FRANCISCO ANTÚNEZ MADRIGAL (1907-1980): The art of printing, books, and cultural promotion

The present work, Francisco Antúnez Madrigal (1907-1980). The art of printing, books, and cultural promotion, authored by Dr. Claudia Patricia Guajardo Garza, won the "Mexican Bibliology Series Award" convened by the Autonomous University of Aguascalientes in its "DeLibros" series, which aims to recognize excellence in research in the fields of history, book studies, and publishing in Mexico. This work is the product of a historical investigation aimed at reconstructing and examining, through written culture as an analytical category, some of the cultural endeavors of the printer Francisco Antúnez Madrigal during the period he lived in the city of Aguascalientes (1936-1980).
Antúnez Madrigal, owner of a printing press, not only exploited his workshop for commercial purposes but also, as part of an intellectual elite, used the written word, and specifically the book, as a tool for cultural promotion in the province. His training in the graphic arts, mostly empirical and self-taught, and the relationships he built throughout his life conditioned his initiatives and the way they were articulated with the sociocultural context. The research that gave rise to this book was based on a hypothesis that proposed that the activities related to research on printing, book manufacturing, and bibliographic promotion carried out by Francisco Antúnez Madrigal constituted a significant factor in promoting culture from the intellectual elite in Aguascalientes from the late 1940s until 1980.
This work consists of six chapters that do not follow a chronological order, but are structured based on criteria that give meaning and allow for the coverage of specific themes. Chapters I, II, III, and IV address broad and panoramic topics, while Chapters V and VI tackle more specific issues. The first chapter serves the purpose of situating this research in a historical context. The second chapter provides a general overview of the character in order to facilitate the approach to their cultural endeavors in the subsequent chapters. The third chapter provides an overview of the printing techniques of the mid-20th century to explain how books were manufactured with the presses and instruments of the time. The fourth chapter presents other facets of the character as a researcher of the printing press and a collector over a period of approximately fifty years. The fifth section, in addition to presenting the context that gave rise to the publication of the book "Primicias litográficas" by the engraver J. Guadalupe Posada, analyzes the materiality of the work: it offers some details about the production, from the conception of the idea and the technical processes involved to the decisions regarding format and distribution strategies. Finally, the sixth chapter narrates the creation of a modern and systematized public library in Aguascalientes.
The conclusion of this book brings together a series of reflections on the research process, private archives, the construction of history, the role of intellectuals, the book as a product emanating from the elites, among other topics.