Passatge del Crèdit — Miró's Birthplace Alley

Passatge del Crèdit is a narrow 19th-century passageway off Carrer Ferran in Barcelona, famous as the birthplace and residence of surrealist artist Joan Miró at number four. Built between 1875 and 1879 by architect Magí Rius i Mulet on former Capuchin convent grounds, the passage features cast-iron pilasters and reddish stone facades. Miró was born at number four on April 20, 1893, and lived and worked there until 1956.

Barcelona · from the walk “Stones & Secrets: Hidden Courtyards of the Barri Gòtic” · audio ~3 min · Generated

Passatge del Crèdit 4, Barcelona

Which famous artist was born at Passatge del Crèdit in Barcelona?

Stop here. Look around you. You're standing in one of Barcelona's best-kept secrets... the Passatge del Crèdit. A narrow passageway, tucked just off the busy Carrer Ferran, hidden in plain sight from the thousands of tourists who walk past its entrance every single day.......... This elegant corridor was built between eighteen seventy-five and eighteen seventy-nine by architect Magi Rius i Mulet, right on the grounds of a demolished Capuchin convent. The passage takes its name from the Societat Catalana General del Crèdit, the building society that financed the residential blocks lining both sides. Notice the cast-iron pilasters, the reddish stone facades, the medallions above the arched entrance depicting Mercury and an allegory of America. This was aspirational nineteenth-century living... a private street for the rising bourgeoisie.......... But the real reason we're here? Look for the small plaque on the wall at number four. This is where Joan Miró was born on the twentieth of April, eighteen ninety-three. The man who would become one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century took his first breath right Here... in this quiet alley.......... His father, Miquel Miró, was a goldsmith and watchmaker. His grandfather, a blacksmith from Cornudella. His mother, Dolors Ferrà, was the daughter of a cabinet maker from Palma de Mallorca. A family of craftsmen, working with their hands for generations. And young Joan? He was a poor student at school but began drawing obsessively at the age of seven.......... Now here's where it gets dramatic. His father Refused to let him become an artist. So at fourteen, Miró was forced into business school while sneaking into art classes at La Llotja on the side. Eventually he took a job as an accounts clerk... and it nearly destroyed him. Can you imagine? The future inventor of surrealist dreamscapes, hunched over a ledger, adding columns of numbers? He suffered a complete nervous breakdown, followed by typhus. His parents finally relented and let him study art.......... And yet even Then, success didn't come easy. His first solo exhibition in nineteen eighteen, at the Galeries Dalmau here in Barcelona, was a Catastrophe. Not a single painting sold. Visitors actually Defaced his work to show their contempt.......... But Miró kept painting. He kept returning to this very address, living and working here at number four until nineteen fifty-six. And decades later, the boy from this hidden alley would donate a giant pavement mosaic to La Rambla, just steps from where you stand now... a gift to the city that once mocked his art. That mosaic, inaugurated in nineteen seventy-six, sits right at the Pla de l'ÓS, where millions of feet walk over it every year, most without even knowing the artist was born in this little passage around the corner.

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