Font de Carmen Amaya: The Dancer from the Shacks
Why is it significant?
Find the fountain in this quiet little square close to the promenade, with children playing around it and the sound of the waves just beyond the buildings. It is easy to walk past without noticing.
Key Facts
| Place | Font de Carmen Amaya: The Dancer from the Shacks |
|---|---|
| Address | Plaça de Brugada, 08003 Barcelona, Spain |
| Geo Coordinates | 41.37980, 2.19240 |
| Part of Walk | Barceloneta and the Sea: Barcelona's Fishermen, Bombas and Beaches |
| Generated | Generated |
Find the fountain in this quiet little square close to the promenade, with children playing around it and the sound of the waves just beyond the buildings. It is easy to walk past without noticing. But it is dedicated to one of the greatest flamenco dancers who ever lived, and she was born a few hundred metres from here, in a shack on the sand.
Her name was Carmen Amaya. She came from a Gitano family living in the Somorrostro, a shanty town of huts and shacks that stretched along the beach north of Barceloneta. Her father played the guitar in the taverns, and as a small girl she danced for coins for the diners, barefoot, fierce, already astonishing.
What made her famous was something no one had seen before in a woman: she danced with the speed and the hammering footwork that were traditionally reserved for men, often in trousers, with a power that people compared to a storm. She left Spain, triumphed in Buenos Aires and New York, danced at Carnegie Hall, appeared in Hollywood films, and is said to have performed for President Roosevelt at the White House.
Meanwhile the Somorrostro went on, home to thousands of people, many of them migrants from the south of Spain, with no running water and no protection from the winter storms. In 1966 the shacks were finally demolished and the families rehoused in new estates on the edge of the city. Carmen Amaya had died a few years earlier, in 1963, still a legend. Today the stretch of sand where the huts stood is called Platja del Somorrostro, so at least the name has stayed.
Stand still for a second and you might imagine it: the guitar, the clapping, a tiny girl beating the boards of a tavern floor while the fishermen eat. Now go back to the promenade and continue north-east, with the sea on your right, towards a tall brick water tower and the beach that kept the shanty town's name.