In 1950, the broadcasting of the most famous radio advice programme during the Franco regime began: Elena Francis' Consultorio para la mujer (Agony aunt for women). Many women who were distraught about their personal problems wrote in to the programme, seeking the advice and consolation of Elena Francis, who nevertheless took the opportunity to reply to them with exhortations, admonitions and warnings in keeping with the principles of the most fundamentalist Catholic morality, thus following the fundamental principles of a regime that above all was recognised as National Catholic.

This exhibition brings together a selection of those replies with the aim of showing different facets of the policy of female submission that Francoism undertook from its beginning. A policy whereby women were subordinate to their husbands, limited to housewife chores with no personal or professional autonomy and, moreover, with virtually no individual rights or legal recognition.

The texts of the letters have been extracted from the book
Las cartas de Elena Francis. Una educación sentimental bajo el franquismo
(The Letters of Elena Francis. A Sentimental Education under Francoism),
by Armand Balsebre and Rosario Fontova (Cátedra, 2018)