Agustina González López
{{Short description|Spanish writer and artist (1891–1936)}}
{{Infobox artist
| name = Agustina González López
| birth_date = 4 April 1891
| birth_place = Granada
| death_date = {{Death-date and age|1936|4 April 1891}}
| death_place = Viznar
| nationality = Spanish
| movement = Abstract art, Feminism
}}
Agustina González López, also known as "La Zapatera" (born 4 April 1891 in Granada; died 1936 in Víznar, Granada province) was a Spanish writer and artist who belonged to the so-called Generation of '27.{{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}} She contested the Spanish parliamentary elections in 1933 with her own party and was executed by Nationalist forces in 1936 at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War.{{cite book|last=Barranco Castillo|first=Enriqueta|url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49829530-agustina-gonz-lez-l-pez-1891-1936-espiritista-te-sofa-escritora-y-po|title=Agustina Gónzález López (1891-1936): Espiritista, Teósofa, Escritora y Política|publisher=Editorial Universidad de Granada|year=2019|isbn=978-8433865076}} Today she is considered a pioneer of Andalusian feminism{{Cite web|url=https://www.pagina12.com.ar/245670-agustina-gonzalez-lopez-y-un-rescate-imprescindible|title=Agustina González López y un rescate imprescindible|first=Silvina|last=Friera|date=February 5, 2020|website=Pagina12}}{{cite book|last=Fagoaga|first=Concha|title=La Voz Y El Voto De Las Mujeres.l sufragismo en España 1877-1931|publisher=Icaria editorial|year=1985|isbn=978-8474261073
}} and an avant-gardist, both politically and artistically.{{Cite web|url=https://www.elindependientedegranada.es/blog/agustina-gonzalez-lopez-zapatera-fusilada-romper-moldes|title=Agustina González López, La Zapatera, fusilada por romper moldes|first=Juan|last=Pérez|date=September 7, 2019|website=El Independiente|quote=(Spanish): "Agustina González López: Escritora, política, progresista, feminista… Mujer inclasificable, adelantada a su tiempo,...Fue una intelectual global"}}
Introduction
During her lifetime, Agustina González López was known as an eccentric: Her nickname was "la Zapatera" (English: the Shoemaker) {{cite web |last1=González López (La Zapatara) |first1=Agustina |title=Who was who - Universo Lorca |url=https://www.universolorca.com/en/personaje/gonzalez-lopez-agustina-la-zapatera/ |website=Universo Lorca |access-date=10 October 2021}} because her family owned a shoe store in Granada. She was a friend of Federico García Lorca,{{cite web |last1=González López (La Zapatara) |first1=Agustina |title=Who was who - Universo Lorca |url=https://www.universolorca.com/en/personaje/gonzalez-lopez-agustina-la-zapatera/ |website=Universo Lorca |access-date=10 October 2021}} and contemporaries such as the writer Francisco Ayala described her as a "flamboyant figure, probably a madwoman":
"La Zapatera," Ayala wrote in his Relatos Granadinos, "wandered around a lot, entering cafés and restaurants, alone! and wrote absurd things, which she had printed and then offered for sale in the window of her shoe store."{{cite book |last1=Ayala |first1=Francisco |title=Relatos Granadinos |date=1990 |publisher=Ayuntamiento de Granada|location=Spain |isbn=84-87713-01-7 |access-date=10 October 2021 |url=https://www.iberlibro.com/buscar-libro/kw/francisco-ayala-relatos-granadinos/libro/|quote=(Spanish): "La Zapatera era una figura extravagante, probablemente una chiflada, callejeaba mucho, entraba -¡y sola!- en los cafés y restaurantes y escribía cosas absurdas que hacía imprimir y ponía luego a la venta en el escaparate de su zapatería."}}
After her execution in 1936, rumors circulated that she had been killed because she was "a whore" or "a lesbian".{{cite web |last1=Gallastegui |first1=Inés |title=Doble velo de silencio |url=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20081012/sociedad/doble-velo-silencio-20081012.html |website=Ideal |date=12 October 2008 |access-date=10 October 2021}} Her body was never identified {{cite web |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Agustina González López |url=https://www.todoslosnombres.org/content/biografias/agustina-gonzalez-lopez |website=Todos los Nombres |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}} and she was forgotten. She was rediscovered only in 2010, as part of a research project at the University of Granada not originally dedicated to her.{{cite web |last1=Cárdenas |first1=Andrés |title="Ai ke ablar de la kuestion" |url=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html?ref=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html |website=Ideal |date=3 May 2014 |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}} Finally, in 2019, a biography of her was published in Spain, in which she is recognized as a feminist writer, artist, and politician.{{cite book |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Agustina González López (1891-1936) Espiritista, Teósofa, escritora y política |date=2019 |publisher=Universidad de Granada, Editorial Universidad de Granada |location=Spain |isbn=9788433865076 |url=https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/libro?codigo=738747 |access-date=10 October 2021}}
