Issues

Interview: Brazilian actress Fernanda Torres on bringing resilience to life in ‘I’m Still Here’

In 1986, Fernanda Torres became a Brazilian icon after winning the best actress award at Cannes for her role in Arnaldo Jabor’s Love Me Forever or Never. Here, she tells Monocle Radio about her latest film, I’m Still Here, set during Brazil’s military dictatorship. The film is already one of Brazil’s most successful-ever features and has been nominated for three Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Actress for Torres.

The film tells the story of Eunice Paiva, who became an activist after her husband disappeared during the country’s military dictatorship.

When did you first learn about Eunice Paiva?
It was through her son Marcelo Rubens Paiva’s 2015 book [I’m Still Here is based on his memoir of the same name]. I watched interviews too. She was persuasive but always gentle and intelligent.

You have just won a Golden Globe for your performance in the film. How important was the recognition?
It was made [during the Bolsonaro years] at a time when the arts were under attack in Brazil. I’m so happy that people of all religions and political beliefs are proud of our culture and going to cinemas to see it.

You’re well known for your comedy roles. Did you enjoy returning to drama?
I thought I was lost to drama! No, not really, I don’t separate genres that way. I’ve done theatre, musicals, and comedy, but of course, my recent TV roles made me widely known as a comedian. Then Walter gave me this incredible gift: a role in a deeply humanistic, profound drama.

What’s special is that a new generation of Brazilian teenagers is watching this film and learning about the dictatorship, often for the first time. They’re discovering history through a family that could be their own. That humanistic approach to storytelling is rare. It might take another 25 years for a film like this to happen again.

‘I’m Still Here’ is out now in Brazil and the US, and will soon be released across Europe. For the full interview with Fernanda Torres and Walter Salles, listen to Monocle Weekly above, or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

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Aviation updates: Greenland opens for business while South Korea spends big on defence

New York’s seafood fans and Icelandic hoteliers can both expect to feel an effect now that Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, has an international airport. Larger planes, such as Air Greenland’s Airbus a330-800, can now fly to the southwest coast of the self-governing territory, which – despite Donald Trump’s recent bluster – is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. Previously, travellers to Nuuk had to stop, often overnight, at Keflavík in Iceland or at Kangerlussuaq, the former US air base in Greenland. Twice weekly flights to New York (a mere four hours away) with United Airlines, and to Copenhagen three times a week with SAS, are scheduled for take-off this year.

This being Greenland, wider geopolitical factors have played a part in the new dkk2.5bn (€340m) airport, the country’s largest-ever infrastructure project (which will open shortly before another airport at Ilulissat, 500km north of Nuuk). In 2018 a Chinese construction company had expressed an interest in building the airport but the Danish government stepped in with partial funding and as guarantor on a loan.

The airport is likely to have a significant effect on the country’s fishing industry, which is hoping for an export boost from sending fresh produce to New York, and on tourism: visitor numbers are expected to almost double to 105,000 during the summer. Nuuk’s location is, however, more vulnerable to the weather than Kangerlussuaq, so visitors might still have to enjoy the occasional overnight stay in the departure lounge.

In the basket
Four Boeing E-7 Wedgetail early warning and control aircraft

Who’s buying: South Korea
Who’s selling: The US
Price: $4.9bn (€4.7bn)
Delivery date: tbc

For obvious reasons, South Korea spends big on defence – $45.2bn (€43bn) in 2024, which is projected to swell to $54.7bn (€52bn) by 2029. Even amid that largesse, this is a significant purchase. The e-7, based on the 737 airframe, is an upgrade on Boeing’s venerable e-3 Sentry, replacing the e-3’s revolving roof-mounted radar dome with a rectangular monolith with superior capabilities. The Northrop Grumman-made sensor can furnish a constant picture of target movements, rather than intermittent glimpses as the radar rotates. The E-7 is also operated by the US, UK, Australia and Turkey. South Korea already flies four E-7s and will be hoping that this doubling of the complement will bolster its ability to keep eyes on its volatile northern neighbour.

Editor’s letter: “Tales of teamwork and togetherness can uplift us all,” says Andrew Tuck

It’s one of those epic events that we had been meaning to cover for years, yet somehow it never made it to the page. But this time, finally, we were there for the biannual castells competition that’s held in the Spanish city of Tarragona. The castells in question are towers constructed from tiers of people, with each level balanced on the broad shoulders of the folk below. To triumph in the competition, you need to make a tower that’s tall (the highest castells can reach a giddy 10 storeys) but also complex. To achieve this, you must place the sturdiest adults on the lower levels and allow the nimblest and lightest to occupy the upper tiers – often the peak position is taken by a very young child.

The event has taken place since 1932 but, in recent years, the number of teams, or colles, taking part has grown apace – in part because of the way these towers represent Catalan identity at a time when many have sought independence for the region. But whoever you are, wherever you’re from, whatever your politics, the pictures of the castellers (taken by Julia Sellmann) are moving, uplifting (literally). It’s because those towers depend on trust, on the ability to endure, to collaborate and to rely on youth to win the day. The castells are living metaphors. Those strained shoulders, those pulsating veins, those taut muscles say, “This is what we can achieve when we work together.” I am seeing a castells workshop for every business hoping to grow, every community in search of harmony – it would be better than some paintballing team-building exercise.

