Grupo Generalísimo Franco is the housing estate in the town of Les Borges Blanques where my maternal grandparents lived. It was inaugurated in 1962,with symbols of General Francisco Franco’s regime on buildings and streetsigns: the pickaxe and the wheat stalks of the regime’s public housingassociation, Obra Sindical del Hogar y Arquitectura, and the yoke and arrows of the fascist party, Falange Española y de las JONS.

These symbols were defaced after the passing of the dictator. In some cases, their traces are indiscernible. In others, the scar of the chisel leaves a glimpse both of the old carvings and the act of their removal.

Whatever they may be, the iconoclastic gestures show a specific relationship with the past, its memory and its understanding, as well as with the present and the construction of the future.

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