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Valencia’s Municipal Falla ‘Hope’ Rises as Anti-War Chaplin Monument

A parallel merchandise drive channels proceeds to Incliva for pediatric lymphoma research.

Overview

  • The city’s out-of-competition monument is now on display in Plaza del Ayuntamiento and is scheduled to burn in the Cremà on March 19.
  • At roughly 27 meters tall with a €239,000 budget, the municipal piece is funded by Valencia City Hall.
  • The work depicts Chaplin’s soldier from the 1918 film Shoulder Arms holding a butterfly as a chain of flowers neutralizes his rifle beneath the word “Hope.”
  • Artists Vicente Llácer and Alejandro Santaeulalia, with design by José Santaeulalia, present the installation as an explicit call for peace.
  • The creators say the concept was unveiled in 2025 and call its overlap with the recent Middle East escalation a coincidence, while the linked campaign sells items to fund Incliva’s pediatric non-Hodgkin lymphoma research.