The power of photography to deliver stories, to hold our attention, is also explored in our culture lead, which delivers a guide to buying photography. In a world where apps, AI and clever camera phones allow even the numptiest of us to take a reasonable picture, what makes a great work stand out? And why do images at auction command such varied prices? Our culture editor, Sophie Monaghan-Coombs, has come up with the answers.

In recent months we have been slowly rethinking how the magazine works, from looking at new formats for the cover to adding new regular features. There’s another change this issue. During our Paris edition of The Quality of Life Conference, we held a session called “The Concierge”. The format was simple and fun. The editors donned sweatshirts emblazoned with the crossed-keys symbol sported by concierges worldwide, and delegates were invited to ask us any travel-related questions that came to mind – but on one condition: that they got out of their seats to bang a hotel-desk-style bell.

Since then, The Concierge has been a radio series, a feature in our Weekend Edition newsletter and a returnee panel at all subsequent Quality of Life Conferences. Now it’s a section in the magazine, taking over the pages previously occupied by Inventory. It even gets a new paper stock and, importantly, the actual concierge comes to life in the style of a French illustrated comic (he’s a cool guy).

The enterprise has been overseen by Monocle’s editor, Josh Fehnert, who delivers a line-up of stories that runs from Viennese sausage stands (there are many sausage puns, the Würst you can imagine) to a guide to modern hosting. Yet the new head of The Concierge is a refusenik when it comes to getting on stage for the live sessions (he sometimes claims that this is because he’s a nervous soul; other times that the sweatshirt is too restrictive). But we’ll gloss over that as it’s a time of year when goodwill should be the go-to sentiment; when we should all find our inner casteller as we pull together for some seasonal cheer and community spirit. So from all at Monocle, here’s wishing you a great Christmas and a towering success of a new year.

If you would like to send ideas, reflections, suggestions, please email me at at@monocle.com.

Balancing act: Catalonia’s castells, or human towers, offer a lesson in sharing the load

On one Saturday in October, colles – groups consisting of people of all ages from all over Catalonia and beyond – parade down the streets of Tarragona accompanied by bands playing Catalan music. Dressed in white trousers, colourful shirts, sashes and bandannas, they make their way to the Tarraco Arena, an amphitheatre in the heart of town. Boys and girls play the gralla, a double-reed instrument, and drums called timbals. Their progress announces the 29th edition of the biggest gathering of castells, Catalonia’s human towers, which are a feat of collaboration and focus.

The human towers are the work of amateur groups that meet for rehearsals twice a week in sports halls across the region. The aim is to build towers that can reach up to 10 people high. “It’s nerve-wracking but also exciting,” says Santi Pie, leader of the Castellers de Sant Cugat, from the eponymous town just north of Barcelona. Pie’s group is one of 30 that has qualified to compete in Tarragona over the weekend in this biannual extravaganza. His job today is to co-ordinate almost 300 people as they aim to create the tallest, most intricate tower possible in order to gain a place, alongside 12 other colles, in the finals of the championship, which take place over the weekend. Monocle joins an audience of 11,000 people, a figure that doesn’t include the thousands of castellers taking part.

Over the past half-century these castells, once the result of a relatively marginal activity, have become one of the most potent symbols of Catalan identity. The tradition was declared a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by Unesco in 2010 and, since then, the number of colles has doubled. The pastime originated in the 18th century in the town of Valls in the Tarragona region. The colles are thought to have developed from a popular dance tradition called Ball de Valencians; music remains central to the activity. Each colla has its own band that starts playing once the base of the tower – the pinya (pine cone) – has been built, and carries on as people climb up to form the upper tiers. The song “El Toc de Castells” guides participants to co-ordinate their movements with the melody, while those at the bottom are able to estimate the tower’s progression via the music. Castells can be found at festivities across Catalonia, where the towers are often built in front of town halls and not necessarily competitive, though the activity is inherently ambitious.

As competitors slowly pile into the centre of the Tarraco Arena Plaça, a former bullfighting ring that has held castells competitions since 1932, a voice on the loudspeakers introduces each colla, many of which have names that hint at the important role played by children: the Xiquets del Serrallo (Kids of El Serrallo); Marrecs de Salt (Brats from Salt); Nens del Vendrell (Children of El Vendrell). Children as young as five or six, whose job it is to climb up to the top of the tower, wear mouthguards and helmets. In pairs, participants help each other to wrap the all-important sash tightly around their waists. This crucial part of their outfit supports the lower back and provides grip for climbers on the ascent. A banner hanging on the edge of the arena reads, “Fent pinya, fas poble.” (“When you huddle together, you make a village.”)

