Bookstores have long ceased to be static spaces for selling books to become cultural centers where to meet with neighbors to think about a different world. Few for this as La Prole, an alternative bookstore if ever there was one and an authentic meeting point for Sant Antonique now fears its closure.
The bookstore, a pioneer in the diffusion of transfeminist and decolonial literature, apart from a great space for second-hand books, is now trying to stay alive. To do so , they have launched a crowdfunding campaign to save a key bookstore for the city.
Why is La Prole important?
La Prole started a few years ago when Ana Navío took over the old Catalán chess bookstore and publishing house, which had been closed for two years but had been operating since the 1950s or 1960s.
Navío turned the space into a bookstore focused on transfeminist and decolonial literature, as well as selling a good number of second-hand books. She also organized vermouths and presentations, making the bookstore a cultural hub for the neighborhood.
Now, a few years later, Ana is no longer strong enough to lead the project alone, so a group of artists has joined the project to keep alive its essence as a neighborhood and alternative bookstore, but also turning it into an authentic cultural cooperative.
How to help La prole?
In the group that now pilots La Prole there are a dozen artists and book lovers, who have been joined by a dozen other entities or various projects that do not want the space to die. To do so, they want it to become a social space where they can meet to create and develop various publishing and cultural projects.
This translates into book presentations, literary vermouths, DJ sessions and all kinds of events, but also to become a sort of “workplace” for publishers, cultural mediators or artists working in areas such as AI.
To achieve this, the bookstore has opened a sponsorship campaign in Goteo that closes its first phase on April 13 but will remain active until April 27, with the intention of raising funds to launch the feasibility project that the bookstore is designing with Tàndem Social, a business strategy consultant for such projects.
By the way , the bookstore will open two stands for Sant Jordi. One in the same premises (Comte Borrell, 100) and another in the Sant Jordi of Avinguda Mistral, selling books with which you can also support their cause.