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Living through the transition to democracy: eroding fear, uncertainty, joy for the future

Photographer Pilar Aymerich captured Barcelona and Catalonia during an ebullient period of history

Following the death of Francisco Franco, Spain was left with a power vacuum and an uncertain road forward.

The dictator appointed Juan Carlos as his successor and future head of state, but in the role of King of Spain. What form or shape this new governmental entity would take was completely up in the air, leading to an atmosphere of excitement and tension across the country.

There was a spate of political violence, fears of another military coup, and plenty of mass demonstrations taking to the streets demanding new rights and freedoms.

In the end, Juan Carlos opted to shift the country away from authoritarianism and towards democracy, but it still required a couple of different appointed Prime Ministers and some years to get all legal mechanisms in place, and sufficient consensus to dissolve the Francoist institutions that held power.

This ebullient period of history has become known as ‘la transció’, or ‘the transition to democracy’ in English, or simply, ‘the transition.’

Pilar Aymerich is a photographer from Barcelona who documented this exciting time as she lived through it. “I believed it was history happening live,” she tells Catalan News ahead of the opening of a new exhibition featuring some of her work during the transition in the Fujifilm House of Photography in Barcelona.

Her photographs capture social movements, including protests calling for equal rights, gatherings to express Catalan identity that the regime had suppressed for so long, and other portraits of Barcelona residents at a time when anything was possible.

Read more on our website ➡️ CatalanNews.com

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