Surveying the crowds from the top floor of the arena is Pere Ferrando, president of the jury. He is surrounded by several screens showing all the action. All colles receive a score based on the difficulty of their constructions, and alongside six other jurors, Ferrando will be marking the performances. There are about 40 different types of castells, each of which is only complete when the enxaneta (one of the smallest castellers) reaches the top of the tower and raises one hand. Extra points are given for a safe dismantling. But today is not only about rivalry. “What makes it interesting is that you don’t necessarily need to compete with another colla,” says Ferrando. “It’s also about surpassing yourself.” That said, he will be keeping a close eye on the tug of war between the two teams angling for the tallest castells: the Castellers de Vilafranca and the Colla Vella dels Xiquets de Valls. The former has dominated the competition since the mid-1990s, winning 11 of the past 13 editions, while the latter is the team threatening this dominance.

It’s mid-afternoon, and the time has come for the Castellers de Sant Cugat to attempt their first tower – an eight-storey construction with four castellers per tier. Pie, the group leader, calls out instructions from the bottom as the stadium watches on. Every step is perfectly synchronised to complete the tower as quickly and safely as possible. As soon as the fourth storey is complete, eight-year-old Candela Casas begins her ascent, stepping on a sea of arms and heads. “I climb up by holding on to sashes, grabbing shoulders and legs,” she says when Monocle meets her backstage. She’s not scared of heights, she says, but it’s important to not look down and to stay focused. When she reaches the top and lifts up her left hand, the stadium breaks into applause. But it’s only when it’s clear that the tower will not crumble, and that everyone is safe, that the castellers begin to jump up and down, exchanging hugs and kisses. When asked what the best thing about castells is, Casas replies without hesitation, “To enjoy yourself!”

Many participants liken the experience to being part of a huge family. For Maricarmen Álvarez, who is watching nervously from her front-row seat, that is quite literally the case. She is here to support her two daughters and six grandchildren, ranging between the ages of 12 and 23. They are all taking part in the competition with the blue-shirted Xiquets del Serrallo from the Tarragona fishing neighbourhood. “It’s very hard for me to watch,” says Álvarez, pausing to point out every family member as they take their positions in the tower. “Come on, you’re almost there,” she says, cheering on as the youngest reaches the top. “Oh God, please don’t let them fall.”

Of course, not every tower can defy gravity. Though the pinya does act as a cushion and serious accidents are rare, the risk involved in castells is what makes the feat of collaboration so enthralling. Álvarez is acutely aware that this is the price to pay for the strong sense of belonging and community that castells provide. She knows that it’s the collective bravery and unconditional trust placed in others that has kept the tradition alive. “My late husband was a casteller and my great-grandchildren will probably be castellers,” she says with a sigh. “It’s passed down from generation to generation; it’s in their blood.”

Making his way through the crowd is Tarragona’s mayor, Rubén Viñuelas. When you grow up here, he says, castells are never far away. “Part of daily life is going out for a vermouth and watching castells,” he says, referencing the celebrations of Sant Magí and the Santa Tecla Festival, which take place in August and September. “Tarragona is the capital of castells, so this event means a lot to us. We pay homage to this way of life. Those of us who grew up here understand what this means and we love to see people from around the world watch on with excitement.”

As a strong expression of Catalan identity, castells often go hand in hand with a sense of regional pride that can be tied to Catalonia’s independence movement, which came to a head with an ultimately unsuccessful declaration of independence in 2017. The competition begins with everyone singing “Els Segadors”, Catalonia’s national anthem, with hands on hearts and fists in the air. Inevitably, this is followed by calls for “Independència!” Some see castells as a metaphor for the region’s strong sense of unity. “There’s the cultural aspect of making castells – it’s about looking after our language and the traditions that have been around for hundreds of years,” says Víctor Biete, president of the Castellers de Sant Cugat. Of course, that doesn’t mean that the activity is incompatible with wanting to remain in a united Spain. And while castells have grown in popularity in recent years, the push for independence has suffered some setbacks. For the first time in more than a decade, the Catalan nationalist parties failed to secure a majority of seats in the regional parliament earlier this year. The pro-union Socialist Party, of which Viñuelas is a member, now leads the Catalan government after years in opposition.

A few streets away, a parallel event is taking place in front of the town hall. In recent decades, castells have expanded beyond Catalonia’s borders. Today several international colles – from London, Paris, Berlin and Copenhagen – have gathered here before heading to the arena to support the Catalan teams. The Xiquets de Copenhagen were founded in the Danish capital in 2014, and Marta Trius, a PhD student, joined them a year ago. “When you’re abroad, the social dimension becomes even more important,” she says. “When you move abroad you have to find your family and this is like having a family.”

Back in the arena, Viñuelas says that the global appeal of castells is due to the teamwork and inclusivity involved. “It’s a piece of Catalonia that we are exporting to the rest of the world, with all its symbolism,” he says. “Everyone has a function in society – the elderly, men, women, children – just like in castells. And in the end, everything depends on the youngsters; on little boys or girls who rise high above everyone else to complete the tower.” In the end, the Castellers de Vilafranca triumphed, taking home its 13th title. For the other, there’s always next time: you’re only as good as your last castell.

