Culture of Argentina
Encyclopedia
The culture of Argentina
is as varied as the country's geography
and mix of ethnic groups. Modern Argentine culture has been largely influenced by European immigration although there are lesser elements of Amerindian and African influences, particularly in the fields of music and art. Buenos Aires, its cultural capital, is largely characterized by both the prevalence of people of European descent, and of conscious imitation of European styles in architecture
. Museums, cinemas and galleries are abundant in all the large urban centers, as well as traditional establishments such as literary bars, or bars offering live music of a variety of genres.
Argentine writer Ernesto Sabato
has reflected on the nature of the culture of Argentina as follows:
can be said to start at the beginning of the Spanish colonisation, though it was in the 18th century that the cities of the country reached their splendour. Cities like Córdoba
, Salta
, Mendoza
, and also Buenos Aires
conserved most their historical Spanish colonial architecture in spite of their urban growth.
The simplicity of the Rioplatense
baroque style can be clearly appreciated in Buenos Aires, in the works of Italian architects such as André Blanqui and Antonio Masella, in the churches of San Ignacio
, Nuestra Señora del Pilar, the Cathedral and the Cabildo
.
Italian and French influences increased after the wars for independence
at the beginning of the 19th century, though the academic style persisted until the first decades of the 20th century. Attempts at renovation took place during the second half of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th, when the European tendencies penetrated into the country, reflected in numerous important buildings of Buenos Aires, such as the Santa Felicitam Church by Ernesto Bunge; the Central Post Office
and Palace of Justice
, by Norbert Maillart; and the National Congress and the Colón Opera House, by Vittorio Meano
.
The architecture of the second half of the 20th century continued adapting French neoclassical architecture
, such as the headquarters of the National Bank of Argentina
and the NH Gran Hotel Provincial
, built by Alejandro Bustillo
, and the Museo de Arte Hispano Fernández Blanco, by Martín Noel.
Numerous Argentine architects have enriched their own country's cityscapes and, in recent decades, those around the world. Juan Antonio Buschiazzo
helped popularize Beaux-Arts architecture and Francisco Gianotti
combined Art Nouveau
with Italianate styles, each adding flair to Argentine cities during the early 20th century. Francisco Salamone
and Viktor Sulĉiĉ
left an Art Deco
legacy, and Alejandro Bustillo
created a prolific body of Rationalist architecture. Clorindo Testa
introduced Brutalist architecture
locally and César Pelli
's and Patricio Pouchulu
's Futurist
creations have graced cities, worldwide. Pelli's 1980s throwbacks to the Art Deco glory of the 1920s, in particular, made him one of the world's most prestigious architects.
, in 1917 and 1918. Argentine cinema
enjoyed a 'golden age' in the 1930s through the 1950s with scores of productions, many now considered classics of Spanish-language film. The industry produced actors who became the first movie stars of Argentine cinema, often tango performers such as Libertad Lamarque
, Floren Delbene
, Tito Lusiardo
, Tita Merello
, Roberto Escalada
and Hugo del Carril
.
More recent films from the "New Wave" of cinema since the 1980s have achieved worldwide recognition, such as The Official Story
(Best foreign film oscar in 1986), Man Facing Southeast
, A Place in the World
, Nine Queens, Son of the Bride
, The Motorcycle Diaries
, Blessed by Fire
, and The Secret in Their Eyes, winner of the 2009 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
. Although rarely rivaling Hollywood
productions in popularity, local films are released weekly and widely followed in Argentina and internationally. A number of local films, many of which are low-budget productions, have earned prizes in cinema festivals (such as Cannes
), and are promoted by events such as the Mar del Plata Film Festival
and the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema
.
The per capita number of screens is one of the highest in Latin America, and viewing per capita is the highest in the region. A new generation of Argentine directors has caught the attention of critics worldwide. Cinema is an important facet of local culture, as well as a popular pastime, and levels of cinema attendance are comparable to those of European countries. Argentine composers Luis Enrique Bacalov, Gustavo Santaolalla
and Eugenio Zanetti
have been honored with Academy Award for Best Original Score
nods. Lalo Schifrin
has received numerous Grammys and is best known for the Mission:Impossible theme.
s and comics creators have contributed prominently to national culture, including Alberto Breccia
, Dante Quinterno
, Oski
, Francisco Solano López, Horacio Altuna
, Guillermo Mordillo
, Roberto Fontanarrosa
, whose grotesque characters captured life's absurdities with quick-witted commentary, and Quino
, known for the soup-hating Mafalda
and her comic strip
gang of childhood friends.
creations, which include empanada
s (a stuffed pastry), locro
(a mixture of corn, beans, meat, bacon, onion, and gourd), humita
s and yerba mate
, all originally indigenous Amerindian staples, the latter considered Argentina's national beverage. Other popular items include chorizo
(a spicy sausage), facturas (Viennese-style
pastry) and Dulce de Leche
, a sort of milk caramel
jam.
