9. From Carmen Square to Salamero Square
We cross Independencia Boulevard and walk along Cádiz Street to Carmen Square, where we find one of the monuments devoted by Zaragoza to the memory of Francisco de Goya, its most international painter. The monument in honour of the artist born in Fuendetodos was always considered an obligation, a commitment to Goya that Zaragoza lasted too many years to settle. In fact, from the beginning of the 20th century different contests were organized, but the monument was not built. The busts of Goya placed in the city -the above mentioned one made by Honorio García Condoy (with similarities with that placed in Fuendetodos made by Julio Antonio), and the bust made by Félix Burriel placed at Goya´s Corner- were built at the end of the 1920s. Nevertheless, decades passed before they were finally placed at its present location. The citizens of Zaragoza had to wait until the 1960s to see a monument to Goya of a certain importance, apart the above mentioned bust. But, there was a certain controversy since it was not built by an Aragonese sculptor, -an idea linked to the project nearly from its very beginning- but directly entrusted to the Catalan Federico Marés and placed at the Pilar Square. The monument remains but its original plan changed after a reform that suppressed plant decoration and included a fountain.
We walk along Teniente Coronel Valenzuela Street to Salamero Square. Even though there is no public sculpture today in this place, we can imagine the view with gardens and the Monument to Joaquín Dicenta built by Honorio García Condoy. This bust formed part of a triple initiative promoted in 1928 to pay homage to three Aragonese writers which were made and erected in different places of the city. Apart from the monument to Dicenta and the above mentioned to Marcos Zapata -placed at Aragón Square- there was a third one devoted to Eusebio Blasco and placed at Primo de Rivera Park. Both monuments- to Dicenta and Blasco- had small fountains at the front that do not exist today, with a symbolic more that useful intention.
Forcing even more our imagination, we can image the look of this square in case the commemorative Monument to the 5th of March -pretended to be built at the centre of the square and opposite 5 de Marzo Street- had been built. Even the first stone was put in March 1909, but the idea was stopped until 1933, when a contest of previous projects made by Aragonese sculptors and architects was announced. If the winner plan -made by Jesús Serrano- had been built, the square will look different today. Another failed initiative, - the monument to Costa- is an example that not always the wish to commemorate someone or something (present all along the 20th century) and pretending to remember past events and characters) is finally carried out. Stop to these initiatives were caused by different reasons, mainly economic and ideological; and, while some of them were only postponed, in other cases such as the above mentioned, they were not rethought.