In the summer of 1941, a modest flat in Barceloneta became much more than a home. Hidden among the narrow streets of the seaside neighborhood, it turned into a secret refuge and meeting point for a small group of young women determined to keep the ideals of freedom alive under Franco’s dictatorship.
That flat was known as “the Oasis.” And today, more than eighty years later, its story comes back to life through an immersive, sensorial exhibition that pays tribute to the courage and resilience of four anti-Franco activists — Soledad Real, Clara Pueyo, Isabel Imbert, and Maria Salvo.
Created by La Inefable and curated by the Associació Conèixer Història, the installation recreates the atmosphere of that clandestine space, where typewriters clattered through the night as bulletins were written, meetings held, and documents distributed to sustain the underground resistance. The rhythm of that typewriter, however, also betrayed them: alerted neighbors led to the women’s arrest in September 1941, marking the end of one of the first youth resistance cells in postwar Barcelona. Imprisoned and tortured, their struggle was nearly erased from memory — until now.
The Oasis invites visitors to experience that hidden history through light, sound, and texture, transforming the exhibition space into a sensorial time capsule. Beyond its aesthetic ambition, the project highlights the often-overlooked role of women in the anti-Franco struggle, reclaiming their voices from the margins of history and giving them the recognition long denied.
Presented at the Casa de la Barceloneta 1761, a small museum devoted to preserving the neighborhood’s seafaring and working-class heritage, the exhibition also reconnects the community with a silenced fragment of its own past — one woven from solidarity, fear, and extraordinary bravery.
Credits
Curators: Fernando Hernández Holgado, Oriol López Badell, and Toni Vidal Arnan
Documentation: Enric Segarra
Sensory installation: La Inefable (Giovanna Pezzullo, Stephane Laidet, and Nelson Jara)
Graphic design: Pol Pinto
Graphic production: COEVE Producció Creativa, Gràfiques Ortells
CB1761 team: Jesús Floro, Ricard Navarro, Cristina Cazorla, and Miquel Pauner
Archival documentation: General Archive of the Administration, Historical General Archive of Defense, Neus Català Foundation Archive, Personal Archive of Soledad Real López, Personal Archive of Maria Salvo Iborra, Pueyo Tartera Family Archive, presodelescorts.org
Acknowledgements: Associació Conèixer Història, ACMe, Neus Català Foundation, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Albert Pueyo Tartera (In memoriam 1936–2024), Josemi Lorenzo, Manuel Moreno
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Pictures on Flickr
Clipping
L’Oasi, by euromemories