Marina Ginestá, Spanish Civil War icon, dies.

The subject of one of the most iconic photographs of the Spanish Civil War has died.  Marina Ginestá, who was photographed by the German Hans Guttman Guster (later Juan Guzmán) in 1936, died in Paris today at the age of 94.  The photograph of a young and defiant Ginestá, taken as she stood guard atop the Hotel Colón in Barcelona at the onset of the Spanish Civil War, was one of many photographs taken by Guttman during his time in Spain as a member of the International Brigades.  Ginestá fled from Spain after the war and settled in the Dominican Republic.  By the mid-1940s, she had run afoul of the Trujillo regime and fled back to Europe.  Guttman too fled Spain at the collapse of the Spanish Republic.  Arriving in Mexico, he became one of the nation’s most important photographers producing a series of images of Mexican artists at work including, most notably, Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo.

Marina Ginestá,  Hans Guttman Giuster (later Juan Guzmán), Barcelona, 1936.  Image courtesy of Revista Ojos Rojos.

Frida Kahlo, Juan Guzmán, Mexico City, 1951.