Granada finds Columbus

A renewed Museo de Belllas Artes has opened its doors after being closed for several years, to expose this exposition ´Columbus after Andalucia´ (1492-1505). A travelling exposition which combines a lot of documents, objects and art works to show the connection between Christopher Columbus and Andalusia.

The Granadian version of this exposition has expanded in relation to the one of Sevilla, with a number of documents which reflect the connection between Columbus and Granada.



Granada managed to get a paper which describes the American adventure of Columbus. A mark on which is written the famous capitulations of Santa Fe and were we got to know Américo Vespucci, an Italian mapmaker who gave this continent a name.
The Granadian historian Consuelo Varela became commissioner of the exposition and emphasizes the Andalusian character of it. Between 1942 and 1505, Columbus lived in Andalusia and especially in Sevilla and Granada.
The first part of the exposition is dedicated to Columbus´s personal life, and it shows what kind of person he was «Most people don´t know that Columbus had a Portuguese family and some Italian cousins», according to Varela. This section tells the story about what happened to Columbus in Granada in 1501, when he entered the city with King Fernando.

In the same section is illustrated how Columbus and Vespucci met each other in Granada. One of the jewels of the exposition is an incunable in which Fray Hernando of Talavera indoctrinates catholicism to the Moorish. This book is published in Granada and comes out together with a portret of Isabel la Católica.
The second part of the exposition is dedicated to scientifics, were you can see maps and books which Columbus consulted that time, as well as notes in the margins which he wrote in it.
They also expose a serie of navigation instruments, similar to those which Columbus always used.
«Although he always used a lead or a sandglass», comments the commissioner of the Exposition.

Presenting an film about the German Democatric Republic police

The filmfestival 100% Europeo in Sevilla presents ´Life of the others´ (Das leben der anderen), a film about the secret police of the old German Democratic Republic, which according to the producer Quintin Berg is a film ´wich will always be emotional and topical´.
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According to Berg, this film will be a German candidate for a Hollywood Oscar for ´non-english language film´. It already received 6 candidatures for the award of the European Film Academy (EFA) and in Germany it got 6 more awards in its first year.
The main character of the film from director Florian Henckel von Dommersmark, is a ´highly competent´ oficial of the Stasi, the secret police of the German communist régime, who en 1984 had to guard a prestigious writer and a popular actrice, and it describes how this influenced his life.

Henckel who is now 32 years old, lived in the western part of Berlin when he was a child, but soon his family moved to the eastern side of the country. In the beginning of the film, he describes his own fears at that time.
The director is a ´passionate and nice´ person if it comes to his work which is reflected in the trust he gets from the actors, even though all were veterans and well known.


Berg sais that, as a producer, he always looks for ´the magic of a proyect´, which he found here. The Stasi will always be a very emotional and strong subject as well as young and topical.