A cavalcade of class divides: festival-going in Seville

Every April, Seville plays host to Feria, an Andalusian tradition stretching back to 1846. In reality, ferias – a special kind of festival similar to a carnival or town fair – occur all across Spain; it just happens that the grandest belongs to Seville. In 2018, almost half a million people visited the Feria each day over the course of a week. The festival featured exactly 212,000 energy-saving light bulbs and over one thousand separate tents to visit. This goes without even mentioning the giant theme park operating next door. The Feria de Abril is vast, a feat of organisation, complete with a new, extravagant portico every year. It even has its own cocktail; but underneath the surface, all is not well at Feria. The cruel divides of Seville’s society disguise themselves behind tent flaps and guy ropes.

A RECIPE FOR REBUJITO (coctél de feria)

- 1 part manzanilla (local fortified wine)

- 2 parts lemonade

- Mint leaves to garnish

The history of Rebujito, the official festival drink (like a white wine sangria with extra spunk), is muddled to begin with. The wine that makes it special, manzanilla, shares a common heritage with flamenco dancers and Spanish guitar, in that they all have roots in Romani culture. In fact, the most popular brand of manzanilla brands itself as la gitana – the gypsy. This trend continues throughout Feria; a perpetuation of some medieval-esque utopia. Women dress in flamenco dresses; men in traditional suits or on horseback. Horse-drawn coaches count their blessings and rake in the fares. Feria stakes itself as an appeal to tradition; the problem is, it isn’t ever clear whose tradition it is.

As I highlighted in last week’s blog, the Romani community in Seville – especially those who live in Las Tres Mil – are second class citizens in the city they made. The people making the most out of Feria aren’t the creators of the cultural stereotypes that dominate now; they are ethnic Spaniards living out a culture they have adopted. This isn’t problematic in itself; flamenco culture has widely permeated Spanish society after being popularised by maestros from the Roma community. It would be wrong to call out the festival-goers for engaging in what is, ultimately, a pastime, and a rich one at that. It’s when barriers get erected that things start to get difficult.

The 1000 or so tents (casetas) that make up Feria are not made equal, which is crucial; for any self-respecting adult who isn’t amused by a ride on the teacups, there’s little to do at Feria but go in a tent and have a dance with a drink & a tapa. 500 of the tents are private, for prominent families, the movers and shakers of Seville. Another 500 are reserved for private entities (companies, clubs, and the occasional union). The few that remain tend to be public. Although these public tents are often much larger than their private counterparts, and there’s one for each city district, they still occupy a slim minority.

A Spaniard, or more likely, a sevillano, would interrupt here to point out that a local would have little trouble making their way into one of the tents that appear, outwardly, to be entirely private. This might, on a case by case basis, have some truth to it. However, the pretense of privacy, of exclusion, has already been erected. The majority have been excluded from Feria. Those who arrive in their freshly pressed suits and elegant, gaudy dresses are guaranteed seats at their personal table. The lower ranks of society are left with the public tents, poorly lit hardwood “dancefloors” selling plastic jugs of rebujito and tortilla baps.

This article is not a complaint about the poor quality of the public tents; it’s about their necessity in the first place. The notion of a festival – an event marked for its ability to galvanise community and togetherness – gating off its key attractions not with money but with fame, itself a proxy for money, is disastrous. Things get exasperating when we compare to the rest of Andalusia; similar ferias in Malaga and Jerez make a point of being almost entirely public. This means that Seville’s adherence to exclusion can’t be enforced by some appeal to tradition, as it simply doesn’t exist.

Perhaps the Feria de Abril is simply another Seville institution. As a city, Seville can often feel almost backward-looking; basking so gently in its glorious history as to forget itself in the present. The prestige of the old town, the old money of its residents, the quiet polarisation of the city and its suburbs; Seville is built on reinforced traditions. It is this motive that gives the city its charm and its crutch in one go. The planners for Feria continuously expand their operations, choosing larger and larger sites year on year, going above and beyond to plan the most impressive festival possible – with the underlying aim of paying the best possible tribute. Maybe next year, that tribute should be paid to everyone.