FROM UP HERE THE ROOFTOPS OF MADRID REMIND ME OF MY HOMETOWN

Desde aquí arriba los tejados de Madrid me recuerdan a mi pueblo' is a choreographic path, a performative walk, that goes from Gran Vía, Plaza de Callao to the viewpoint of the Torre de Madrid in Plaza España. It is on the one hand a framework to talk about the generations that migrated from the villages of Castilla, from the extension of the plateau of the flat land, to get out of extreme poverty, in search of another future. This journey is guided together with my father and in it we analyse his generation, those who came to Madrid, the promised land, in search of the American dream. From the arrival to the centre and the periphery. There is a movement back and forth, from the periphery to the centre, and from the centre to the periphery. A transfer of bodies that takes place day after day and generation after generation. What does it mean to arrive to the top? what is this aspiration to reach the centre and the top? what is this urge to look to the horizon? to see a little further than where we are? what is the horizon of the generations that emigrate again and again? in search of a better future? what is this future that is present? what is this horizon to which we are looking now? This year I have taken many walks with my father, we talk about the past, the present and the future, about how aspirations and concerns and opportunities have changed

My father started to remember. He often repeats: ‘oh, if only Pacilla could see me’. From above, from the top of the Tower, we invoke my grandmother, the Manchegan roots. Some stories of what was, interventions, soundtracks, dances and some moments to stop accompany us to share a horizon at the top of the tower. And as the song of that eighties band said, ‘I finally made it up the Torre de Madrid’

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Intervienen: Esther Rodríguez-Barbero, Jesús Rodríguez-Barbero & special guests

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https://www.madrid.org/surgemadrid/2021/desde-aqui.html 

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