A legacy from dislocation:: future-oriented memory and art-as-labor in the Galician Laboratory of Forms

• Pablo García Martínez ^[1]
  1. [1] Universidade de Santiago de Compostela

     Universidade de Santiago de Compostela

     Santiago de Compostela, España

     
• Localización: Journal of Iberian and Latin American Studies, ISSN-e 1469-9524, ISSN 1470-1847, Vol. 30, Nº. 3, 2024, págs. 301-322
• Idioma: inglés
• Enlaces
  • Texto completo
• Resumen

  • This article analyzes the Laboratorio de Formas (Laboratory of Forms), an institution promoted in the 1960s by two versatile artists, Luís Seoane (1910-1979) and Isaac Díaz Pardo (1920-2012). The text uses previously unpublished archival material and an abundant selection of graphic material to reenact a project oriented towards the study and practice of the interpenetration between tradition and modernity. “A legacy from dislocation” shows how the Laboratorio de Formas’ contribution to the cultural recovery of one of the peripheral nations of the Spanish state (Galicia) was built around a thorough understanding of Galician social and artistic histories, as these intersected with popular culture and industrial memory. The starting point is a reconstruction of the trajectory drawn by the two Laboratorio’s founders, conceived through a dialogue with “dislocation,” as understood by Stuart Hall. The following two sections reconstruct the grounding logic of Laboratorio’s leading institutions, the Carlos Maside Museum and the Sargadelos Ceramics factory. Finally, the original conception of a corporate conglomerate grounded on a solidarity regime —in which the most profitable companies supported the others financially— is compared with its current state: today, only Cerámicas de Sargadelos maintains its vigor thanks solely to its continued production of economic benefits.