From a very narrow conception of art – let’s put as a sublimation of aesthetics – you can think that Hondarribia is the right place to inspire art: imagine, canvas, paintbrush, hat, painter trying to catch one of those beautiful prints of the city. But, coincidentally, it has also been a suitable space for the development of art throughout history. Sample of this set of currently active artists: Jude Arrieta, Sergio Prego, Maider Goikoetxea, Iñaki Gracenea, Aiert Alonso, to name but a few. Further back in time, it is interesting to know the importance of Hondarribia in the formation of the Gaur group.

The Gaur group, which needs no presentation, revolutionized the Basque art of the 1960s and laid the foundations of the art of the coming decades. Among them were Oteiza, Chillida, of course, great artists such as Friendly Arias. Regarding Hondarribia, Rafael Ruiz Balerdi and Jose Antonio Sistiaga had workshops in the Casco Viejo in the Guipuzkoan town. Nestor Basterretxea still did not live there, but he had his house with Oteiza in Irun, a long way away. And, of course, today we are interested here, a significant member, a son of the city, Remigio Mendiburu, who serves as an excuse for a tour of Hondarribia. A pretext, a reason, but not a pretext: We will know the work of Mendiburu and we will know the work of Hondarribia.

Remigio Mendiburu for Oteiza: “Undoubtedly, among us, the sculptor of the greatest Basque fortress” (and that is not known exactly), “the most identified with our Basque Country and in the simplest and most natural way”. Bernardo Atxaga told us more intelligently: “The wildest artist ever seen in the Basque Country.” Born in Hondarribia in 1931, he has been in Hondarribia since his death in 1990 in Barcelona. It also consists of a sample of his work. Not in vain, in total there are five sculptures scattered in so many other points of the city. Also a sixth, but in the Boardroom of the House of the People: it is difficult to see this image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, if not in a plenary or in a wedding, both with many difficulties.

By the Shore

Somehow you have to arrange the excursion, and we can start the road down, by the water bank, right where you cross the Bidasoa and the airport. The district of Puntal (formerly of Spain), in which the Bird is located, is located in the Bay of Txingudi, the epicenter of birds during trans-European migration. Mendiburu made hunter traps, made a loose bird in 1985, seemingly singing. Bronze is not difficult for migrants according to the time of the year, with a little luck you can hear a waltz on the piano, Chopin, from the window of a house. Txoria is located in the park dedicated to Pierre Loti, in front of the house the military writer had in Hendaia. It was a statue, long (or not) ago, but the honoree was anticlerican. By putting Mendiburu's in Loti's, some consciousness would finally calm down.

Let us leave the temptation to be there a branch and go ahead. On Javier Ugarte Street, behind Carlos Castle V.aren, next to the elevator that comes up from Oilar enea to the Old Part, Talua. Sculpture especially entrainable. I will tell you as I have received it: from the roof of the house next door, in the Mendiburu workshop, he threw a large piece of plaster, and after a while he made the piece in bronze, as it had fallen. As Mendiburu linked them with his mother's suicide, Oteiza asked him to leave that work path.

Not far from there, in the Plaza del Sol, the City Hall has acquired the last of Mendiburu, No title (so called). Not far from there, too, Remigio Mendiburu Street. With all respect to those who live in that street: too inadequate for the recognition that the artist deserves. You can't see it in Google Maps either. And, at this point, a request: the institutions should work to create a foundation, a museum or something, as has been done with others – Oteiza, Chillida, with better or worse luck – to make Mendiburu’s work known.

To the mountain

We are now forced to turn to the mountain, to the hermitage of Guadalupe. In the next field is the Txalaparta, the iconic image of the Ez Dok Amairu group, which was exhibited at the Venice Biennale of 1966. The same as the bird visited: the original wood, passing bronze, has lost much of its grace. Mendiburu worked on all the materials that the sculpture has used, but is known for its relationship with wood. Beech, above all, and oak. As if I had heard the words of the Saint Bernard of the 12th century: “The forest will teach you more than books.” He used poor materials, which nobody wanted, he gave away, he left, he found, old beams, forgotten logs, taken from landfills. Of course, showing the bad wood outdoors in bronze would be one of the worst options.

Even higher, next to the summit of Mount Jaizkibel, the Union of Peoples, long before a political party of similar names, in 1963. Fried egg is known to people with a more popular name. Symbolically strong: Pasai Donibane (former of Pasaia Hondarribia) and Hondarribia have been confronted since the 17th century. For example, the Pasaitarras have made a claim for sovereignty and the priest of Hondarribia has thrown some blessed branches and a cross against them. Hence the need for the milestone of the Union of Peoples to give way to the most stable peace in history. Mendiburu decided to place the sculpture in the place where it is located, as he saw a couple impacting on the place as a love center. It wouldn't be a wrong strategy to drive sculpture, to put it in every single place where the touches are made.

Mendiburu had difficulty deciding how and where to locate the sculptures. After the end of the tour, let's say that they are better in the form and in the place they are, perhaps not better, than if they were nowhere. Recalling what Oteiza said of Mendia, “a historic, in a town without criticism, without history,” we have completed the tour. A historic tour.