Symbolism  of the space

This art installation is located on the north-east side of the corner of Carrer d'Europa and Carrer Joan Güell. It is made up of six breakwater stones from  different places around Spain, five informational totems four totems with lighting, inscriptions on the pavement and a weathering steel plate that recreates the perimeter of the prison, as well as a low basalt wall with the dates when the correctional centre was open.

The six breakwater stones from around Spain are a key part of the project that symbolise the diverse, dispersed origins of all the women prisoners. Next to each stone,  inscriptions describe what the Les Corts Women’s Prison used to be and provide  geological information on the origin of the stones.

The Les Corts women's prison

The Les Corts women’s prison was opened in 1936, and during the war,  and women with right-wing ideologies and POUM members were imprisoned there. After the war, between 1939 and 1955, it was a place of repression and imprisonment of women, many of them for political reasons. Eleven women prisons were shot and killed in the Camp de la Bota during this period. The prison closed in 1955 after the women from the religious order that ran the prison managed to exchange the property. The area changed quickly, leaving no traces of the prison.