Six cities around Barcelona - Hospitalet, Badalona, Terrassa, Sabadell, Mataró,
Santa Coloma de Gramenet - are among the ten most populated in Catalonia. But only Hospitalet and Santa Coloma have a
higher density than Barcelona,
compact city par excellence. The urbanistic chaos that characterises Santa Coloma de Gramanet is the direct result of real estate speculation and
political corruption:
persistent racism among some sectors of its population is the other side of overcrowding and impressive diversity of origins that defines the people of
Santako. But if in the beginning of the 20th century, those who rejected the immigrants from southern Spain settled in the
casas baratas at least could hold to their local origins and catalan speech, in the 21th century
those who promote boycott to arabics, chinese, latinamericans, romans of the city, are themselves - for the most part - second generation immigrants.
The video Mézquita no! (2005) describes the conflict around the opening of a mosque in the Singuerlin neighborhood.
We always liked this photo. In 2004, who is now the new mayor of Barcelona visited Bon Pastor neighborhood: this photo was taken in the casa barata of some friends (and informants) of ours. What is really interesting here is the presence, we might call it, of the different kind of people portrayed. The man on the right, the grandfather, the girl, look solid, real, strong. The politician in the middle seems like he was cut out and sticked on a scenario that doesn't fit him: it makes him feel unconfortable, like he didn't know how to behave. Some places make the power feel unconfortable; and the power - rightwing or leftwing, it's the same - tries by all means to wipe them out.