At CIMIE 2017 (June 29–30), Professor Esther Oliver presented research that was being conducted at CREA on the invisibilization of one of the women who has most contributed to Bilbao’s transformation. That same month, 27 adults walking through the park were asked, “Do you know the name of this park?” and only one person did not know it. However, when asked, “Do you know any of the things Doña Casilda did?” 20 out of the 27 people said no.
This lack of awareness is significant, given that the following improvements are wholly or partly attributable to her: the Basurto Civil Hospital, the University of Deusto, the Arriaga Theater, the park that bears her name, the Casa de Misericordia, and several schools for the working classes. It is also significant that the only seven people who knew of any of her works were older; the fact that young women were unaware of her indicated that the media and the educational system were contributing to this invisibility. A very enlightening and dialogic debate took place during that session. Faced with the clear evidence of her contribution, one of the feminists present said, in a very good-natured tone, that it made her angry to have to acknowledge it, and that she was going to look into where Casilda’s fortune came from. Another feminist remarked that it was significant that we were trying to dig up some dark past regarding her financial background in order to exclude her from feminism, yet we saw no problem with Virginia Woolf’s family wealth—even though we knew it was tied to the context of the British Empire. The woman who had raised the issue replied, “Touché.”
Just five months later, a seated statue was erected in the park. A bust had been part of the monumental composition created by Agustín Querol since 1906. In 2008, on the occasion of his bicentennial, the city council sponsored two research projects. In 2019, the Bilbao 700 Foundation published her first modern biography. That same year, the city council and the Sabino Arana Foundation organized a series of lectures. And so it continued until 2025, when an international scientific article was published that received significant media coverage in pieces such as “Casilda Iturrizar, the Forgotten Feminist” in Deia, “Remembering Casilda Iturrizar” in Osakidetza, and “Scientific Research Revives the Figure of Casilda Iturrizar, Doubly Marginalized as a Woman and a Conservative” in DiarioEs.
Tomorrow at 2:00 p.m., CIMIE26 will hold a tribute to her at the seated statue, featuring a performance by Guridi’s Mirentxu, who included in her recordings the voices of boys and girls whose education was supported by Casilda Iturrizar.
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