Can fashion still be original if it’s trying to please an algorithm?

For any fashion editor, the quarterly trip to the Fondazione Prada in Milan to take in the latest collections by Miuccia Prada and her co-artistic director Raf Simons is one of the highlights of any fashion week. You never know what to expect. It’s a treat to hear Mrs Prada talk about the ideas, conversations and visual references that informed her latest collection.

Surrounded by journalists clutching voice recorders, the Italian design doyenne always keeps her cool and shares insights into her creativity. This season she spoke about her desire to work against social-media algorithms. But how? One way is to present a different idea for every look, rather than a cohesive theme that could be replicated online. “We wanted to add a human touch,” she said, adding that humanity often equals unpredictability.

Weeks later, I’m still thinking about that brief backstage encounter. At a time when so many fashion collections and images are criticised for looking homogenous and algorithm-friendly, can design still be original? And can we still dress in a way that feels personal? It would be easy to adopt a negative outlook and give up on originality. But then again, there might be a simple solution: seeking style inspiration away from the screen.

As we enter the gifting season, seek the unpredictable – like the elusive Mrs Prada – and try to find out more about the products that you’re buying. Behind every item are stories of entrepreneurship, craft and human relationships between designers and makers. Our fashion pages feature collections of such best-in-class products to start you off.

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Western leaders shouldn’t allow themselves to be pushed around by Donald Trump

How would you like your country’s leader to act if intimidated? As the US’s traditional allies consider their response to the election of Donald Trump, it’s a pertinent question.

Emmanuel Macron, the French president, claims that Europe must stop being a herbivore and become an omnivore so as to avoid consumption by the world’s carnivores. It’s no secret that most of Washington’s partners in Europe and Asia were hoping for and even anticipating a Democratic victory. I attended a media roundtable in London on the evening of 5 November featuring some of the most illustrious names in foreign affairs journalism. All of those who offered a prediction on the outcome of the vote said that Kamala Harris would win and far more time was devoted to discussing her potential appointees than Trump’s. Thankfully, no one will suffer as a result of that faulty guesswork – but the same cannot be said for any diplomats or government officials who are inadequately prepared.

Had they sought advice in the aftermath of the shock result, they would have found no shortage of purveyors. Much of what most commentators say boils down to an insistence that leaders should indulge the new president’s allegedly transactional nature and narcissistic tendencies – that he must be flattered and bribed into doing the right thing. But this betrays the same cynicism that has led to the election of politicians such as Trump, who have exploited voters’ antipathy towards the institutions of government and their leaders, who he has labelled as dishonest and corrupt. What is more dishonest and corrupt than kowtowing to someone who you believe to be wrong?

Of course, we don’t know how Trump will treat the likes of France when he begins work on 20 January. Portentous warnings of a vengeful isolationist could well be overblown. But if the president does use intimidation and threats to force Washington’s erstwhile friends to do his bidding, those same friends should not be cowed. Foreign relations, especially those conducted by the world’s economic and military hegemon, have always been transactional. Even the Marshall Plan, often presented as proof of the US’s inherent nobility, had cynical motives – namely, curbing the influence of the Soviet Union in Western Europe.

Moreover, though the US has often claimed to be acting selflessly, while invoking its self-declared exceptionalism, no country is exceptional when it comes to how it should treat others. One need only look at the number of nationalist strongmen currently in power across the globe to understand that America’s situation in 2025 is far from sui generis. Each of these leaders has preached their country’s innate superiority in order to win elections. And while it’s true that none of them are running as powerful a nation as the US, neither are they bound by the checks and balances of that country’s constitution.

What should the US’s allies do if they are faced with a combative Trump? What they think is right, of course. This might sound idealistic but it will protect their countries (and careers) in the long term. Much of the present crisis in liberal democracy stems from the fact that voters are so enraged by their leaders’ prevarication on certain issues that they are drawn to those who they believe are at least genuine. It is in the darkness between the official explanation and the concealed truth that populism festers and metastasises. Trump is not the first US president whose election has confounded the country’s allies; nor will he be the last. He will only be in the job for another four years but the damage done to voters’ faith in politicians who find themselves lying to placate him will take far longer to repair. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

The merits of soft power should not be underestimated

One of the things that distinguishes soft power from hard power is that the former is a two-way relationship. The point of hard power – tanks, fighter jets, the proverbial sending of the marines – is that you don’t ask the permission of whoever you’re menacing. Soft power works best when the party on the receiving end is a willing participant. In October the annual Brics summit was held in Kazan, Russia. It was portrayed by Russia as a defiant diplomatic triumph for Vladimir Putin. Putin is, in theory, a pariah: an imperialist warlord wanted for war crimes. But 24 world leaders – far beyond the official membership of Brics – attended.

But it is striking how few of the participating countries regard Russia as a trustworthy ally and how strapped for actual friends many of them are. It was, to a large extent, a gathering of the “soft power-less”. These countries might be rich, fearsome or undeniably (if infuriatingly) important but they command little affection. Russia, to cite an obvious example, has serially squandered its formidable soft-power arsenal – glorious literature, fabulous music, scientific prowess – on demented ideological projects, often involving the coercion of reluctant neighbours. Moscow now has clients and customers, flunkies and cronies, hostages and victims but few, if any, friends.

