"The idea of ??erecting a monument or a statue to the distinguished republican began to be considered in 1903 with the intention, even, of opening a popular subscription to defray the expenses that the work would bring with it. However, this issue was not discussed again until in January 1927 the editor of El Liberal D. Luis Rojas cried out in a newspaper article "Castelar does not have a monument in Seville!". But it would take another year for the enthusiasm for the politician and his sculpture to resurface.
In 1929, already counting on some donations, the sculptor Manuel Echegoyán, then a student at the Sevillian School of Arts and Crafts and Fine Arts, carried out a project supported by El Liberal, which published the photograph and a detailed description of it. No location had yet been considered.
The materials used were Monóvar stone, bronze for the bust of the politician and marble for the stairs at the base. The set was made up of a stone block, with a tripartite structure, whose central part, lower and topped by the bust of Castelar, bore a legend alluding to the abolition of slavery. The two lateral blocks served as a support for two allegorical figures, Justice and Eloquence. The very simple architectural structure, of pure volumes, and the sculptures are situated in a classical line in which architectural functionalism and a frequent humanist tendency in the visual arts of many Hispanic artists of that time are mixed. The set recalls, in its approach, the one carried out by Vitorio Macho as a tribute to Ramón y Cajal in Madrid's Retiro Park, inaugurated in 1926. The tripartite distribution, the purity and simplicity of lines and the cleanliness of volumes are the same, although the central part is resolved in a different way.
The monument to Castelar became a reality when, in 1930, it was decided to place it in the still unfinished garden of Cristina , in the corner facing the Puerta de Jerez. The modeling and casting works were carried out in the same Echegoyán workshop, despite the sculptor Joaquín Martín Ruiz having previously offered to carry it out without any interest.
Finally, on July 15 of that year, said construction was completed. 11,485.05 pesetas had been raised through public subscription. Once installed, a parterre made by the arboriculturist and flower grower JP Martín, supplier of the Royal House, was arranged in front of him, as an "exquisite work of garden goldsmithing". Subsequently, this small parterre that surrounds the monument had to undergo continuous repairs, like the rest of the garden, due to the damage caused by a certain public that shows an absolute lack of respect towards everything and everyone."
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The reliefs are the figures of the Justice and eloquence, an the textil that has in the middle.