VIRTUAL Barcelona
Abstract
The urban center of El Raval in Barcelona has been the subject of many studies and controversies. My talk aims to explore the social and cultural housing landscape of this rich community through different urban planning approaches proposed to it in combination with a close-reading perspective from the Visual Arts. In particular, I look at three key moments in thinking about inhabiting El Raval: the 1930s Republic right before the Spanish Civil War, with the hygienist plans of the GATCPAC, the “democratic transition” of the 1970s after years of dictatorship, and the turn of the century as the Olympic Games challenged urban conceptions of the city and the so-called Barcelona Model was in its peak. In them, I examine the artistic work of women photographers Margaret Michaelis, Carme García, and Anna Boyé and the documentary film En construcción (2001) by Catalan filmmaker Jose Luís Guerín to scrutinize the ways in which the conceived, perceived, and lived space, following Henri Lefebvre’s famous triad, affect housing configurations within the intersections of urbanism and the visual arts. I contend that artistic representations and spatial practices challenge often overviewed conceptions of what does inhabiting a space implies especially as residential buildings lie in precarious state or almost in a ruined state.
Laura Menéndez Gorina is a Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University, where she teaches Iberian and Latin American cultures, literature, and arts. She specializes in modern literature, photography, and film, with a focus on Catalan Studies and Transatlantic connections between Cuba and the Iberian Peninsula. Her research also engages with Gender Studies and intersections between Urbanism and Arts. In her dissertation, “Inhabited Ruins,” Laura questions representations of homes within construction, destruction, and reconstruction processes that the two cities have undergone from the 19th century onwards.