May 2021
Territori Contemporani 3/5
by Olga Olivera-Tabeni

Thirty-four days walking around thirty-four plots of land

These itinerary is an adaptation of a piece with the same name that refers and as the title says to walk thirty-four days following the estates of an old document found, estates of the inheritance of the first Catalan mayoress, Dolores Codina Arnau.

And as the estates are defined in the notarial documentation by their limits, the piece tries to look for these spaces between, to walk around, as a simple action, but at the same time complex, full of meanings.

Walking around these places reveals several realities, remains of old buildings, dry stone walls, old fruit trees, pear trees, almond trees, olive trees that have been abandoned and no one stops to pick their fruits, remains of a subsistence economy that the capital machine has taken away, or spaces where weeds proliferate, which sometimes the farmer burns or uproots, but that are reborn again and again. Narrow places, the last and scarce redoubts of an uncultivated world, free, without master (and all the tensions that also occur). Outside of the productive world, of capitalism, a Midstream or diffused terrain, of floating ecology, which we cannot fix.

But at work and as we can not access the land registry, by the law of data protection, while having changed some of the names of the items, of owners who appear, new reparcelling, or land affected by roads …. It is difficult for us to access and identify them. In the end, this itinerary ends up being a pile of photographs of spaces and routes that surely have nothing to do with those reported in these old documents, a situation of oblivion, amnesia and a strange game of approximations and absurdities.

19a: Another piece of land in the field, located in the same term of Talladell and “PLANS” of capacity five and a half jornal (ancient agriculture area mesure) or 2 hectares, 39 areas, 69 centiares; adjacent: to the East with Jaume Calafell; at noon, with the pond; to the West with the same pond and the road of Cervera; and to the North with the road of “Plans”.

5362’50 2443’33

REGISTERED in volume 485 of the Archive, page 87, property number 592.

24a: Another piece of land for irrigation, located in the same term and heading “HORTA” of approximate capacity three and a half days or one hectare, 52 areas, 53 centimeters; adjoining: to the East with the road of Casa Blanca and Ramón Perelló; at noon, with the reguero and José Segura, and to the North with the road of Casa Blanca.

6493’75 3041’66

REGISTERED in the page 107 of the volume 485 of the Archive, property number 597.

25a: Another piece of land for fields and irrigation, located in the same municipal district and heading of “L’Horta” with a capacity of one day’s work, or 43 areas, 58 centiáreas; facing to the East with the heirs of María Antonia Puig; to the Noon, with José Pont; to the West, with the road to Planós; and to the North with the irrigation ditch and part with the heirs of Mrs. Puig.

582’50 522.

INSCRIBED in the page 111, of the volume 485 of the Archive, property number 598.

31a: Another piece of land planted with vines and olive trees; called the “CALVETA”, in the same term of Talladell and the district of LAS GARRIGAS; with a capacity of three jornales (ancient agriculture area mesure), 3 porcas (ancient agriculture area mesure), or 1 hectare, 41 areas, 63 centiares; adjoining: to the East with the term of Granyena; at noon, with lands of the village of Mas de Bondia; to the West, with Francisco Vilardosa; and to the North, with Felipe Solé and Ramón Rufes.

321’25 1400

Registered in volume 485, page 135, property number 604.

AREA OF SITJAS OR FLOREJACHS:

33a: The right of pastures and herbs, of the inherited “MAS LLORENS”; field, vineyard, olive grove, wasteland, and forest, located to the area of Sitjas or Florejachs of extension 311 Jornales, ten porcas, or be——————-(it does not appear); Adjoining: for East with the area of Guardiola; for Noon, with the said term of Florejachs; for West, with the area of Renant; and for North with that of Castellblanch. This inheritance belonged to Mr. Antonio Esteve Ramón and Mrs. Teresa Ramón Pujol, as heir and usufructuary of her father and husband José Esteve Valls, and they registered it in the volume 265 of the Archive, property number 377 duplicate, inscriptions ninety and tenth (the page is not recorded). A portion of one hundred and fifty-five days of the part of East of this inheritance was insolutum to Antonio Vilalta and so much in the deed of insolutum of this portion of inheritance, as in the description of the total inheritance, it was stated that the same one, that is to say the total property, was subject to the right of pastures that obtained the gentleman Joaquín Codina Canut. As it has been several years since this grazing right has been effective, it is valued at the amount of 2000 pesetas according to the title deed.

Valued at 5,333.33 2000. Irrigation value. 5333,33 )

It is registered on page 46 of volume 1012, property number 377.88; on page 90 of volume 933, property number 1383; on page 196 of volume 933, property number 1384; and on page 72, of volume 1138, all of them in the municipality of Florejachs.

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The place names and proper names of the original document, which is a typed list of Dolores Codina Arnau’s possessions, have been respected.

Graf Route through Lleida by Olga Olivera-Tabeni, artista visual.

This text is part of the set of routes directed by Frederic Montornés. With the intention of getting out of Barcelona city and making other route projects known, GRAF invites Frederic Montornés to make a first introductory Route to the repository of Territori Contemporani – a television programme to discover the spaces of diffusion and production of contemporary art in the regions of Catalonia, through the artists and cultural agents involved – and in the same way, to direct four GRAF Routes through the four provinces of Catalonia by the hand of artists linked to these territories.