The pact with Francisco Moreno Galván

We begin the first day of 2025 with an unavoidable memory, the centenary of Francisco Moreno Galvan, the artist –admittedly– who defined the flamenco as "the most effective system to penetrate the heart of man." And for this universal Moor, the cante It was "the most beautiful way to denounce, because the flamenco "Above all, it's anger: you can't sing well if you don't do it with anger."

Francisco was the second of the four children of the marriage formed by Jose Moreno Galvan y Maria Galvan Jimenez, a humble and multi-employed family who I don't know if they predicted that they would bring a baby into the world that New Year's Day, The Puebla de Cazalla, to the axiom of the best Andalusian expressionist artist I have known, the one who most fully reflected in art the dramatic universe of the jondo and, therefore, one of the strongest pillars of flamenco communication.

Since he was 11 years old when he first saw the tragedy of the civil war and the misery and helplessness of the subsequent post-war years, our protagonist has been committed to his land and its people, which explains why, after leaving for Madrid in 1951 with the saddlebags of his first hobby, drawing and painting, he returned to his land in 1977, where, as in so many Andalusian towns, the hope for a change of life was awakened.

Their commitment is evident in urban and cultural reconstruction, in the sacrifice for their people, and in seeking an ally in the flamenco, a world endowed with formidable plastic elements and where he felt the true spirit of the race. Discover in the mairenista movement the keys to exemplarily illustrating a speech to which he assigns a relevant social role. He put his genius at the service of the poster flamenco, communicating those original features that escape the common man, while, as a lyricist, his verses were unequivocal denunciations, but also the reflection of a simple and profound being, human and transparent, always giving himself to others.

«From supports such as posters, murals, oil paintings or album covers, the work of this 20th century Michelangelo pays attention to the cry, rather than to the aesthetics of expression. To the heartbreak, rather than to the subtlety of the melody. And the fact is that Francisco was not only an amateur, but even an amateur singer»

Thus a new aesthetic movement was born in Andalusia. Its pictorial symphony is captured in the cubist principle of reducing nature to the geometric forms that the artist considered essential, such that Meeting of Cante Jondo, but also in the effort to extract plastic substance from the unfathomable well of the jondo, from which he borrowed so much, such as his lyrics, which seem to be carved from the very pommel of social injustice.

However, the role of lyricist was not enough for him. Francisco was a poet, and his frustration was not having been a singer. But he found in Jose Menese (from 1963 to 2000), whom he welcomed as a son; Miguel Vargas (from 1969 to 1993), Diego Clavel (from 1971 to 1974) or Curro Lucena, the mold in which to shape the desires of his people

In this way, he revolutionized the cante and found in José Menese, mainly, a young man who fit his idea of ​​how the word should be said. cante. Menese was a young but strong tree, which Francisco proposed with all his strength to raise straight and without twists, until he created a lyrical work with verses that seem anonymous and centuries old, of burning relevance at the time in Spain when they were written, a copious anthology that was released on April 26, 1998, coinciding with the first anniversary of the creation of the Peña Flamenca Francisco Moreno Galvan, when it hosted the presentation of the Complete flamenco lyrics by Francisco Moreno Galván, Cristino Raya.

In another order of things, Francisco's pictorial expressionism is focused from a perspective disenchanted with reality. And I write it like this because his proposal was rebellion, commitment and the creation of poetic harmony, hence we are before an artist in whose heart the desire to live was awakened. flamenco a story and it is already part of that story.

From supports such as the poster, the mural, the oil painting or the record folder, the work of this Miguel Angel of the 20th century pays attention to the cry, rather than to the aesthetics of the expression; to the heartbreak, rather than to the subtlety of the melody. And the fact is that Francisco was not only an amateur, but even an amateur singer, an aptitude that is reflected in other examples such as Juan Valdes, arguing this opinion my partner Carmen Arjona, for whom we are faced with "one of the contemporary painters who best (if not the best) has known how to bring to his paintings the feeling, the cry, the crying, the pain, the complaint, the love, the sorrow, that emerges from the torn throat of the singer, from the chest open to the world to show his sorrows."

But in the background of the approaches addressed, there is a dimension that I cannot leave between the lines: his social commitment to the society of his time, a reflection of social concerns and denunciation of injustices, demands that are linked to the ideological positions of the intellectuals he met and that he assumed in the last years of Franco's regime. It is at this time that he commits himself to the workers' movement to which he lends his support, even obtaining a seat as a councilor in the democratic transition. Communist party in his town.

«Today, when one hundred years have passed since his birth, I keep the pact with him that I had in life and I pay tribute to the preacher of an aesthetic that, learned in the gospel of feelings, contributed so much to exalt and arouse love for what is jondo»

I would like to point out that Francisco became a restoration councillor of his town, councillor for Urban Planning, a department from which he painted a picture of the urban landscape, as he was the urban planner who promoted the unique aesthetic that prevails today in the Moorish town, a traditional landscape, with a taste of the land within, of the Andalusia of always.

Although to understand a personality as complex as it is interesting, I cannot forget that, from his friendship with José Menese, he inspired the I Meeting of Cante Jondo of Puebla de Cazalla on September 2, 1967, a historic date for the future of art jondo and initiative carried out together with Salvador Marin, Miguel Núñez y Fernando Guerrero, the one at the Central Bar.

I conclude this memory of Francis on the very first day of the year because our conscience compels us to do so, those of us who have memory. On the numerous occasions when we coincided, he always showed himself humble but sincere, and he possessed a wealth of wisdom unbecoming of his time, far above his contemporaries. And that was my perception until, in mid-September 1983, on the occasion of the XI National Art Congress Flamenco It held in Granada, I reinforced it as soon as I came to the conviction that we were before one of those men of the people for whom the label of intellectual is too small. His talent and identity awareness were a divine prodigy.

It was in the Hotel Alhambra Palace, where we formed a gathering with friends and wise Moriscos that ended with the monologue of a Francisco in a state of lucidity and full wisdom. I reflected on those reflections, and back in 1992, when the II Cultural Week of Parades, I threw them to the four winds. It was only fair to make a plea in favour of the creative motor of this Andalusian involved in the fight against the fractures of his land, that is, committed to a castrated society, conscious of its mutilation, and that under his feet there was nothing but a reaper cutting off the past at the root.

Francisco, universal bald like Picasso, Antonio Mairena o Rafael the Rooster, with his shiny bald head and his covered eye, was an exemplary Moor who, like a committed intellectual, believed like so many others in the need to take sides and occupy a trench in the fight for classicism and what is well done, emerging in him an authentic impulse that would increase with the ideological depth of his vision. That is why today, when 100 years have passed since his birth, I maintain the pact with him that I had in life and I pay tribute to the preacher of an aesthetic that, learned in the gospel of feelings, contributed so much to exalt and arouse love for what is well done. jondo.