The Argentine barbecue, asado
as well as a parrillada, includes various types of meats, among them chorizo, sweetbread
, chitterlings
, and morcilla (blood sausage
). Thin sandwiches, sandwiches de miga
, are also popular. Argentines have the highest consumption of red meat
in the world.
The Argentine wine
industry, long among the largest outside Europe, has benefited from growing investment since 1992; in 2007, 60% of foreign investment worldwide in viticulture
was destined to Argentina. The country is the fifth most important wine producer in the world, with the annual per capita consumption of wine among the highest. Malbec grape, a discardable varietal in France (country of origin), has found in the Province of Mendoza an ideal environment to successfully develop and turn itself into the world's best Malbec
. Mendoza accounts for 70% of the country's total wine production. "Wine tourism" is important in Mendoza province, with the impressive landscape of the Cordillera de Los Andes and the highest peak in the Americas, Mount Aconcagua, 6952 m (22,808 ft) high, providing a very desirable destination for international tourism.
of provinces based on rural conservatism) and the Unitarians (pro-liberalism and advocates of a strong central government that would encourage European immigration), set the tone for Argentine literature of the time.
The ideological divide between gaucho epic Martín Fierro
by José Hernández, and Facundo by Domingo Faustino Sarmiento
, is a great example. Hernández, a federalist, was opposed to the centralizing, modernizing and Europeanizing tendencies. Sarmiento wrote in support of immigration as the only way to save Argentina from becoming subject to the rule of a small number of dictatorial caudillo
families, arguing such immigrants would make Argentina more modern and open to Western European influences and therefore a more prosperous society.
Argentine literature of that period was fiercely nationalist. It was followed by the modernist
movement, which emerged in France in the late 19th century, and this period in turn was followed by vanguardism
, with Ricardo Güiraldes
as an important reference. Jorge Luis Borges
, its most acclaimed writer, found new ways of looking at the modern world in metaphor and philosophical debate and his influence has extended to writers all over the globe. Borges is most famous for his works in short stories such as Ficciones
and The Aleph.
Some of the nation's notable writers, poets and intellectuals include: Juan Bautista Alberdi
, Roberto Arlt
, Enrique Banchs
, Adolfo Bioy Casares
, Silvina Bullrich
, Eugenio Cambaceres
, Julio Cortázar
, Esteban Echeverría
, Leopoldo Lugones
, Eduardo Mallea
, Ezequiel Martínez Estrada
, Tomás Eloy Martínez
, Victoria Ocampo
, Manuel Puig
, Ernesto Sabato
, Osvaldo Soriano
, Alfonsina Storni
and María Elena Walsh
.
), is Argentina's musical symbol. The Milonga
dance was a predecessor, slowly evolving into modern tango. By the 1930s, tango had changed from a dance-focused music to one of lyric and poetry, with singers such as Carlos Gardel
, Hugo del Carril
, Roberto Goyeneche
, Raúl Lavié
, Tita Merello
and Edmundo Rivero
. The golden age of tango (1930 to mid-1950s) mirrored that of Jazz
and Swing in the United States, featuring large orchestral groups too, like the bands of Osvaldo Pugliese
, Anibal Troilo
, Francisco Canaro
, Julio de Caro
and Juan D'Arienzo
. Incorporating acoustic music
and later, synthesizers into the genre after 1955, bandoneon
virtuoso Ástor Piazzolla
popularized "new tango"
creating a more subtle, intellectual and listener-oriented trend. Today tango enjoys worldwide popularity; ever-evolving, neo-tango is a global phenomenon with renown groups like Tanghetto
, Bajofondo and the Gotan Project
.
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Argentine rock
, called rock nacional, is the most popular music among youth. Arguably the most listened form of Spanish-language rock, its influence and success internationally owes to a rich, uninterrupted development. Bands such as Soda Stereo
or Sumo
, and composers like Charly García
, Luis Alberto Spinetta
, and Fito Páez
are referents of national culture. Mid-1960s Buenos Aires and Rosario were cradles of the music and by 1970, Argentine rock was well established among middle class youth (see Almendra, Sui Generis
, Pappo
, Crucis). Seru Giran
bridged the gap into the 1980s, when Argentine bands became popular across Latin America and elsewhere (Enanitos Verdes, Fabulosos Cadillacs, Virus
, Andrés Calamaro
). There are many sub-genres: underground, pop-oriented and some associated with the working class (La Renga
, Attaque 77
, Divididos
, Hermética
, V8 and Los Redonditos
). Current popular bands include: Babasonicos
, Rata Blanca
, Horcas
, Attaque 77, Bersuit, Los Piojos
, Intoxicados
, Catupecu Machu
, Carajo
and Miranda!
.
