Gaudí Centenary. On June 7, 1926, the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, creator of the Sagrada Família, was struck in Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes. This happened directly in front of what is now our dojo, the Zen Kannon Temple on Gran Via. As a result of his injuries, he died three days later at the Hospital de la Santa Creu.
This event, so meaningful to us, led us to request the installation of a commemorative plaque or sculpture at the exact site of the tragic event. We did so during the year marking the Gaudí Centenary. Through Coreixample, the proposal reached the district council and was unanimously approved by all political parties.
We felt the need to remember and honor this moment through a living and shared action. Gaudí was not only a genius of architecture, but also a man deeply devoted to his work, with a spiritual vision of labor and beauty. His life, marked by dedication, simplicity, and perseverance, resonates with the spirit of Zen practice: building with attention, inhabiting the present, and giving form to emptiness.
Gaudí Centenary Tribute Meditation on the Morning of June 7
For this reason, during the Gaudí Centenary year, the practitioners of Zen Kannon held a meditation in the street. We gathered at the exact place where Gaudí was struck, as a gesture of remembrance, respect, and presence. It was an open practice, held in silence amid the life of the city, transforming the ordinary urban space for a few moments into a place of contemplation and historical memory.
Unveiling of the plaque at the site where Antoni Gaudí was struck, on the centenary of his death.
At 6:00 p.m., at the exact time when Gaudí was struck, the official unveiling ceremony of the plaque took place. Present at the event were the councillor for the Eixample district, the Director General of Heritage of the Government of Catalonia, the commissioner of the Gaudí Year, the president of Coreixample, a representative of the Sagrada Família Neighbourhood Association, and Lluís Nansen, representing Zen Kannon, the organization that promoted the plaque.
The various speeches were interspersed with performances by the Esbart Gaudí dance group. Nansen was entrusted with reading aloud the Judicial Writ of Case No. 339, dated June 11, 1926. In it, the judge summoned witnesses to testify in order to determine whether Gaudí had been struck by a tram or by an automobile.
The ceremony attracted a much larger audience than the organizers had expected, and by the end of the event the plaque was already covered with flowers and candles. The plaque has become a place of remembrance and veneration, a space dedicated to preserving the memory of and paying tribute to the spirit of Gaudí.
Video explaining how Natàlia discovered it.
Explanation by Xavier Llobet of Coreixample during the unveiling ceremony of the commemorative plaque honoring Antoni Gaudí at the site where he was struck on June 7, 1926. The site of the accident, where the plaque was installed on June 7, 2026, is located at 665 Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes, directly in front of what is now the Zen Kannon meditation center. Xavier of Coreixample explains how Natàlia of Zen Kannon discovered the location and initiated the process that led to the installation of the plaque.
Video of Nansen’s participation in the ceremony of Gaudí Centenary
Video of the unveiling ceremony of the commemorative plaque honoring Antoni Gaudí at the site where he was struck on June 7, 1926. As one of the promoters of the plaque, Lluís Nansen was entrusted with reading the judicial summons dated June 11, 1926.
The site of the accident, where the plaque was installed on June 7, 2026, is located at 665 Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes. This is directly in front of what is now the Zen Kannon meditation center.