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Timeout at Jardins Walter Benjamin
Escape from busy city life at Walter Benjamin Gardens
The connection between Walter Benjamin and Barcelona seems to be quite random. So do these small gardens located next to Placa de la Carbonera. However, the missing link here is Catalonia itself, where Walter Benjamin died in 1940. He committed suicide in the small Catalan port town of Portbou being on the run from the Gestapo, Hitler’s Secret State Police. Walter Benjamin’s journey ended when he was denied an exit visa to the USA. The city of Barcelona dedicated these small gardens to him – Jardins Walter Benjamin.
Who was Walter Benjamin?
Walter Benjamin was born in Berlin and mainly associated with the German Frankfurt School. The Jewish essayist and literary critic Benjamin was friends with Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, he worked closely with them as a member of the Institute of Social Research at the University of Frankfurt am Main, Germany until the Nazis took over the power. Adorno and Horkheimer moved the Institute to New York in 1935. Two other important friends of Benjamin were the philosopher Gershom Scholem as well as writer Bertolt Brecht, who highly influenced Benjamin’s turn to Marxism in 1930. Beside Benjamin’s famous translations of Marcel Proust’s texts, his early papers were focused on his own language theory. Later on, Benjamin’s scripts had a slightly more culture critical approach such as one of his most famous essays “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”.
After the Nazis had taken over the power in Berlin, Walter Benjamin spent most of his time in Paris. When the Nazis reached the French border and Paris in 1940 he left France as a refugee trying to reach Portugal where he hoped to be able to flee to the United States. When the group of Jewish refugees Benjamin had joined were stopped by the Spanish police in Portbou, a small French-Spanish border town in the Pyrenees, Water Benjamin committed suicide in September 1940.
Benjamin’s works were completely reissued by Adorno when re-establishing the Institute of Social Research after WWII in the 1950′s in Frankfurt am Main. Today, Walter Benjamin’s essays are internationally recognised within media and cultural studies and are regarded as some of the most important essays of the 20th century.
Walter Benjamin Gardens – Graffiti wall
The small shady gardens are slightly hidden, but can be used for a little break when on the way to the Jardins de Joan Brossa. Ideas of moving through urban spaces and looking for a getaway were discussed by Benjamin in his “Notes on flanerie” (c.p. The Arcades Project). The primary route across the gardens is decorated with four small stone pyramids which represent the concept of pyramids as symbols of European tourism in the 19th century. Also, they represent distance which is one of the features that defines Walter Benjamin’s concept of “Aura”. There are benches and a small fountain in the middle of the Jardins. Other significant features are the colourful graffiti on the walls where the gardens are located. It can be seen whilst driving along Passeig de Josep Carner. Walter Benjamin Gardens is one of many places in Barcelona where nature meets urban culture. The graffiti on the walls at Jardins Walter Benjamin was done by some of the most recognised artists of the Barcelona Graffiti scene and regularly appears on all of Barcelona’s graffiti websites.
small gardens are very cute and could be well managed easily. we have 2 small gardens at home.”-’