The past few weeks have seen some interesting changes take place in ANOET, Spain’s national association of bullfight organisers.

At the end of January, a general meeting of ANOET members elected a new executive committee. The presidency of La Asociación Nacional de Organizadores de Espectáculos Taurinos remains in Plaza 1’s hands despite rumours of Simon Casas’s departure from that position in 2001, while Ramón Valencia (representing Pagés, empresa of Sevilla’s La Maestranza) and Óscar Martínez Chopera (Bilbao) continue as vice-presidents. The vocales consist of Ángel Bernal (Murcia), Antonio Barrera (FIT - Olivenza), José Cutiño (FIT - Badajoz), Nacho Lloret (Alicante) and Joaquín Domínguez (Zafra), together with Alberto García (Tauroemoción - Valladolid and other plazas), who has returned to the fold following his 2021 resignation from ANOET on the grounds that he didn’t agree with the organisation’s direction of travel.

The changes have come with the creation of a new vice-presidency representing 3rd and 4th class plazas, a position that has been taken up by Carmelo García (Sanlúcar de Barrameda, amongst other plazas), and the addition of two more vocales – Juan Bautista as a representative of French bullrings and Jesús Hijosa, the mayor of Villaseca de la Sagra, for his involvement in El Foro de la Defensa de las Novilladas.

It’s interesting that Casa Matilla, the rumoured capo de capo of the bullfighting world, has no direct representation on ANOET, which claims to represent over 90% of Spain’s 1st and 2nd class plazas and over 100 3rd and 4th class rings (its members put on over 1,600 festejos last year).

The meeting also decided to restructure ANOET internally by establishing a number of commissions and working groups, each with an executive committee representative, to consider several issues, being “conscious of the need to innovate and to focus especially on the problems faced by 3rd and 4th class plazas as a consequence of the economic crisis”.

ANOET’s objectives

Earlier this month, ANOET published its objectives for 2023:

1. To strengthen the Asociación by incorporating new members, increasing unity amongst empresas and becoming tauromaquia’s principal negotiator with institutional bodies.

2. To achieve improvements in professionals’ income.

3. To adopt measures that will avoid unfair competition for tenders of bullrings.

4. To study los reglamentos and actively participate in the reforms planned in the short term for some of these.

5. To work to improve the presence of bullfighting on free-to-air television channels.

6. To establish a plan that will help 3rd and 4th class bullrings avoid unfair competition and non-compliance with el convenio.

7. To strengthen ANOET’s role in speaking on behalf of empresas with public authorities.

8. To consolidate assistance to the Fundación del Toro de Lidia (FTL) in the defence of bullfighting.

The first of these objectives is an understandable aim for the organisation (although there could be some conflict with the role of the FTL) and should lead to the accomplishment of the third and seventh objectives.

The second objective is somewhat vague – which ‘professionals’ does ANOET have in mind? Usually in bullfighting’s context, the term refers to the toreros, although there’s no reason why the empresas shouldn’t regard themselves as professionals too, as well as some (if not all) ganaderos. If the term is supposed to refer to toreros, then the likelihood – unless the sector changes radically - is that this would involve higher ticket prices for spectators, which is not in bullfighting’s longterm interest. It can also be argued, given the wide range of matador earnings, that some toreros should receive more income, while others should receive less.

The fourth objective begs the question who is planning changes to the regulations in the short term? The only recent discussion (attempts to persuade changes being made to the puya and banderillas having, to date, come to naught) has been about returning to one set of national regulations, but this would require a Government initiative and at present there appears to be no political appetite for such involvement.

The fifth objective would involve an increase in empresas’ earnings as well as improving access to the corrida for the Spanish public – on paper, a win-win situation. It seems that the replacement of Movistar’s Canal Toros pay television channel as the main broadcaster of the leading ferias with OneToro’s subscription-based streaming service on mundotoro.tv could open the door to more free-to-air televising of corridas in Spain. This has already occurred with Plaza 1’s San Isidro agreement with Telemadrid. As ever, though, the mundillo should take care – televising corridas can affect same-day bullring attendance and, if poor bulls with shaved horns are shown in front of undemanding spectators, it can also present an image of bullfighting that acts against encouraging greater attendance at festejos or even the preservation of the spectacle.