European classical music is well represented in Argentina. Buenos Aires is home to the world-renowned Colón Theater
. Classical musicians, such as Martha Argerich
, Eduardo Alonso-Crespo
, Daniel Barenboim
, Eduardo Delgado
and Alberto Lysy
, and classical composers such as Juan José Castro
and Alberto Ginastera
are internationally acclaimed. All major cities in Argentina have impressive theaters or opera houses, and provincial or city orchestras. Some cities have annual events and important classical music festivals like Semana Musical Llao Llao
in San Carlos de Bariloche
and the multitudinous Amadeus in Buenos Aires.
Argentine folk music is uniquely vast. Beyond dozens of regional dances, a national folk style emerged in the 1930s. Perón
's Argentina would give rise to Nueva Canción
, as artists began expressing in their music objections to political themes. Atahualpa Yupanqui
, the greatest Argentine folk musician, and Mercedes Sosa
would be defining figures in shaping Nueva Canción, gaining worldwide popularity in the process. The style found a huge reception in Chile, where it took off in the 1970s and went on to influence the entirety of Latin American music
. Today, Chango Spasiuk
and Soledad Pastorutti
have brought folk back to younger generations. Leon Gieco
's folk-rock bridged the gap between Argentine folklore and Argentine rock, introducing both styles to millions overseas in successive tours.
. Immigrants like Eduardo Schiaffino
, Eduardo Sívori
, Reynaldo Giudici, Emilio Caraffa
and Ernesto de la Cárcova
left behind a realist heritage influential to this day.
Impressionism
did not make itself evident among Argentine artists until after 1900, however, and never acquired the kind of following it did in Europe, though it did inspire influential Argentine post-impressionists
such as Martín Malharro
, Ramón Silva
, Cleto Ciocchini, Fernando Fader
, Pío Collivadino
, Cesáreo Bernaldo de Quirós
, Realism
and aestheticism continued to set the agenda in Argentine painting and sculpture, noteworthy during this era for the sudden fame of sculptor Lola Mora
, a student of Auguste Rodin
's.
As Lola Mora had been until she fell out of favor with local high society, monumental sculptors became in very high demand after 1900, particularly by municipal governments and wealthy families, who competed with each other in boasting the most evocative mausolea
for their dearly departed. Though most preferred French and Italian sculptors, work by locals Erminio Blotta
, Ángel María de Rosa
and Rogelio Yrurtia
resulted in a proliferation of soulful monuments and memorials made them immortal. Not as realist as the work of some of his belle-époque predecessors in sculpture, Yrurtia's subtle impressionism inspired Argentine students like Antonio Pujía
, whose internationally prized female torsos always surprise admirers with their whimsical and surreal touches, while Pablo Curatella Manes
' sculptures drew from cubism.
Becoming an intellectual, as well as artistic circle, painters like Antonio Berni
, Lino Enea Spilimbergo
and Juan Carlos Castagnino
were friends as well as colleagues, going on to collaborate on masterpieces like the ceiling at the Galerias Pacifico
arcade in Buenos Aires, towards 1933.
As in Mexico and elsewhere, muralism became increasingly popular among Argentine artists. Among the first to use his drab surroundings as a canvas was Benito Quinquela Martín
, whose vaguely cubist pastel-colored walls painted in his Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca
during the 1920s and 1930s have become historical monuments and Argentine cultural emblems, worldwide. Lithographs, likewise, found a following in Argentina some time after they had been made popular elsewhere. In Argentina, artists like Adolfo Bellocq
used this medium to portray often harsh working conditions in Argentina's growing industrial sector, during the 1920s and 1930s. Antonio Seguí
, another lithographer, transferred his naïve style into murals in numerous nations, as did Ricardo Carpani
, though in a realist style.
The vanguard in culturally conservative Argentina, futurists
and cubists
like Xul Solar
and Emilio Pettoruti
earned a following as considerable as that of less abstract and more sentimental portrait and landscape painters, like Raúl Soldi
. Likewise, traditional abstract
artists such as Romulo Macció
, Anselmo Piccoli
, Eduardo Mac Entyre
, Luis Felipe Noé
and Luis Seoane
coexisted with equal appeal as the most conceptual mobile art creators such as the unpredictable Pérez Celis
, Gyula Kosice
of the Argentine Madí Movement and Marta Minujín
, one of Andy Warhol
's most esteemed fellow Conceptual art
ists.
The emergence of avant-garde genres in Argentine sculpture also featured Pablo Curatella Manes
and Roberto Aizenberg
, and constructivist
s such as Nicolás García Uriburu
and Leon Ferrari
, one of the world's foremost artists in his genre, today. In the 1960s and 1970s, many of these figures' abstract art found their way into popular advertising and even corporate logos.
Generally possessing of a strong sentimental streak, the Argentine public's taste for naïve art and simple pottery cannot be overlooked. Since Prilidiano Pueyrredón's day, artists in the naïve vein like Cándido López
have captured the absurdity of war, Susana Aguirre and Aniko Szabó the idiosyncrasies of everyday neighborhoods, Guillermo Roux
's watercolors, a circus atmosphere, and Gato Frías, childhood memories. Illustrator Florencio Molina Campos
's tongue-in-cheek depictions of gaucho
life have endured as collectors' items.
