Nitrato do Chile

A long time ago I made a geological fieldtrip to Spain. In an abandoned quarry I came across an old shot-holed metal advertising board for a fertilizer product called ‘Nitrato de Chile.’

I watched the picture with awe and took a photograph (which unfortunately got lost). It showed a horseman, or better the black silhouette of a horseman and his horse plotted against a yellow morning sky (Spanish version: de Chile, Portuguese: do Chile).

It revoked in my mind the legends of the Gauchos, the horsemen who rode into a chilly sunrise with the bitter mate taste in their throats - reflections synonymous of a lost era of simplicity, honor and dignity.

The logo 'Nitrato de Chile' belonged to a company that traded guano fertilizer from Chile on the Iberian Peninsula during the 1920^th and 1930th. It was a rough time in Europe, and also in the new world. Impoverished farmers fought to survive. Only by using fertilizers one could squeeze a bit of food, a bit of money from Europe’s starved, depleted farmlands. The nitrate extracted from the guano fowl’s excrements was then the only ray of hope.

I wonder how these pictures were made- I guess probably using two, or three paint/spray moulds. Watching the picture, you can actually perceive it in two different ways: The horseman is either riding toward you, approaching from the left, or turning away from you to the right.

‘Nitrato de Chile’ belonged to a category of Art Deco that maximized impression by a stylistic reduction to the bare essential of artistic expression.  The ‘Veterano Osborne’ bull that looms over the plains of Spain is another example for that kind of art.

Needless to say, that the ‘Nitrato de Chile’ picture influenced me a lot, and I kept it in my mind. Finally, and some 25 years later, I made an effort to look the picture up on the web. The one I found gives me the same chill, the same impression of honor, noblesse and masculine virtue I felt in 1978. I love this picture, and made it the logo of my photo page.

How can 'trivial' art inspire that much? Because it links the mind to a period of history, where life was brutal, but certainly less complicated compared to our time? Or is there a deeper, encrypted message in pictures, as some psychologists advocate?

Be it as it may, I collected what I was able to find on the web. Come and have a look at  www.flickr.com/photos/matahari, or click the link at the bottom of my page.

The photograph shown above was shot by A. Guet, 1998, in Portugal’s impoverished Alentejo province. I’ve copied for the interested reader a few (mainly Spanish) sites below:

www.tee-usa.com/ele1959.html

www.elve.net/padv/en/agri.htm

www.imaginarymagnitude.net/blog/img/fall04/files/IMG_5.html

www.exordio.com/1939-1945/ paises/Latinoamerica/chile

www.kzgunea.net/images/Boletin/boletin14_en.htm - 28k -

www.soria-goig.com/Biblioteca/autores/au_21.htm - 7k