The sixth objective presumably refers in part to the Convenio Colectivo Nacional Taurino, but, more generally, to the agreement I reported on last August when Hijosa’s Foro de Defensa de las Novilladas persuaded ANOET and a number of taurine trade unions to sign up to a 25% reduction in cuadrilla members’ nationally set earnings (which seemingly contradicts ANOET’s third objective). Otherwise, the intention was to ban the appearance of novilleros, jefes de cuadrillas and cuadrillas that do not meet the legal obligations of that convenio.

The eighth objective is a restatement of ANOET’s support for the FTL, although, as mentioned earlier, there is potentially some conflict between the two organisations – and, indeed, some existing conflict, as the FTL’s involvement in initiatives such as la Copa Chenel and the various circuitos de novilladas effectively involves a different model of being an empresa, one that involves the use of public subsidies, compared to ANOET’s privately funded activities.

The objectives as a whole beg the question as to whether these are what bullfighting really needs.

For bullfighting to have a prosperous future, for the spectacle to continue to have popular support, there needs to be a reduction in ticket prices. To facilitate this will require reductions in some toreros’ earnings and fewer administrative costs in putting on festejos (something which ANOET appears not to be campaigning for). There should be greater exploration of sponsorship opportunities and more variety in ticket prices, reflecting the quality and the costs of putting on each individual corrida. To encourage attendance at festejos, there needs to be greater coverage of bullfighting across mainstream media, coupled with improved marketing and publicity so that the general public have a better sense of how each temporada is progressing and who (in terms of both toreros and ganaderías) the local empresa is inviting them to see perform. There needs to be greater sector investment in novilladas in 3rd and 4th class plazas to ensure youngsters are always coming through and to foment interest in particular toreros. There also needs to be a decoupling of the empresa/apoderado relationship so that carteles are generally made up of the top performers, those toreros showing promise and those that have earned cult followings. Compared to these aspirations, although it is good to see a focus on minor ring novilladas and a willingness for dialogue with the French experience, the bulk of ANOET’s stated objectives are merely tinkering with the existing approach of putting on bullfights.

A rudderless ship

In a recent article, the taurine critic José Carlos Arévalo describes the bullfight sector as “a rudderless ship”. He points out that the sector is currently “a culture industry hybrid – most bullrings are publicly owned; ganaderías are private properties; bullfight empresarios are bidders to run bullrings on an interim basis; matadors are autonomous, free, individuals contracted by the empresas [perhaps Arévalo is being ironic here when so many of the top matadors are in the hands of empresa managers]; and their subalternos are temporarily employed people.” After emphasising the Spanish State’s role in not only owning bullrings but, despite being a non-participant, regulating festejos, Arévalo comments, “If other events, like sports, that attract the public were dealt with in a similar way, the respective federations would adopt a war footing.”

Although he recognises the State’s helpful role in the legislation of 2013 and 2015 that sought to protect bullfighting, Arévalo says that events in Barcelona and Gijón, where bullfighting no longer occurs - in the former case due to private sector inactivity, and in the latter because of a local authority that is unafraid to sanction the spectacle - show the State’s fragility and limitations as a guarantor of tauromaquia. Attacking, without naming them, both ANOET and the FTL, he goes on to say that the taurine sector “merely consists of various trade bodies whose only role is to defend the interests of their members. There is no organ, senior council or a federation of tauromaquia which could act as an official negotiator, representative of all the Fiesta’s sectors, with the State and its autonomous bodies; that could regulate and rationalise bullring tenders; have an effective Communications Department able to respond to anti-taurine tales and neutralise animalismo’s restless manoeuvrings; educates, brings together and disciplines corrida authorities; and which could draw up and promulgate the regulations that give order to the spectacle and govern the lidia.”