To help showcase Argentine and Latin American art and sculpture, local developer and art collector Eduardo Constantini
set aside a significant portion of his personal collection and, in 1998, began construction on Buenos Aires' first major institution specializing in works by Latin American artists. His foundation opened the Buenos Aires Museum of Latin American Art (MALBA)
in 2001.
, played with a six-handle ball on horseback, but the most popular sport is association football. The national football team
has won 25 major international titles including two FIFA World Cup
s, two Olympic gold medals and fourteen Copa América
s. Over one thousand Argentine players play abroad, the majority of them in European football leagues. There are 331,811 registered football players, with increasing numbers of girls and women, who have organized their own national championships since 1991 and were South American champions in 2006.
The Argentine Football Association
(AFA) was formed in 1893 and is the eighth oldest national football association in the world. The AFA today counts 3,377 football clubs, including 20 in the Premier Division. Since the AFA went professional in 1931, fifteen teams have won national tournament titles, including River Plate
with 33 and Boca Juniors
with 24. Over the last twenty years, futsal and beach soccer have become increasingly popular. The Argentine beach football team was one of four competitors in the first international championship for the sport, in Miami, in 1993.
Basketball is the second most popular sport; a number of basketball players play in the U.S. National Basketball Association
and European leagues including Manu Ginóbili
, Andrés Nocioni
, Carlos Delfino
, Luis Scola
and Fabricio Oberto
. The men's national basketball team won Olympic gold in the 2004 Olympics
and the bronze medal in 2008
. Argentina is currently ranked first by the International Basketball Federation
. Argentina has an important rugby union football
team, "Los Pumas
", with many of its players playing in Europe. Argentina beat host nation France
twice in the 2007 Rugby World Cup
, placing them third in the competition. The Pumas are currently eighth in the official world rankings
. Other popular sports include field hockey (particularly amongst women
), tennis, auto racing, boxing, volleyball, polo and golf.
The Vamos vamos Argentina
chant is a trademark of Argentine fans during sporting events.
is synonymous with the art. It is thought of as 'the street that never sleeps' and sometimes referred to as the Broadway of Buenos Aires. Many great careers in acting, music, and film have begun in its many theaters. The Teatro General San Martín
is one of the most prestigious along Corrientes Avenue and the Teatro Nacional Cervantes
functions as the national stage theater of Argentina. The Teatro Argentino de La Plata
, El Círculo in Rosario
, Independencia
in Mendoza and Libertador
in Córdoba are also prominent. Griselda Gambaro
, Copi
, Roberto Cossa
, Marco Denevi
, Carlos Gorostiza
, and Alberto Vaccarezza
are a few of the more prominent Argentine playwrights. Julio Bocca
, Jorge Donn
, José Neglia
and Norma Fontenla
are some of the great ballet dancers of the modern era.
Argentine theatre traces its origins to Viceroy Juan José de Vértiz y Salcedo
's creation of the colony's first comedy theatre (La Ranchería) in 1783. This development was complemented by the 1804 opening of the Teatro Coliseo in Buenos Aires, the nation's longest-continuously operating stage. The musical creator of the Argentine National Anthem, Blas Parera
, earned fame as a theatre score writer during the early 19th century. The genre suffered during the regime of Juan Manuel de Rosas
, though it flourished alongside the economy later in the century. The national government gave Argentine theatre its initial impulse with the establishment of the Colón Theatre in 1857, which hosted classical and operatic as well as stage performances. Antonio Petalardo's successful 1871 gambit on the opening of the Teatro Opera
inspired others to fund the growing art in Argentina.
The 1874 murder of Juan Moreira
, a persecuted troubadour
, provided dramatists with a new hero. Possessing all the elements of tragedy
, the anecdote inspired Eduardo Gutiérrez
's 1884 play Juan Moreira and the work made the gaucho
the inspiration for the Argentine stage in subsequent years. Spanish literature
began to overtake the gaucho following the 1897 relocation to Argentina of Spanish theatre producer María Guerrero
and her company, who popularized professional stage theatre in the country. Making the Teatro Odeón
a nerve center for the medium, her evolved stagecraft
led to the creation of the national stage, the Cervantes Theatre
, in 1921.
The wave of European Immigration in Argentina created a need for a cultural shift in theatre addressed by Florencio Sánchez
, a pioneer in professional theater locally and in Uruguay
. Local color became the primary inspiration for Roberto Arlt
, Gregorio de Laferrère
, Armando Discépolo, Antonio Cunill Cabanellas
and Roberto Payró
during the 1920s and 1930s, while also helping amateur theatre
revive locally. The Teatro Independiente movement created a counterwight to professional theatre and inspired a new generation of young dramatists in this vein such as Copi
, Agustín Cuzzani
, Osvaldo Dragún
and Carlos Gorostiza
.