Western policymakers have recently been fretting about the posse that Russia is assembling to challenge Western hegemony. Often characterised as the Axis of Upheaval, it is generally held to include Russia, Iran, North Korea and China: four countries united by little beyond the fact that they dislike and suspect the West more than they dislike and suspect each other. The regimes of all four rule by fear. Many of their people would leave in a heartbeat.

All of the Axis of Upheaval might well dismiss soft power as an effete and decadent notion, scoffing that there is a clue in the adjective “soft”. It was a predecessor of Putin’s who is reported to have snorted, when warned of the (considerable) soft-power influence of the Vatican, “How many divisions has the Pope?” But presenting an unrelentingly combative visage to the world will only get you so far. Hard power is a willingness to fight – and any idiot can do that. Soft power is having something worth fighting for.

Andrew Mueller hosts ‘The Foreign Desk’ on Monocle Radio.

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Andalusia’s aerospace industry is providing a clear runway to major players in aviation

More than 2,000 years ago, the Romans transformed the settlement of Hispalis, now Seville, into a centre of shipbuilding and trade. Some 90km from the Atlantic, the inland river port was ideally placed. Today, five centuries since the colonisation of the Americas brought Andalusia to its apex as a seafaring hub, the Guadalquivir river continues to carry ships laden with olive oil and wheat products.

But walk along the river’s banks, as holidaymakers are ferried gently to and fro, and you’ll see that the languidly flowing waters no longer shift fortunes as dramatically as they once did. Instead, Seville is now shaking up the world thanks to the aviators who first took to its skies more than a century ago.

With two major manufacturing sites in the city that trace their roots to those pioneering days of aviation, Airbus has proven itself to be a powerful driver of industrial innovation in Andalusia and beyond. In 2019 the company accounted for 60 per cent of Spain’s aerospace and defence exports at a value of €4.3bn. Airbus Spain reported a revenue of €6.08bn in 2023, with its Defence and Space division pulling in 66 per cent of that total. In Andalusia, aircraft and spacecraft exports grew by 61 per cent year on year in the first three quarters of 2024 to reach €1.78bn. Meanwhile, the overall Spanish aerospace industry grew by 24 per cent between 2012 and 2022 and saw significant investments in R&D, accounting for 10 per cent of the industry’s sales.

Monocle is driving past neat rows of olive trees along the perimeter of Seville’s San Pablo Airport when the vast hangars of Airbus’s installations come into view. Airbus employs about 3,400 people at its facilities in Cádiz and Seville. In addition to the final assembly lines of the C295 and A400M military transport aircraft at San Pablo, there’s an internationally accredited flight-training centre that receives 2,800 students a year, including pilots, mission crew and mechanics from 90 countries across the globe.

Senior manager Arturo Lammers leads us to the cavernous final assembly line of the four-engine A400M that’s inside a four-storey hangar. “I remember we had visitors from the Bundestag at the start of the A400M programme,” says Lammers, who worked on the twin turboprop C295 for 24 years before taking over the newer plane’s final assembly line. “One of the German representatives asked me, ‘How come the A400M is assembled in Seville?’ And I answered quite naturally, ‘Because we are the best in Europe at building planes for military transport.’” Lammers knows the aircraft intimately and has even parachuted out of one or two.

Airbus Spain was born of the merger in 1971 between two homegrown enterprises, Construcciones Aeronáuticas SA (CASA) and Hispano Aviación. In 1926, CASA, based in the Madrid region, established its first outpost in Cádiz, where it built military seaplanes under a German licence. Barcelona-based Hispano-Suiza, an automaker that produced almost 33,000 aircraft engines for use during the First World War, went on to set up Hispano Aviación in Seville in 1943. CASA’s merger with Hispano Aviación in 1971 consolidated more than 50 years’ worth of the region’s experience in engineering and aviation, standing Spain in good stead when it joined the Airbus project later that year.

We follow Lammers up three flights of stairs to a vantage point from which we can marvel at the 42.4-metre-long carbon-fibre wings below us that are being lowered delicately onto the awaiting fuselage. Their descent is aided by laser guidance as part of Airbus’s “best-fit” technology, which matches the live-assembly process to theoretical computer models in real time.

“Today is one of the drumbeat moments for everyone across the entire planet that is working on the A400M,” says Lammers. The A400M aircraft is an example of international collaboration, from its design phase to the various countries that build its major parts – such as France, where the cockpit is produced; the UK, where the wings are made; and Germany, where the fuselage comes from. Next door, the five stations of the C295’s final assembly line are more of an Andalusian affair. Some 75 per cent of the Spanish-designed plane’s major sections are integrated in the region; in addition, services such as painting, delivery, maintenance and client support are supplied locally. “We Andalusians are generally nonconformists,” says Luis Marmolejo Vidal, the head of Airbus Spain’s light transport aircraft, flight line and delivery centre. “We like to feel proud of what we do. I believe that this is why there has been such a strong push to create a state-of-the-art industry within the region.”

