José Luis Castro de Paz: Historial Cinematographic Documents Made In Galicia

Jose Luis Castro de Paz -Doctor of History of Cinema, audiovisual communication professor and researcher – took part of the presentation round table of the section Historic archives of Galicia.

SECTION: HISTORIAL CINEMATOGRAPHIC DOCUMENTS MADE IN GALICIA

José Luis Castro de Paz

If the cinematographic production in Galicia, as everybody knows, was practically nonexistent until the seventies of the last century -drastically truncated the possible foundations of a Galician Cinema during the republican period by the military fascist uprising-, the expression turns out to be nearly literal until 1920.

So, and still including the nineteenth-century, relevant and possibly particular filmography of José Sellier Loup (native of Lyon, now settled down in A Coruña), it should not be surprising that what was filmed in Galicia until de end of the second decade of the 20th century hardly exceeds, as a whole, some thousand meters of celluloid -lost in its vast majority—and that its (non)-existence it is specially due to the individual willfulness of small businessmen or enterprising photographers rather than an industrial will worthy of such a name, since, in reality -and how it will be supposed- the extremely weak and apathetic Galician bourgeoisie will not show any interest in contributing in the uprising of a cinematographic industry. It is due to this fact that beyond the intrinsic value of the material conserved (and occasionally restored) by the Centro Galego de Artes da Imaxe (CGAI), and that it is an outstanding part of the section that we present, this material reaches for us the category of an authentic historical and anthropological treasure. info