JUAN DIEGO MADUEÑO
@juandimc
Madrid
Updated Sunday, April 10, 2022-00:38
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In the documentary
What we did was secret
, the history of punk in Madrid, the birth of the scene, its musical implantation, the development of the movement and its aesthetic settlement in the heart of the system appear as a visual fold-out.
There was a modern core in the city of the 80s raised by the breath of fresh air that came when Franco's body was removed from the duct.
The agitation left behind the theoretical considerations and Alaska, Ramoncín and other bands occupied, above all, the musical programs, the agenda interviews and the downtown bars that now act as museums of the past with a bar.
Who occupied abandoned houses?
Was there an anti-system explosion?
Was there something true in that wave?
Was it just fun, the pose of those who could be considered privileged?
Are there any sunken remains of the punkra substratum of the metropolis?
The questions can be answered by
David Arribas
, a photojournalist born in Leganés in 1978, author of
Ansia.
The crude expression of revenge
, the photographic documentary that accounts for what has remained.
Of the surrounding, unusual and suburban punk that had no place in the official media.
The
punks
had neighborhood bands, they made their girillas, they played in some bars,
they squatted
some houses, they lived loyal to a way of approaching the world.
They were present without making a claim of their lifestyle.
They were, quite simply,
punks
.
"The scene was for the posh and punk was for the neighbourhoods. They played after the fall of Francoism. To the
punks
they were looked at badly.
They were put in broth.
No one expected punk to come to stay.
People on the left didn't like it.
In the Transition it was a very uncomfortable movement
.
In punk, the lyrics of the songs spit in your face.
They tell you the things you don't like to hear.
He tells you 'I shit on God' without censorship.
This is what there is”, analyzes Arribas, who has known the environment of
squats
since he was 14 years old .
"For me they have always been close stories."
Ansia
portrays traditional punk, the atmosphere that gave rise to the formation of groups such as Delincuencia sonido, Tarzán y su puta madre squatting in a flat in Alcobendas, Panaderia Bolleria Nuestra Señora del Karmen or Matando Gratix.
"Thanks to these photographs I won the Albarracín Seminary scholarship. It allowed me to work on the project for six years.
In the photos I look for tension and for them to be attractive. I have looked a lot for symbols: crests, ears with earrings, rings, broken beer cans and all that"
.
the punk zine
The members of the Ansia Viva band were the first to let him through the curtains.
Through the method of donations known as
crowdfunding
, he managed to edit 400 copies, a print run in which no cover is repeated.
"
I am in charge of making a drawing by hand, a graffiti or something like that, different each time"
.
He included a fanzine
as a reward
.
"I asked Álvaro from the Contrahistoria collective for a comment about punk. He sent me so much text that I edited a fanzine. I gave it away to the first buyers. Álvaro talks about punk as a feeling that comes out of the gut. He also goes through the gambling dens in Vallecas, Villaverde or Getafe that have been lost.
There are fewer and fewer bars of this style. Álvaro enriched the product
».
He selected 96 photographs for 165 pages, but before that there were thousands of shots.
"Almost all the photos are from Madrid.
It seemed that punk was off but it resurfaces again. It has never gone away for most of the protagonists of the book
", he reflects.
"There is a social crisis, conflicts, political problems, abuses of authority, a crisis in the monarchy. What we exposed before has not changed despite the fact that 30 years have passed. On the contrary: it is still worse. All the songs that I listened to when I was 13 years old are still in force. I have verified it".
In the ecosystem in which there is still the possibility of making the subversive everyday, they made a hole for it.
"At first I stayed with them to gain confidence. We spent time together. We drank beers. Little by little I got closer material."
He photographed the
punks
with his children, consuming drugs, in the usual bar, giving a concert or working, in a new dimension.
The guys with the hellish looks also have a routine.
"Some were introducing me to others. Some were interested and others were not.
They liked the black and white images. When they saw themselves in powerful images, almost everyone changed their attitude. Take pictures of me, they told me"
.
And Arribas kept pressing the button.
"I can't say that I've done anything new. Everything is practically invented. Original? It will have more to do with the way of telling than with the story, but I'm not too sure about it either."
His photographs cover the punk universe
in
a few kilometers.
"I have received messages from people who are in Bilbao and feel identified with what I show".
Most of its protagonists, who lead a life adhering to the punk canon
,
are anonymous.
"It's what I find most interesting," the author stresses.
There is a range of ages that ranges from 30 to 50 years of age.
"They are people who have been punk all their lives, who live in Vallecas, Villaverde, Pozuelo or Leganés. I have gone to festivals. To group rehearsals. To their houses. To a wedding"
, composing a puzzle of the ordinary that puts together the forgotten scene.
He also accompanied the guitarist of Side Effects to the cemetery.
"It was the second time he visited the grave of his brother, who had died of an overdose. It is a very intimate, emotional moment. It was in the Carabanchel cemetery. It is huge.
I did not know very well where to go, so we spent a long time looking the tombstone. He did not remember. It had been a long time since the last time he was there
, "says Arribas.
computer with camera
To all this, David Arribas is a computer scientist.
"I usually say that I have a job that pays for my life and another that gives me life"
.
He decided to delve into photography through photojournalism.
"I really like to travel. During the trips I used to take pictures of landscapes. I was fascinated by landscapes. I didn't take pictures of people. Only of landscapes."
One of his teachers,
Antonio Heredia
, a photographer for this newspaper, made him turn around, look for faces, stand a meter and a half from the people, as
Fernando Múgica
advised .
"I began to meet photojournalists. I did workshops. I went to training centers. I
protested against the war, against unemployment
. I was a conscientious objector and did not do the
military
.
Photography has opened up the possibility of telling what worries me.
I used to go to demonstrations and leave.
Now I try to provoke questions in the public that consumes my work"
. That connection with punk got him hooked on social problems. There are people who generate endorphins by playing sports, there are those who generate them by measuring the sadness of others. "Then I began to deal with social issues and taboos, such as animal abuse, anorexia or suicide".
The only difference with the 80 reflected in his work is the simple passage of time.
Children appear, new responsibilities, another vital space.
"
They are functional adults who maintain the same thinking they had then. They maintain the aesthetics and the pints.
They continue going to concerts, bars and demonstrations. The body is not the same and the hangovers and the fatigue of the tours are not the same" .
Like the one that took him with Ansia viva to the Basque Country.
"The worst thing about the job was when we were at the punk festivals and you wanted to go home. You're tired and you wait to see if they go away or not. Or when they come back after all the delay and you're still there, trying to make a good portrait" .
David Arribas raises an idea of punk far from the showcase of vanities that they installed in Malasaña.
"It is what I know.
I do not pretend to establish any dogma. I have simply dedicated myself to portraying what I know
."
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