A video circulated on social networks recovers the words of the sculptor Juan de Ávalos —author of the famous «La Piedad» in the Valley of the Fallen— in which he reacts energetically to the possibility that his work be removed or dismantled. The fragment comes, according to the publication, from the program Tal Cual (1993).
In the recording, just a few seconds long, Ávalos expresses sadness that the civil war continues to be a source of divisions and responds with irony and annoyance to the suggestion of dismantling his sculpture: «they would have to put a quantity of dynamite in the work that I have made», he says, underscoring the irreversible and violent nature of such an operation.
The government’s decision to “resignify” the Valley of the Fallen and the eventual removal of artistic and religious elements, including the sculpture of La Piedad by Juan de Ávalos, have reignited the public debate on memory, art, and politics. Ávalos’s reaction, captured in this brief audiovisual archive, is not only a defense of the artistic value of his work: it is also a public reproach against the political instrumentalization of historical memory.
Beyond ideological disputes
Juan de Ávalos (1911–2006) was a convinced republican before the Civil War and holder of membership card nº 7 of the PSOE in Mérida, as well as a political exile in Portugal during the first years of Franco.
His political trajectory, however, did not prevent him from creating some of the most imposing religious works of 20th-century Spain, nor from leaving a legacy of sacred art deeply marked by Christian symbolism.
His ability to transcend ideology and work on projects of religious inspiration —including sculptures of Christ, virgins, and saints— demonstrates that sacred art does not belong to an ideology, but rather responds to a transcendent vision of beauty and faith.