Over the past decade, the facility has fully digitised its production processes. Workers rely on tablet computers to view schematics and troubleshoot, as well as to track progress between shifts and across stations. A recent innovation – augmented-reality goggles with integrated voice activation – ensures that workers can access computer data hands-free. When we test the specs, we are transported to the interior of a fuselage, where wiring and its related fixtures are highlighted in canary yellow to guide correct placement.

According to María Ángeles Martí, the senior vice-president of Airbus Defence and Space, the Andalusian facilities will continue to hold great importance to Airbus, particularly as the EU progresses towards its strategic defence goal of increasing technological autonomy as a response to growing instability in the region due to Russian aggression in Ukraine. “Airbus Defence is part of the road map for European defence,” says Martí, before outlining the division’s work on the EU’s Future Combat Air System and Eurodrone projects. The company’s Tablada facility in Seville will assemble the Eurodrone’s central and rear fuselages, as well as other parts.

While it is undeniable that, as Spain’s largest aerospace manufacturer, Airbus exerts a powerful influence, more than half of Andalusia’s 147 aerospace companies have fewer than 50 employees. Juan Román, the managing director of business cluster Andalucía Aerospace, says that there is an ongoing debate within the sector about whether the region’s enterprises should join together to form larger entities in an effort to better compete in the global marketplace. “On the one hand, we might consider increased size to be a key factor in improving robustness,” he says. “On the other hand, we realise that the flexibility and specialisation that a small company brings is far greater than that of a larger company.”

One of the cluster’s members, Solar mems Technologies, fits that bill. Not only is the firm highly specialised – it produces sun sensors built with micro-electromechanical systems – but it is also dedicated exclusively to the space sector, which currently accounts for a mere 3 per cent of the companies in the Andalusian aerospace industry. The Spanish Space Agency’s move from Madrid to Seville in 2023 portends a significant change in the subsector.

José Manuel Quero Reboul, a co-founder of Solar mems and tenured professor at the University of Seville’s Higher Technical School of Engineering, explains that the company’s business model is rooted in experimentation. At the university’s lab, he develops technology side by side with students that is then patented. He hands over these experimental innovations to the company so that it can translate them into marketable products, with 1 per cent of any sales going back to the university. “Though I’m sort of the father of all this, I try not to meddle,” he says with a smile. “I’m a researcher.”

The turning point for Solar mems came with a collaboration with Airbus Defence and Space as part of a project to build 648 telecommunications satellites for the Oneweb network, the only alternative constellation to SpaceX’s consumer-orientated Starlink. “Until that point, we were doing things by hand and maybe could build four devices a month – and then suddenly we needed to produce two a day,” says Quero Reboul about the order of 1,000 optical sensors that the company had to fulfil out of its tiny lab. 

An Airbus team took up residence in the Solar mems clean room to teach its technicians how to replicate quality at scale. “We are one of the few companies in the sector that have implemented assembly-line production,” he says. That allowed Airbus to make two satellites a day in its Cape Canaveral facility. Low-orbit satellites, such as the ones that Oneweb makes, can cost less than 10 per cent of what is required to build traditional ones.

While Seville’s legacy in industrial machining keeps it at the centre of the Andalusian aerospace industry, other southern cities are expanding into alternative areas. Coastal Malaga is an incubator for specialists in digital systems such as avionics software, while Huelva, near the Portuguese border, has the potential to become a hub for drone development. In October 2024 a 75-hectare installation for the testing of unmanned aerial systems opened there, becoming Europe’s first airfield dedicated to the development and trial of drones weighing up to 15 tonnes.

Aníbal Ollero is Andalusia’s foremost expert in unmanned aerial systems, as evidenced by the more than 650 publications that he has authored on the subject. He believes that diversifying the aerospace sector beyond traditional manufacturing will help to ensure its long-term success. “We mustn’t only stick to what we already know,” he says. “We should look for what else might one day play an important role in aeronautics.”

Monocle meets Ollero at Seville’s GRVC Lab, where he leads a group of professors, researchers and engineers in developing aerial robots. The indoor testing arena brings to mind an aviary: the high-ceilinged space is draped with a tent of white rope nets. This is meant to offer protection to the team’s “birds” – ornithopters, robots with flapping wings – that flutter through the air in a hi-tech homage to nature. These lightweight ornithopters are capable of quiet, hazard-free flight, particularly in comparison to rotary-wing drones, making them ideal for use in proximity to wildlife. The GRVC Lab is working on a project in which its ornithopters will be used to inspect and maintain power lines in one of the region’s major nature reserves, thus reducing the possibility of disturbing migratory birds, as well as the vulnerable Iberian lynx.