Gorostiza and other self-trained dramatists also popularized Realism in the Argentine theatre after 1950, a genre advanced by Ricardo Halac, Roberto Cossa
and among others. Griselda Gambaro
and Eduardo Pavlovsky popularized the theatre of the absurd
in Argentina after 1960, a genre that found local variant in the grotesque
works of Julio Mauricio and Roberto Cossa, whose La Nona became an iconic character in the Argentine theatre in 1977.
Argentina's last dictatorship
posed the greatest challenge to the development of local theatre since the Rosas era of the mid-19th century. Numerous actors, playwrights and technicians emigrated after 1976, though the dictators' own sense of the theatrical persuaded them to loosen pressures on artists around 1980. Seizing the opportunity, playwright Osvaldo Dragún
marshalled colleagues to restore an abandoned sparkplug factory to organize the improvisational Argentine Open Theatre
in 1981, a triumph dampened by their Picadero Theatre's fire-bombing a week later.
The theatre thrived before and after the 1983 return to democracy
. Established playwrights and directors such as Norman Briski
, Roberto Cossa, Lito Cruz
, Carlos Gorostiza
, Pacho O'Donnell
and Pepe Soriano
and younger dramatists such as Luis Agostoni, Carlos María Alsina, Eduardo Rovner and Rafael Spregelburd. Works by these and other local authors, as well as local productions of international works, are among the over 80 theater works presented every weekend in Buenos Aires, alone. The stage also plays host to well-known comedy acts, such as those of satirist Enrique Pinti
, female impersonator Antonio Gasalla
, storyteller Luis Landriscina and the musical comedy troupe, Les Luthiers
.
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
is as varied as the country's geography
Geography of Argentina
Argentina is a country in southern South America, situated between the Andes in the west and the southern Atlantic Ocean in the east. It is bordered by Paraguay and Bolivia in the north, Brazil and Uruguay in the northeast and Chile in the west....
and mix of ethnic groups. Modern Argentine culture has been largely influenced by European immigration although there are lesser elements of Amerindian and African influences, particularly in the fields of music and art. Buenos Aires, its cultural capital, is largely characterized by both the prevalence of people of European descent, and of conscious imitation of European styles in architecture
Architecture of Argentina
The Architecture of Argentina can be said to start at the beginning of the Spanish colonisation, though it was in the 18th century that the cities of the country reached their splendour...
. Museums, cinemas and galleries are abundant in all the large urban centers, as well as traditional establishments such as literary bars, or bars offering live music of a variety of genres.
Argentine writer Ernesto Sabato
Ernesto Sabato
Ernesto Sabato , was an Argentine writer, painter and physicist. According to the BBC he "won some of the most prestigious prizes in Hispanic literature" and "became very influential in the literary world throughout Latin America"...
has reflected on the nature of the culture of Argentina as follows:
Architecture
The architecture of ArgentinaArchitecture of Argentina
The Architecture of Argentina can be said to start at the beginning of the Spanish colonisation, though it was in the 18th century that the cities of the country reached their splendour...
can be said to start at the beginning of the Spanish colonisation, though it was in the 18th century that the cities of the country reached their splendour. Cities like Córdoba
Córdoba, Argentina
Córdoba is a city located near the geographical center of Argentina, in the foothills of the Sierras Chicas on the Suquía River, about northwest of Buenos Aires. It is the capital of Córdoba Province. Córdoba is the second-largest city in Argentina after the federal capital Buenos Aires, with...
, Salta
Salta
Salta is a city in northwestern Argentina and the capital city of the Salta Province. Along with its metropolitan area, it has a population of 464,678 inhabitants as of the , making it Argentina's eighth largest city.-Overview:...
, Mendoza
Mendoza, Argentina
Mendoza is the capital city of Mendoza Province, in Argentina. It is located in the northern-central part of the province, in a region of foothills and high plains, on the eastern side of the Andes. As of the , Mendoza's population was 110,993...
, and also Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
conserved most their historical Spanish colonial architecture in spite of their urban growth.
The simplicity of the Rioplatense
Río de la Plata
The Río de la Plata —sometimes rendered River Plate in British English and the Commonwealth, and occasionally rendered [La] Plata River in other English-speaking countries—is the river and estuary formed by the confluence of the Uruguay River and the Paraná River on the border between Argentina and...
baroque style can be clearly appreciated in Buenos Aires, in the works of Italian architects such as André Blanqui and Antonio Masella, in the churches of San Ignacio
San Ignacio Miní
San Ignacio Miní was one of the many missions founded in 1632 by the Jesuits in the Americas during the Spanish colonial period near present-day San Ignacio valley, some 60km north of Posadas, Misiones Province, Argentina....
