The Model opens to reveal the black history of Barcelona
A new “museum” has been born in Barcelona: La Modelo. Like in the movie The Rock, citizens can visit the interior of the former prison located in the heart of the Eixample and feel, for a moment, the deprivation of freedom, when they are momentarily isolated between the entrance gate, already closed, and the one that gives access to the inside of the prison, which takes a few seconds to open. However, unlike the famous San Francisco prison, this new attraction has an expiration date, November 26th, the last day to visit the exhibition “La Modelo speaks to us. 113 years. 13 stories”.
The exhibition has generated so much anticipation that registrations to visit La Modelo over the coming months have already sold out, as announced by the Ministry of Justice of the Generalitat. This enormous response should not surprise us, since the history of Barcelona over the last 113 years cannot be explained without the history of a prison that was built in 1904 on the outskirts of the city and ended up being engulfed by its growth, placing it right in the center of the Eixample district.
Until its definitive closure on June 8, the prison has witnessed the most violent events of the city; the Tragic Week, the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, the Francoist repression, and the social issues of the 1980s with the rise of heroin as an escape route, among others.
The exhibition recovers, through themed cells, the memory of 13 inmates who encapsulate the history of the city: political prisoners like Francisco Ferrer i Guardia and Lluís Companys, anarchists such as Salvador Seguí and Salvador Puig Antich, or common criminals, like Juan José Moreno Cuenca, “El Vaquilla”, who led a riot in 1984 to demand heroin supply. A special mention is deserved for the visit to the cell of “La Gilda”, the alias of A.R., a 24-year-old bartender who was arrested in 1955 for being homosexual.
The first day of visits took place on July 3rd. At that time, 750 lucky individuals were able to witness the film Salvador, which explains the story and the trial that led to Puig Antich's death sentence, an execution that was carried out in the same prison and represented the last in the history of our country. After the screening, attendees of the exhibition were able to see cell 443 where he spent his last days and the room where he was executed by garrote vil on March 2, 1974.
Among the registered visitors, many neighbors from Nova Esquerra del Eixample, who have fought for years for the closure of La Modelo, have finally seen their longstanding demand met. The Barcelona City Council, the current owner of the premises, has not yet specified what uses it will give to the site, although it has advanced that there will be a green area and public facilities for the neighborhood. The solution will come in December, when the Generalitat will definitively hand over the keys to a site that is key to understanding the evolution of Barcelona during the 20th century.
