With gray hair, ailments, and baldness: the spirit of the movida returns 40 years later

They've developed wrinkles, they suffer from various ailments, almost all of them have gray hair, and it's rare that someone doesn't suffer the ravages of baldness. Many are elderly, and some even use a hearing aid. But 40 years ago, they were the coolest of the coolest: the most modern, the most innovative, the most daring, the most artistic. We're talking about people like Alejo Stivel . (from the group Tequila), Teo Cardalda (Golpes Bajos), Alberto García Alix , Álvaro Urquijo (Los Secretos), Paco Clavel , Coque Malla (Los Ronaldos), Joaquín Rodríguez , ( Los Nikis ), Ana Curra (Parálisis Permanente), José Luis Moro (Un Pingüino en mi Ascensor)... Between hugs, phrases (not always sincere) of the type "you look great" and pats on the back, they all met again yesterday at the opening of La Movida, youth and freedom. 1977-1986 , the exhibition that pays tribute to those years of cultural effervescence and that can be visited until July 20 at the Madrid headquarters of the General Society of Authors and Editors, the SGAE .

Curated by another of the legendary names of the movida - Sabino Méndez , author of many of Loquillo 's songs - the exhibition reviews, through numerous objects, the explosion of creativity that took place after Franco 's death in November 1975 and at the beginning of the Transition , when a youth thirsty for freedom led a subversive and very frenetic cultural (or rather, countercultural) revolution.

The precursors of the movida were bands like Tequila and Burning , who bridged the gap between classic rock and the emerging pop movements. And when the movida itself arrived, it was a craze that quickly spread to all artistic expressions —music, visual arts, film, photography, fashion, design, and so on—and although it had its epicenter in Madrid, it soon spread to many other parts of Spain.

"The exhibition doesn't offer interpretations or assessments, nor does it delve into the realm of political manipulation surrounding the Movida, which also existed. It aims to be a sample, an index, of what those years were like so that anyone who comes to see it can judge for themselves," explains Sabino Méndez.

There are the Super 8 cameras with which Pedro Almodóvar filmed his first short films, the Telefónica notebook in which, as an employee of that company, he wrote the draft of the script for The Great Disappointment , the precursor to Pepi, Luci, Bom and Other Girls Like a Bunch , his first feature film. There is Bernardo Bonezzi 's original score for Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown , specifically the famous scene in which Julieta Serrano forces a rocker ( Ambite , the bassist of Los Pistones) at gunpoint to take her to the airport on his Harley-Davidson while Carmen Maura follows her in the mambo-taxi. There are handwritten lyrics by Antonio Vega to some of his best-known songs, such as El sitio de mi recreo . There are photographs of Ouka Leele , Alberto García-Alix, and Pérez-Mínguez ...

There are album covers, band posters and concert announcements, through which thirty emblematic groups of that period are represented, including Alaska y los Pegamoides, El Aviador Dro y sus Obreros especializados, Gabinete Caligari, Nacha Pop, Parálisis Permanente and Hombres G, among many others. There is the guitar of Jorge Martínez , from Los Ilegales; that of Emilio J. López , from Los Elegantes, the first guitar that David Summers , from Los Hombres G, had.

There are paintings by Ceesepe , El Hortelano , Carlos Berlanga , Guillermo Pérez Villata … Many magazines, many fanzines. “There were no social media; we got our information through magazines and fanzines, which generally consisted of stapled photocopies distributed in the bars and establishments we frequented,” explains Sabino Méndez.

And, of course, there's no shortage of clothes , because the look , the image, was one of the main signs of the break with the established order that the movida represented. The SGAE exhibition includes everything from an industrial jumpsuit by Aviador Dro to the shirt Edi Clavo wore on Gabinete Caligari's first album, as well as a pair of colorful jackets by Tino Casal , an elegant tuxedo by Loquillo, an Alaska coat designed by one of his favorite stylists, Antonio Alvarado ; the shirt Bernardo Bonezzi, the leader of Los Zombies, wore in the video for Greenland ; and the Hawaiian skirts (decorated with plastic bananas) worn by the two girls who sang backing vocals in Objetivo Birmania (the birmettes). "Fashion was a fundamental element at the time, and we made many of the styles we wore ourselves," says Méndez.

The texts accompanying the exhibition , which guide visitors through that magical period, are written by some of the Movida's greatest music journalists: Diego A. Manrique, Jesús Ordovás , Patricia Godes , and Rafa Cervera . There's also a section dedicated to the media, specifically television and radio. "It would have been impossible for the Movida to have the impact it had without the support of people like Jesús Ordovás, Diego Manrique, Carlos Tena , and Paloma Chamorro ," emphasizes Sabino Méndez.

Officially, by 1986, the movida had been written off ; it was practically considered dead. But it managed to extend its lifespan a little further thanks to a second wave of artists (mostly musicians), a bit younger than the movida's main protagonists and including, for example, Los Ronaldos, Los Hombres G, Los Secretos, and Un Pingüino en mi Ascensor. But by 1989, the movida had completely died.