, Nuestra Señora del Pilar, the Cathedral and the Cabildo
Buenos Aires Cabildo
The Buenos Aires Cabildo is the public building in Buenos Aires that was used as seat of the ayuntamiento during the colonial times and the government house of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata...
.
Italian and French influences increased after the wars for independence
Argentine War of Independence
The Argentine War of Independence was fought from 1810 to 1818 by Argentine patriotic forces under Manuel Belgrano, Juan José Castelli and José de San Martín against royalist forces loyal to the Spanish crown...
at the beginning of the 19th century, though the academic style persisted until the first decades of the 20th century. Attempts at renovation took place during the second half of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th, when the European tendencies penetrated into the country, reflected in numerous important buildings of Buenos Aires, such as the Santa Felicitam Church by Ernesto Bunge; the Central Post Office
Buenos Aires Central Post Office
The Buenos Aires Central Post and Communications Office is a public building and landmark in the San Nicolás district of Buenos Aires.-Overview:...
and Palace of Justice
Supreme Court of Argentina
The Supreme Court of Argentina is the highest court of law of the Argentine Republic. It was inaugurated on 15 January 1863. However, during much of the 20th century, the Court and, in general, the Argentine judicial system, has lacked autonomy from the executive power...
, by Norbert Maillart; and the National Congress and the Colón Opera House, by Vittorio Meano
Vittorio Meano
Vittorio Meano was an Italian architect born in Susa, Italy, near Turin.-Background and early career:He studied architecture in Albertina Academy in Turin....
.
The architecture of the second half of the 20th century continued adapting French neoclassical architecture
Neoclassical architecture
Neoclassical architecture was an architectural style produced by the neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century, manifested both in its details as a reaction against the Rococo style of naturalistic ornament, and in its architectural formulas as an outgrowth of some classicizing...
, such as the headquarters of the National Bank of Argentina
Banco de la Nación Argentina
Banco de la Nación Argentina is a state-owned bank in Argentina, and the largest in the country's banking sector.-Overview:The bank was founded on October 18, 1891, by President Carlos Pellegrini by way of stabilizing the nation's finances following the Panic of 1890; its first director was...
and the NH Gran Hotel Provincial
NH Gran Hotel Provincial
The NH Gran Hotel Provincial is a five star establishment in Mar del Plata, Argentina.-Overview:The hotel is one of a pair of twin buildings designed by architect Alejandro Bustillo. Inspired by seafront Hotel du Palais in Biarritz, France, the hotel and neighboring Casino Central remain...
, built by Alejandro Bustillo
Alejandro Bustillo
Alejandro Bustillo was an Argentine painter and architect who left his mark in various tourist destinations in Argentina, especially in the Andean region of the Patagonia....
, and the Museo de Arte Hispano Fernández Blanco, by Martín Noel.
Numerous Argentine architects have enriched their own country's cityscapes and, in recent decades, those around the world. Juan Antonio Buschiazzo
Juan Antonio Buschiazzo
Juan Antonio Buschiazzo was an Italian architect and engineer who contributed to the modernisation of Buenos Aires, Argentina in the 1880s and to the construction of the city of La Plata, the new capital of the Buenos Aires Province.Born in 1845 in Pontinvrea, Province of Savona, Liguria,...
helped popularize Beaux-Arts architecture and Francisco Gianotti
Francisco Gianotti
Francisco Gianotti was an architect who designed many important Art Nouveau buildings in Buenos Aires, Argentina....
combined Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...
with Italianate styles, each adding flair to Argentine cities during the early 20th century. Francisco Salamone
Francisco Salamone
Francisco Salamone was an Argentine architect of Italian descent who, between 1936 and 1940, during the Infamous Decade, built more than 60 municipal buildings with elements of Art Deco style in 25 rural communities on the Argentine Pampas within the Buenos Aires Province...
and Viktor Sulĉiĉ
Viktor Sulcic
Viktor Sulčič, also known as Víctor Sulcic, was a Slovenian born architect in Argentina. He was born in 1895 in Križ near Trieste, died in 1973 in Buenos Aires....
left an Art Deco
Art Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
legacy, and Alejandro Bustillo
Alejandro Bustillo
Alejandro Bustillo was an Argentine painter and architect who left his mark in various tourist destinations in Argentina, especially in the Andean region of the Patagonia....
created a prolific body of Rationalist architecture. Clorindo Testa
Clorindo Testa
Clorindo Manuel José Testa is an Italian-Argentine architect and artist. He graduated from the School of Architecture at the Universidad de Buenos Aires in 1948....
introduced Brutalist architecture
Brutalist architecture
Brutalist architecture is a style of architecture which flourished from the 1950s to the mid 1970s, spawned from the modernist architectural movement.-The term "brutalism":...
locally and César Pelli
César Pelli
César Pelli is an Argentine architect known for designing some of the world's tallest buildings and other major urban landmarks. In 1991, the American Institute of Architects listed Pelli among the ten most influential living American architects...
