LaSal, a Feminist Library-Bar in Barcelona. Feminine Empowerment and Visual Culture

Abstract

The aim of this article is to expand the geography of feminist art spaces of the seventies through a close analysis of the Spanish case of LaSal. In this feminist library-bar in Barcelona, a crea- tive search took place following the need for cultural reform of the second feminist movement. A er a historic reconstruction of this space, this article will analyse the development of new visual produc- tion seen predominantly in illustrations and comics, where women subverted the status that society had given them. e signi cance of the post-Franco context within which this speci c movement evolved, with in uences of Di erence Feminism from Mediterranean regions, lays on the fact that it o ers an alternative to North-American models of feminist art spaces. Finally, the article, which has been elaborated in conjunction with original eld research, proposes a renewed interpretation of separatist feminism throughout the seventies, and it highlights a speci c aspect of subversion that identi es LaSal as a heterotopic space.