Not one to rest on his laurels, Ollero is busy with various projects that aim to keep Seville at the cutting edge of drone technology. He is the manager of the soon-to- open Center for Innovation in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and Urban Air Mobility, which will consider ideas such as the aerial delivery of packages and transport via air taxis. He will also continue as the scientific director of catec, a research and development centre for aerospace technology that links the public and private sectors.

Ollero says that his work demands a certain steadfastness. “Researchers must somehow see the future,” he says. “The research that we began 20 years ago is bearing fruit now. It’s possible that we won’t get to see the results of what we are working on today.”

Innovators at Australian-Spanish start-up Dovetail Electric Aviation, however, are working to bring the future as close to today as possible. Last summer the company went to Seville to present a prototype of its hydrogen- fuel-cell powered electric motor, which can be retrofitted on existing aircraft in the under-20-passenger category. While hydrogen-fuel-cell technology is not yet advanced enough for use in long-haul flights, Dovetail has set its sights on shorter flights as an achievable goal within the next two years. A maiden flight of its electric-powered engines is planned to take place in 2025.

“In addition to being zero-emission, electrification’s promise lies in its ability to significantly reduce operating costs,” says David Doral, the company’s co-founder and ceo. Electric-battery powered engines can achieve flight times of 15 to 20 minutes, which are suitable for skydiving centres and other uses in tourism, such as island-hopping or scenic flights. With the addition of hydrogen fuel cells, an engine’s range extends to one hour, opening up the possibility of a renaissance in regional air travel between cities that are currently unviable to connect by air.

Though Doral has had an international career in the aerospace sector, working for companies including Embraer in Brazil and Boeing in the US, the time that he spent in Seville left an impression. “I’ve always seen it as a fascinating place for growing projects,” he says, before outlining Dovetail’s plans to expand in Spain with an R&D base and manufacturing facility. Though it’s not clear whether Andalusia will be Dovetail’s future home, Doral mentions that the impending arrival in Seville of Swiss aircraft manufacturer Pilatus bodes well, as the company’s PC-12 is “perfectly compatible” with Dovetail’s retrofits.

Andalusia’s aerospace industry presents fascinating contrasts, with tradition and innovation combining to sparkling effect. For major players with staying power and forward-thinking spirits alike, it seems that there are nothing but clear skies ahead.

Why the appeal of printed photographs is enduring through a digital age

For the global photography market, 2023 was a record year in terms of sales volume. But there was a catch: the total value of those sales was $62.4m (€57.4m), marking a fall from 2022. Though the market is active, the sector’s buyers don’t necessarily have the deepest pockets. For many, photography offers an entry point to art collecting.

In a world where we can take and view images with a tap of a finger on a smartphone, what does it say about the medium that we continue to collect and surround ourselves with photographs? What makes the snapshots that we choose for our walls special and how are they valued? And how does living with photographs change the way we experience a room?

Over the following pages we explore the art of building a collection. We visit a Park Avenue auction, spotlight galleries across the globe and explore the history of the art form. We also enter the homes of some keen-eyed enthusiasts to take a peek at their extraordinary collections. They might inspire you to snap up a print or two of your own.

At Monocle, we take the pursuit of a fantastic shot seriously. And sometimes, a good photo shouldn’t be confined to the page. — L

AUCTIONS to watch
Negative equity
New York

Within seconds, Peter Hujar’s lifetime print, titled “David Wojnarowicz (Village Voice ‘Heartsick: Fear and Loving in the Gay Community’)”, climbs in price from $26,000 (€24,000) to $70,000 (€64,700), before continuing upwards. The photograph takes just two minutes to be sold at a final price of $139,700 (€129,300). “It’s the only lifetime print of that image that we’ve seen,” says Sarah Krueger, Phillips’ head of photographs in New York, who is the auctioneer when monocle attends the Park Avenue event. (A “lifetime print” is one that’s produced while the photographer is still alive.)

Until the Hujar print, the mood in the auction room has been relatively calm, with a small group of seated bidders and others dropping by for certain lots. Every now and then, someone will gently raise their paddle. One man in the second row bids by lifting his finger with the slightest of movements. Blink and you’d miss it. “He’s a collector who I’ve been dealing with for decades,” says Christopher Mahoney, senior international specialist, photographs, at Phillips. “I remember seeing him in the 1990s. He’s a real auction pro.”

That was back when the sale rooms were full and frantic, sometimes brimming with more than 100 people. Nowadays, though the auction is still held in a physical space, most of the action takes place by phone or through the online platform, which people log into from around the world. “The technology has become so good and accessibility has expanded so much,” says Mahoney.

Whether attending in person or engaging down the line, thousands of bidders from more than 40 countries have turned out for the slew of famous photos under the hammer, including Wolfgang Tillmans’ “Paper Drop Novo”, Cindy Sherman’s “Untitled Film Still #18” and Alfred Stieglitz’s “From the Back Window – 291 – Snow Covered Tree, Back-Yard”, which sells for $304,800 (€282,330).

The price that a photograph achieves at auction is the result of several factors: the condition and size of the print, how many were made, how often one becomes available and how long after the negative date the work was printed. “While there are innumerable variables for our valuations, rarity and condition can be the biggest drivers,” says Krueger. Though the most common prints that she sees at auction are gelatin silver, chromogenic and pigment, many contemporary artists use traditional processes such as the 19th-century daguerreotypes.

