The bullfighter is called a “diestro” because his profession is based on skill, not art, unless one considers art the act of killing the bull without slashing its throat and hitting the finishing stroke on the first attempt. This is also done by skilled butchers in the slaughterhouse and no one calls them artists. The bullfight has a unique aesthetic that relies on the cruelty with which animals are treated. There is no debate about this. The bullfight always ends up turning the beauty of the bull into a bloody stew. Some Spaniards like it, but the vast majority do not. The bullfighting enthusiast does not see the cruelty because, out of habit, he sees this torture as something natural and necessary for the fight, to the point that he can yawn while the carnage is taking place; on the other hand, the anti-bullfighting individual, upon seeing that with the first lunge the bull’s blood reaches down to the hoof, refuses to continue and leaves the “verónicas” and “pases de pecho” for those who want to swallow them. Ortega y Gasset said that without the bullfighting festival, the history of Spain could not be understood. True. It could also not be understood without the Inquisition, without hunger and centuries of illiteracy, without the cry of “long live the chains!”, without banditry, without the pair of 19th century Civil Guards whose silhouette with the cape, the tricorn hat, and the orange rifle slung over the shoulder caused terror on the dusty roads of that dark Spain. It must be clear that Goya was anti-bullfighting and in Picasso’s Guernica there is a Goyesque inspiration because ultimately that painting is a tauromachy united with the horrors of war. Until recently, bullfighting had no ideology. There have always been bullfighting fans on both the left and the right, but today the festival, already in its death throes, has been taken up by the traditionalist right as a weapon of attack and political resistance with a fierce face. San Isidro arrives and in the Las Ventas arena the havoc begins with an Iberian ring divided in two, like the country, in sun and shade.