Life
Agustina González López was born in Granada on 4 April 1891. Her family had a shoe store at Calle Mesones No. 6. From the age of 7 to 9, she attended the Real Colegio in Granada as a boarding student, and she took an early interest in astronomy and medicine.{{cite web |last1=Cárdenas |first1=Andrés |title="Ai ke ablar de la kuestion" |url=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html?ref=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html |website=Ideal |date=3 May 2014 |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}} Her father died when she was 13, and her two older brothers took over her education. To escape their control, she began disguising herself as a young man and going out alone at night.{{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}} She was discovered, doctors diagnosed hysteria and prescribed strict bed rest. Facing punishment, Agustina González López claimed to suffer from "locura social" (social insanity).{{cite web |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Agustina González López |url=https://www.todoslosnombres.org/content/biografias/agustina-gonzalez-lopez |website=Todos los Nombres |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}}
Agustina González López was financially independent.{{cite web |last1=Gallastegui |first1=Inés |title=Doble velo de silencio |url=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20081012/sociedad/doble-velo-silencio-20081012.html |website=Ideal |date=12 October 2008 |access-date=10 October 2021}} She traveled alone and trained as a painter and engraver.{{cite web |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Agustina González López |url=https://www.todoslosnombres.org/content/biografias/agustina-gonzalez-lopez |website=Todos los Nombres |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}}
In 1916, at the age of 25, she published her first essay, Idearium Futurismo,{{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}} and it was at this time that she met Federico García Lorca,{{cite web |last1=González López (La Zapatara) |first1=Agustina |title=Who was who - Universo Lorca |url=https://www.universolorca.com/en/personaje/gonzalez-lopez-agustina-la-zapatera/ |website=Universo Lorca |access-date=10 October 2021}} who was inspired by her, not only for his play La Zapatera Prodigiosa,{{Cite web|url=https://www.pagina12.com.ar/245670-agustina-gonzalez-lopez-y-un-rescate-imprescindible|title=Agustina González López y un rescate imprescindible|first=Silvina|last=Friera|date=February 5, 2020|website=Pagina12}} but also for the character of Amelia in his play The House of Bernarda Alba.{{cite web |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Aspectos teosóficos del teatro de Agustina González |url=https://studylib.es/doc/6204597/aspectos-teos%C3%B3ficos-del-teatro-de-agustina-gonz%C3%A1lez |website=studylib.es |access-date=10 October 2021}} "Amelia" was a name with which Agustina González López signed many of her drawings and watercolors.{{cite web |last1=González López (La Zapatara) |first1=Agustina |title=Who was who - Universo Lorca |url=https://www.universolorca.com/en/personaje/gonzalez-lopez-agustina-la-zapatera/ |website=Universo Lorca |access-date=10 October 2021}}
She had contacts with Spanish suffragettes{{cite book|last=Fagoaga|first=Concha|title=La Voz Y El Voto De Las Mujeres.l sufragismo en España 1877-1931|publisher=Icaria editorial|year=1985|isbn=978-8474261073}} as early as the 1920s. When the Spanish feminist Elisa Soriano Fisher (1891-1964) asked her for her assessment of the situation regarding women's rights in Granada, she described it in a letter in January 1920 thus:
