Noguera at El Artesano Cutlery
When we found out that Miguel Noguera was traveling to Albacete to perform an ultrashow organized by the city's School of Art, we had no doubts: we had to go out and meet him. We write to you proposing you to tour the place where Joaquín Reyes and company forged what some have baptized with a horrible name: post humor . He accepted the invitation.
Noguera's first impression is of being somewhat shy. But after a while you discover that no, that you are wrong. If you give him a foot he starts to fabricate ideas quickly. He explains his technique : “It is a mood, you unintentionally string together five ideas because you are a bit in that attitude. If that provision appears wherever you are, you write things down. You can be in a picturesque place that harbors a potential for curious moments and still not write anything down. That reassures me a lot because if I didn't have a kind of obsession with visiting curious places or watching strange movies ”. That state of mind that he talks about seems to be good on the trip, because in the interview he tells us that the first idea he has in Albacete occurs to him as soon as he arrives in the city.
Miguel Noguera does not seem uncomfortable wasting time. Quite the contrary, because he tells us that “ I'm good at traveling . There are many moments of waiting that I like, the moments of 'now you can't do anything, you can't send any business'. My natural state is to have nothing to do and despite that your presence in the world is justified ”.
On the express tourist route that we have designed around the city no visit to any church is planned . A mistake, because he confesses that these are the places he visits the most when he travels: “In a church you know what you are going to find. There is no noise from your peers , the noise of contemporary problems”. Yes, the man who is turning the concept of humor upside down neither visits contemporary art museums nor goes out for drinks after ultrashows.
We begin the journey at the Teatro Circo. A building with a futuristic touch that keeps in its entrails a 19th century stage prepared to host circus shows. One of the employees explains to us that the Arabic inscriptions that can be seen next to the seats on the first floor were made by an illiterate Arab. He limited himself to copying one of the phrases that can be seen in the Alhambra in Granada: ** Wa-la galib illa Allah (There is no winner but Allah) **. After digesting that information we headed to the lodares passage, a small roofed shopping street that takes on an air one finds in Paris or Milan. It is the tourist site par excellence of Albacete.
Once in the Passage we enter the The Craftsman cutlery . A tiny shop packed with razors, knives, scissors and swords. Noguera seems somewhat overwhelmed. We don't know if because of the situation or because of the brightness of the sharp blades that surround it. The visit ends when the owner of the store, as if he were a character from an ultrashow, takes out a knife that measures about a meter.
Noguera in the Lodares Passage
The next novel by Pepe Carvalho after The Birds of Bangkok is The Rose of Alexandria. Vázquez Montalbán jumped from Thailand to the La Mancha plain and framed the plot in Albacete. During the interview we explained to Noguera that a fight scene in the book takes place in the Lodares Passage . Between laughs he gives us the idea that if the street-fighter If Albacete were included among the scenes of the fights, that street would appear.
Since we want our man not to leave without seeing a cloister, we make a stop at the Rosary Inn, a 16th century building converted into a library. It is the closest thing we can find to that medieval that tells us so much that he is interested.
Then we walk to the main bookstore in Albacete: Popular, which has dedicated its window to Noguera's books. There he writes and draws some dedication with enough concentration. Something that he does several times during the 24 hours that his trip to La Mancha lasts. From his last book, Better than living tells us that “this scoring machine is a place that is as if out of life. A kind of thing where there is no time, there are no problems, It is like a machine to treasure moments. A very withdrawn form of contact with the world”.
Noguera in the Popular
When he realizes that his luggage should have been out of his hotel room 40 minutes ago, we bolt. Already with the suitcase in hand we take an appetizer in a key place on the Albacete tapas route, the doodle. We give each other a hug and Noguera leaves in a hurry to catch a taxi so as not to miss the train. Another ultrashow awaits you in Barcelona. We were very convinced that he is a great guy.
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Noguera at the Teatro Circo, Arab futurism