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Emiliano Revilla
By h.b. - Mar 24, 2008 - 8:27 AM
ALSO SEE : • ANV party offices ordered to be closed in Portugalete - May 6, 2008 - 6:02 AM
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Emiliano Revilla - Archive Photo EFE
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An ETA kidnap victim turns to art
Just over two and a half years ago, an exhibition opened in Ólvega, a village in the northeast of Soria, 46 kilometres from the provincial capital. The pictures on show – more than 50 of them - were photocopies of the originals and were the work of the business magnate, Emiliano Revilla, a local man who was Mayor of Ólvega between 1960 and 1974.
All the work on show was produced in 1988, at a time when Revilla had never drawn or painted before – at least, not since his childhood – and 17 years later he was persuaded to exhibit them by the local Town Hall.

Emiliano Revilla was living in Madrid in 1988, and was met outside his home in the Plaza de Cristo Rey as he returned from work on the night of 24th February that year by four ETA terrorists. He was forced into a car at gunpoint and taken to a hiding place where he was to spend 249 days in captivity, the third longest kidnapping in the history of ETA terrorism. He was kept in a room below the garage of a property near Calle Arturo Soria, a residential area in the eastern part of the Spanish capital. It was a space which measured 2 metres long, 1 metre wide, and just 1.80 metres high. He said he only had a space of 2 metres by 40 centimetres in which to move.

He asked for a pen and paper to pass the time, and began to write his memoirs. He spoke of how he used to enjoy painting when he was at school, and his kidnappers decided to supply him with the materials to allow him to try his hand again. They gave him a sketchpad, a ruler and a rubber, and a box of coloured pencils. Much of what he produced over the coming months was inspired by pictures in Hola magazine, and out of date newspapers which his kidnappers allowed him to read. Others came from his imagination and from his memories of his family. Reporters who saw the exhibition in Ólvega said none of them depicted the ordeal of his captivity, just one sketch which shows the layout of the room where he was kept.
There are landscapes, a monkey dressed in a suit, scenes from bullfighting, the back view of a woman dressed in just a g-string, and …. lots of ties. One of the first things the businessman asked his wife when he was finally released was if she had the gold tie clip he had lost when he was forced into the car on that night in February.
He was reported saying at the exhibition, ‘I don’t know how I was able to do all this, how I could produce these shadows, these effects of light.’

Emiliano Revilla was set free on 30th October 1988 after 249 days in captivity. His family are believed to have paid more than one billion pesetas for his release – the equivalent of 6 million €. The businessman is said to have directed the financial operation to move the money himself, by sending instructions to his son via his kidnappers.
He was left near his home at 2 o’clock that morning, carrying a gift from the kidnappers – a fruit tart – along with the box of paintings which had kept his mind centred during those long months of captivity.
His release came just a few hours after the latest ETA murder, the National Policeman, Cristóbal Díaz García, who was killed in Bilbao on 29 October 1988. He was the fourth ETA victim that month, and the sixteenth victim to have died during Emiliano Revilla’s 249 days in captivity.


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