"I can only give you my own very humble and very frank opinion. The women in Grenada are backward and traditionalist, so it is useless to preach to them, and any modern and progressive movement scares them, I think they are carried away by the modern currents, but just carried away. I am disillusioned and it seems to me that I can make little difference here, I just lead by example, but they don't take it. My opinion on the two feminist congresses in Madrid: I think it's very good that both the Suffragettes Congress and the Congress organized by the Spanish feminists in honor of Concepción Arenal are taking place."{{cite book|last=Fagoaga|first=Concha|title=La Voz Y El Voto De Las Mujeres.l sufragismo en España 1877-1931|publisher=Icaria editorial|year=1985|isbn=978-8474261073|quote=(Spanish):...puedo darle a usted mi opinión particular muy modesta y muy franca. ... Las mujeres granadinas son retrógradas y tradicionalistas, aferradas a las costumbres hasta cierto punto árabes, así que calcule usted es predicarles inútil y todo movimiento moderno y progresista les aterra, yo creo que serán arrastradas por las corrientes modernas pero arrastradas. Yo estoy desengañada y me parece que trabajaré poco aquí en la localidad, únicamente trabajo con el ejemplo pero no lo toman. Con respecto a mi opinión sobre los dos congresos feministas de Madrid: que me parece muy bien que se celebre tanto el Sufragista como el que organizan las feministas españolas en honor de Concepción Arenal.}}
In 1927 and 1928 she published two more essays, Justificación (Justification), a kind of autobiography, and Las Leyes Secretas (The Secret Laws), in which she expounded her philosophy of life.{{cite web |last1=Barranco Castillo |first1=Enriqueta |title=Agustina González López |url=https://www.todoslosnombres.org/content/biografias/agustina-gonzalez-lopez |website=Todos los Nombres |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}}
In 1933, she founded a political party called Entero Humanista, with which she contested the Spanish parliamentary elections and received 15 votes. The party program called for, among other things, a world without borders, a common currency, education for all, equal rights for nobility and proletariat, and social acceptance for marriages of same-sex partners.{{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}}
In 1936, shortly after the start of the Spanish Civil War, Agustina González López was imprisoned in Granada and shot along with two other women in the nearby town of Viznar. Her exact date of death is not known, and the murderers were never identified. The Francoist Juan Luis Trescastro later boasted of having killed both her and Garcia Lorca, "him because he was a faggot and her because she was a whore.".{{cite book |last1=Gibson |first1=Ian |title=The Assassination of Federico Garcia Lorca |date=1 May 1983 |publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=978-0140064735 |pages=288 |url=https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31601.The_Assassination_of_Federico_Garcia_Lorca |access-date=10 October 2021}}
Works
In 2019, three essays by Agustina González López were published as a book in Spain.{{cite book |last1=González López |first1=Agustina |title=Clemencia a las estrellas: Justificación. Las leyes secretas. Idearium futurismo |date=6 June 2019 |publisher=Ménades Editorial S.L.U. |isbn=978-8412020489 |pages=210 |url=Agustina González López: Clemencia a las estrellas: Justificación. Las leyes secretas. Idearium futurismo.}} During her lifetime she had her writings printed herself and sold them in her shoe store. Reviews of her first writing, Idearium Futurismo, appeared in the Spanish newspapers ABC {{cite web |title=Archivo ABC. 19 September 1917 |url=https://www.abc.es/archivo/periodicos/abc-madrid-19170919-16.html |website=abc.es |date=5 August 2019 |access-date=10 October 2021}} and La Correspondencia de España in 1917.{{cite web |title=La Correspondencia de España, nº 21.741. 22.August 1917 |url=http://hemerotecadigital.bne.es/issue.vm?id=0000749378&page=3&search=&lang=es |website=/hemerotecadigital.bne.es |access-date=10 October 2021}}
= Idearium Futurismo (1916) =
In this essay, Agustina González López introduces a new kind of writing that she invented and calls "Futurismo." Her "Futurismo" abandons 7 letters of the Castilian alphabet (c, h, qu, v, x, y, z) and simplifies orthographic rules.{{cite news |last1=Arroyo |first1=Javier |title="Kedan suprimidas por konpleto siete konsonantes del kastellano" |url=https://elpais.com/cultura/2019/12/17/actualidad/1576579226_100074.html |newspaper=El País |date=17 December 2019 |publisher=El País. 18 December 2019 |access-date=10 October 2021}} To demonstrate the practicality of the new futuristic script, the essay itself is also futuristic, i.e., written in simplified Spanish:
"El sistema futurista de eskribir resuelve las difikultades ortográfikas por lo mismo que simplifika la Ortografía" (English: "The futurist writing system solves spelling difficulties by simplifying spelling").