How quickly something sells depends, of course, on how decisive the bidders are. “It’s from 40 seconds to a minute when people have to make decisions,” says Krueger.

Long-time collector Louis Berrick, who loves the work of William Klein, recommends going in with a plan and a sum in mind. He is less concerned with rarity and appreciates how accessible the art form can be. “If there are 40 photographs that were made and signed by the artist, that’s great,” he says. “It’s a very democratic art form.”

Like most collectors, he’ll peruse the catalogue beforehand and take note of a few pieces. But he mostly chooses what to bid on through impulse. “I decide in the moment,” says Berrick. He’s glad that the online platform allows more bidders to take part but says there’s nothing like being in the room. Before the auction, Berrick will view the collection in person, sometimes asking if he can see the photographs outside the frame. “You’ll go there and realise a photograph isn’t so big. Or you’ll see something different in the picture. It changes your experience.” Mahoney also encourages collectors to engage with the collections if they can.

In the auction room itself, there’s one piece of advice that everyone will tell you: unless you’re bidding, keep your hands firmly in your lap. Lifting a finger can come at a high price.

Gelatin silver print.

10⅛ inches 3 10 inches (25.7cm 3 25.4cm).

Printed by the artist, with the estate’s copyright-credit reproduction limitation stamps. Signed, titled and dated by Stephen Koch, executor of the Hujar estate, in pencil.

estimate: Up to $50,000 (€46,250).

sold for: $139,700 (€129,300)

Cindy Sherman
Untitled Film Still #18, 1978.

Gelatin silver print.

7⅝ inches 3 9½ inches (19.4cm 3 24.1cm).

Signed, dated and numbered 5/10 in pencil on the verso.

estimate: $80,000 (€74,100) to $120,000 (€111,150).

sold for: $101,600 (€94,110)

Francesca Woodman
Self Portrait (with Bird), 1976-78.

Unique oversized gelatin silver print with applied paint and pigment.

49¾ inches 3 35½ inches (126.4cm 3 90.2cm).

with frame: 58⅜ inches 3 43⅛ inches (148.3cm 3 109.5cm).

estimate: $150,000 (€139,000) to $250,000 (€231,570).

sold for: $190,500 (€176,450)

Tina Modotti
Telegraph Wires, circa 1925.

Platinum print.

9⅜ inches 3 7⅛ inches (23.8cm 3 18.1cm).

Former owner Vittorio Vidali’s “Commissar of the Fifth Regiment” stamp, a typed caption label and reduction notations in an unidentified hand in pencil on the verso.

estimate: $150,000 (€139,000) to $250,000 (€231,570).

sold for: $177,800 (€164,840)

Alfred Stieglitz
From the Back Window – 291 – Snow Covered Tree, Back-Yard, 1915.

Platinum print.

95/8 inches 3 75/8 inches (24.4cm 3 19.4cm).

estimate: $250,000 (€231,570) to $350,000 (€324,190).

sold for: $304,800 (€282,330)

At the Honolulu Defense Forum, the sector prepares for a China crisis

Valentine’s Day in Hawaii sounds romantic but for bigwigs in the US defence sector, 14 February will be devoted to one thing: facing up to Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific. The second iteration of the Honolulu Defense Forum (HDF), which runs from 13 to 14 February and is organised in partnership with the US Indo-Pacific Command and the Office of the Secretary of Defense, will focus on “operationalising urgency” and “promoting regional security” from the Bering Strait to Cape Horn.

“With intensifying security challenges, such as those posed by Russia’s aggression in Ukraine and heightened tensions in the South China Sea, both European and Indo-Pacific theatres face pressing security needs,” says Kimberly Lehn, senior director of the HDF. “What we offer is an event focused on strategic policy questions and solutions. It’s more intimate than bigger conferences, such as the Shangri-La Dialogue. Some 250 members of government will be in attendance, as well as military policymakers, planners, analysts, think-tanks and venture capital.” Keynote speakers include Washington operators such as Robert J Wittman, the US representative for Virginia, and Jedidiah P Royal, an Indo-Pacific security expert at the Department of Defense.

On the commercial side of things, HDF’s sponsors have included traditional defence names including Lockheed Martin, as well as relatively new tech operators, such as Palantir Technologies and Amazon Web Services. The latter two’s presence indicates the important role that technology companies play in the defence space, as well as the rewards on offer from the most recent military budget presented to Congress, which included a request for $895bn (€820bn) in funding for 2025.

HDF will take place at Waikiki Beach, which has become a byword for relaxation. Yet the watchword will be preparedness, as there are many in the US and among its allies who believe that the Pentagon has been too slow to counter China’s military posturing across the Indo-Pacific (Beijing now possesses the world’s largest maritime fighting force, operating 234 warships to the US’s 219). All eyes will be on Waikiki this Valentine’s Day for a signal of Washington’s renewed intent.

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