure of the husband and wife.