The goal is to popularize writing, enabling even illiterate people to communicate their thoughts.{{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}}{{cite news |last1=Arroyo |first1=Javier |title="Kedan suprimidas por konpleto siete konsonantes del kastellano" |url=https://elpais.com/cultura/2019/12/17/actualidad/1576579226_100074.html |newspaper=El País |date=17 December 2019 |publisher=El País. 18 December 2019 |access-date=10 October 2021}} Today, the writing designed by Agustina González López is considered an anticipation of those spellings that are common in (Spanish) short messages via SMS or WhatsApp.{{cite web |last1=Cárdenas |first1=Andrés |title="Ai ke ablar de la kuestion" |url=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html?ref=https://www.ideal.es/granada/20140503/local/granada/ablar-kuestion-201405030032.html |website=Ideal |date=3 May 2014 |publisher=Confederación General del Trabajo de Andaluciá |access-date=10 October 2021}}
= Justificación (1927) =
The essay Justificación is a kind of autobiography in which Agustina González López explains herself and responds to criticism of her behavior, which contemporaries considered scandalous.{{cite web |last1=Cornejo |first1=Josefina |title=Con pantalones (5). Agustina González López |url=https://cvc.cervantes.es/el_rinconete/anteriores/noviembre_20/04112020_01.htm |website=cvc.cervantes.es |publisher=Instituto Cervantes |access-date=10 October 2021}} She was subjected to numerous hostilities in the conservative Granada of her time, not only because she went out alone and wore men's clothes, but also because she publicly stood up for her freedom and for the emancipation of women.{{Cite web|url=https://www.elindependientedegranada.es/blog/agustina-gonzalez-lopez-zapatera-fusilada-romper-moldes|title=Agustina González López, La Zapatera, fusilada por romper moldes|first=Juan|last=Pérez|date=September 7, 2019|website=El Independiente}} She counters the accusation of being a madwoman thus:
"Social insanity consists in the fact that the person called insane is sane and the society in which he lives does not understand him and therefore misjudges him. ... This madness manifests itself in the error of others. And I have been suffering from this madness for 23 years."{{cite web |title=Futuristas Del Pasado |url=https://herstoricas.com/futuristas-del-pasado/ |website=herstoricas.com |date=14 October 2020 |publisher=Herstóricas |access-date=10 October 2021|quote=(Quote in Spanish):La locura social, consiste, en que el señalado como loco, está cuerdo, y que la sociedad en que vive no lo comprende y por lo mismo, lo juzga mal ...Esta locura se manifiesta en el error de los otros. Y esta locura la vengo yo padeciendo veintitrés años.}}
In her essay, she describes herself as a feminist and claims to have paved the way for younger women:
"Little by little they gave me permission to go out on my own and wear whatever I wanted. [...] Now young ladies study, paint, write, work, go out alone and it's not frowned upon. I, who have always stepped out of line - you will not deny me that in many of these cases I have made the Christ."{{cite web |title=Futuristas Del Pasado |url=https://herstoricas.com/futuristas-del-pasado/ |website=herstoricas.com |publisher=Herstóricas |access-date=10 October 2021|quote=(Quote in Spanish): Poco a poco me fueron dando permiso unos y otros para salir sola, llevar puesto lo que quisiera […] Ahora las señoritas estudian, pintan, escriben, trabajan, salen solas y no está mal visto; yo que siempre he roto filas, no me negareis, que en muchas de estas causas he hecho el Cristo.}}
Another subject of the essay is the question of why there are feminine men ("hombres afeminados") and masculine women ("mujeres masculinizadas") {{Cite web|url=https://www.pikaramagazine.com/2018/09/agustina-la-escritora-futurista/|title=Agustina, la escritora futurista|first=Mar|last=Gallego|date=September 27, 2018|website=Pikara Magazine}}
= Las Leyes Secretas (1928) =
Agustina González López came into early contact with spiritual and theosophical movements that were fashionable at the beginning of the 20th century. In the essay Las Leyes Secretas (The Secret Laws), she tells how, as a hypnotist, she succeeded in capturing apparitions in watercolors and photogravures.{{Cite web|url=https://www.elindependientedegranada.es/blog/agustina-gonzalez-lopez-zapatera-fusilada-romper-moldes|title=Agustina González López, La Zapatera, fusilada por romper moldes|first=Juan|last=Pérez|date=September 7, 2019|website=El Independiente}} According to her biographer Enriqueta Barranco Castillo, this makes her a pioneer of abstract art, similar to Georgiana Houghton (1814-1884) and Hilma af Klint (1862-1944) {{cite web |last1=Campos |first1=Débora |title=Entrevista con su biógrafa "Ai ke ablar de la kuestion", la historia de la española que en 1916 anticipó el lenguaje del chat |url=https://www.clarin.com/cultura/-ai-ke-ablar-kuestion-historia-espanola-1916-anticipo-lenguaje-chat_0_D7xOjWzu.html |website=clarin.com |date=6 October 2019 |publisher=Clarín. Argentina |access-date=10 October 2021}}
References
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Category:People killed in the Spanish Civil War
Category:20th-century Spanish artists