's and Patricio Pouchulu
Patricio Pouchulu
Patricio Pouchulu is a Futurist contemporary architect.Born in Buenos Aires, he graduated as an Architect at Universidad de Buenos Aires before moving to London to study with Peter Cook at The Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, where he got a M.Arch...
's Futurist
Futurist architecture
Futurist architecture is an early-20th century form of architecture characterized by anti-historicism and long horizontal lines suggesting speed, motion and urgency. Technology and even violence were among the themes of the Futurists. The movement was founded by the poet Filippo Tommaso...
creations have graced cities, worldwide. Pelli's 1980s throwbacks to the Art Deco glory of the 1920s, in particular, made him one of the world's most prestigious architects.
Cinema
Argentina is a major producer of motion pictures, and the local film industry produces around 80 full-length titles annually. The world's first animated feature films were made and released in Argentina, by cartoonist Quirino CristianiQuirino Cristiani
Quirino Cristiani was an Argentine animation director and cartoonist, responsible for the world's first two animated feature films as well as the first animated feature film with sound, even though the only copies of these two films were lost in a fire...
, in 1917 and 1918. Argentine cinema
Cinema of Argentina
The cinema of Argentina has a tradition dating back to the late nineteenth century, and continues to play a role in the culture of Argentina....
enjoyed a 'golden age' in the 1930s through the 1950s with scores of productions, many now considered classics of Spanish-language film. The industry produced actors who became the first movie stars of Argentine cinema, often tango performers such as Libertad Lamarque
Libertad Lamarque
Libertad Lamarque was an Argentine-Mexican actress and singer. Originally from Argentina, she reached fame throughout Latin America while living in Mexico and working in Mexican cinema.-Career:...
, Floren Delbene
Floren Delbene
Floren Delbene was an Argentine film actor of the classic era.Ferreyra began acting for film in 1926 and made some 60 film appearances between then and his retirement in 1969 appearing in films such as Amalia and Ayúdame a Vivir in 1936 and Besos Brujos often working alongside Libertad Lamarque...
, Tito Lusiardo
Tito Lusiardo
Tito Lusiardo was an iconic Argentine film actor and tango singer of the classic era.Lusiardo began acting for film in 1933 and made some 50 film appearances as an actor....
, Tita Merello
Tita Merello
Laura Ana Merello best known as Tita Merello was a prominent Argentine film actress, tango dancer and singer...
, Roberto Escalada
Roberto Escalada
Roberto Escalada born Aldo Roberto Leggero was a major Argentine film actor and cinema icon of the classic era....
and Hugo del Carril
Hugo del Carril
Pierre Bruno Hugo Fontana otherwise known as Hugo del Carril was an Argentine film actor, film director and tango singer of the classic era.-Early life:...
.
More recent films from the "New Wave" of cinema since the 1980s have achieved worldwide recognition, such as The Official Story
The Official Story
The Official Story is a 1985 Argentine drama film directed by Luis Puenzo, and written by Puenzo and Aída Bortnik. It stars Norma Aleandro, Héctor Alterio, and Chunchuna Villafañe, among others. In the United Kingdom, it was released as The Official Version.The film is about an upper middle class...
(Best foreign film oscar in 1986), Man Facing Southeast
Man Facing Southeast
Man Facing Southeast is a Spanish-language motion picture originally released in Argentina in 1986 as Hombre mirando al sudeste.-Summary:...
, A Place in the World
A Place in the World (film)
A Place in the World is an Argentine drama film co-written, co-produced and directed by Adolfo Aristarain. The film features José Sacristán, Federico Luppi, Leonor Benedetto, and others....
, Nine Queens, Son of the Bride
Son of the Bride
Son of the Bride is an Argentine comedy drama film, directed by Juan José Campanella and written by Campanella and Fernando Castets. The executive producers were Juan Vera and Juan Pablo Galli, and it was produced by Adrián Suar...
, The Motorcycle Diaries
The Motorcycle Diaries (film)
At the end of the film, after his sojourn at the leper colony, Guevara confirms his nascent egalitarian, anti-authority impulses, while making a birthday toast, which is also his first political speech. In it he evokes a pan-Latin American identity that transcends both the arbitrary boundaries of...
, Blessed by Fire
Iluminados Por El Fuego
Blessed by Fire is an Argentine film about the Falklands War written and directed by Tristán Bauer. The film features Gastón Pauls, Pablo Ribba, César Albarracín and Hugo Carrizo among others...
, and The Secret in Their Eyes, winner of the 2009 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
The Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film is one of the Academy Awards of Merit, popularly known as the Oscars, handed out annually by the U.S.-based Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences...
. Although rarely rivaling Hollywood
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...
productions in popularity, local films are released weekly and widely followed in Argentina and internationally. A number of local films, many of which are low-budget productions, have earned prizes in cinema festivals (such as Cannes
Cannes
Cannes is one of the best-known cities of the French Riviera, a busy tourist destination and host of the annual Cannes Film Festival. It is a Commune of France in the Alpes-Maritimes department....
