We’ve taken advantage of this moment when we’re together at the transnational capacity-building workshop to write some texts together about what we’ve talked about over the last few days. Today’s is about the artistic resistance movements in our countries and what comparisons we can make between them.
Throughout the 20th century, Portugal, Spain, Germany, and Italy experienced periods of authoritarian rule marked by censorship, persecution, and suppression of artistic expression. Despite some differences in the nature and duration of their dictatorships, artists in these countries faced similar challenges and obstacles to their creative freedom.
In Portugal, the Estado Novo regime, led by António de Oliveira Salazar, governed for nearly five decades, from 1933 to 1974. During this time, artists and intellectuals were subject to strict censorship and surveillance by the regime’s secret police. One prominent example is the poet Fernando Pessoa, whose work was often censored or suppressed due to its political and philosophical themes. Pessoa’s modernist poetry challenged the traditional values upheld by the regime and questioned the nature of identity and reality.
Similarly, in Spain, Francisco Franco’s dictatorship, which lasted from the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939 until his death in 1975, imposed strict censorship and control over the arts. Artists such as the painter Pablo Picasso, whose iconic work “Guernica” condemned the horrors of war and fascism, faced persecution and exile under Franco’s regime. “Guernica” was banned in Spain during Franco’s rule, and Picasso himself was branded a “communist” and a “degenerate” by the regime.
In Germany, under the Nazi regime led by Adolf Hitler from 1933 to 1945, artists and writers faced persecution and censorship on a massive scale. The Nazis sought to control all forms of cultural expression, promoting art that adhered to their nationalist and racist ideology while condemning works they deemed “degenerate” or “un-German.” One example is the painter Max Ernst, whose surrealist art was condemned by the Nazis as “degenerate” and confiscated from museums. Ernst fled Germany in 1938 to escape persecution.
Italy, under the fascist rule of Benito Mussolini from 1922 to 1943, similarly imposed strict control over the arts and media. Artists such as the filmmaker Roberto Rossellini faced pressure to produce propaganda films glorifying the regime, while others, like the writer Italo Calvino, chose to engage in covert resistance through their work. Calvino’s allegorical novel “Invisible Cities,” written during World War II, subtly critiqued fascist ideology and celebrated the diversity of human experience.
Despite the differences in their experiences, artists in Portugal, Spain, Germany, and Italy during the 20th century all faced censorship, persecution, and suppression of their creative freedom under authoritarian regimes. Through their work, they challenged the oppressive ideologies of their respective dictatorships and, in some cases, paved the way for resistance and eventual democratization. Their stories serve as a reminder of the enduring power of art to confront injustice and inspire change.