), and are promoted by events such as the Mar del Plata Film Festival
Mar del Plata Film Festival
The Mar del Plata International Film Festival is an international film festival that takes place every November in the city of Mar del Plata, Argentina...
and the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema
Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema
The Buenos Aires Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente is an international festival of independent films organized each year in the month of April, in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina.The festival is managed by the Ministerio de Cultura del Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, it is not...
.
The per capita number of screens is one of the highest in Latin America, and viewing per capita is the highest in the region. A new generation of Argentine directors has caught the attention of critics worldwide. Cinema is an important facet of local culture, as well as a popular pastime, and levels of cinema attendance are comparable to those of European countries. Argentine composers Luis Enrique Bacalov, Gustavo Santaolalla
Gustavo Santaolalla
Gustavo Alfredo Santaolalla is an Argentine musician, film composer and producer. He has won two Academy Awards for Best Original Score in two consecutive years, for Brokeback Mountain in 2005 and Babel in 2006.-Life and career:...
and Eugenio Zanetti
Eugenio Zanetti
Eugenio Zanetti is an Argentine dramatist, painter, film set designer, and theater and opera director.Zanetti was born in Córdoba, Argentina...
have been honored with Academy Award for Best Original Score
Academy Award for Best Original Score
The Academy Award for Original Score is presented to the best substantial body of music in the form of dramatic underscoring written specifically for the film by the submitting composer.-Superlatives:...
nods. Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin is an Argentine composer, pianist and conductor. He is best known for his film and TV scores, such as the "Theme from Mission: Impossible". He has received four Grammy Awards and six Oscar nominations...
has received numerous Grammys and is best known for the Mission:Impossible theme.
Comics
CartoonistCartoonist
A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...
s and comics creators have contributed prominently to national culture, including Alberto Breccia
Alberto Breccia
Alberto Breccia was an Uruguay-born Argentine comics artist and writer.-Biography:Born in Montevideo, Uruguay, Breccia moved with his parents to Buenos Aires, Argentina when he was three years old...
, Dante Quinterno
Dante Quinterno
Dante Quinterno was an Argentine comics artist, famous for being the creator of the Patoruzú, Isidoro Cañones and Patoruzito characters....
, Oski
Oscar Conti (Oski)
Oscar "Oski" Conti was a prominent Argentine cartoonist and humorist.-Life and work:Oscar Esteban Conti was born in Buenos Aires in 1914. Enrolling at the National Fine Arts School, he helped finance his studies by creating caricatures for local advertisers...
, Francisco Solano López, Horacio Altuna
Horacio Altuna
Horacio Altuna is an Argentine comics artist.-Biography:Born in Córdoba, Altuna made his debut in the comics world in 1965 for publisher Editorial Columbia...
, Guillermo Mordillo
Guillermo Mordillo
Guillermo Mordillo , known simply as Mordillo, is a creator of cartoons and animations and was one of the most widely published cartoonists of the 1970s...
, Roberto Fontanarrosa
Roberto Fontanarrosa
Roberto Alfredo Fontanarrosa was an Argentine cartoonist and writer. He created the characters Inodoro Pereyra, a fictional gaucho, and Boogie, el aceitoso, a fictional serial killer.-Early life:...
, whose grotesque characters captured life's absurdities with quick-witted commentary, and Quino
Quino
Joaquín Salvador Lavado, better known by his pen name Quino is an Argentine cartoonist. His comic strip Mafalda is very popular in Latin America and many parts of Europe.-Early life and work:...
, known for the soup-hating Mafalda
Mafalda
Mafalda is a comic strip written and drawn by Argentine cartoonist Joaquín Salvador Lavado, better known by his pen name Quino. The strip features a 6-year-old girl named Mafalda, who is deeply concerned about humanity and world peace and rebels against the current state of the world...
and her comic strip
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
gang of childhood friends.
Cuisine
Besides many of the pasta, sausage and dessert dishes common to continental Europe, Argentines enjoy a wide variety of Indigenous and CriolloCriollo people
The Criollo class ranked below that of the Iberian Peninsulares, the high-born permanent residence colonists born in Spain. But Criollos were higher status/rank than all other castes—people of mixed descent, Amerindians, and enslaved Africans...
creations, which include empanada
Empanada
An empanada is a stuffed bread or pastry baked or fried in many countries in Latin America, Southern Europe and parts of Southeast Asia. The name comes from the verb empanar, meaning to wrap or coat in bread. Empanada is made by folding a dough or bread patty around the stuffing...
s (a stuffed pastry), locro
Locro
Locro is a hearty thick stew popular along the Andes mountain range. The dish is a classic Ecuadorian cheese and potato soup from the Ecuadorian cuisine. This is also a dish in Peruvian cuisine, which at one point held the center of the Inca empire. It typical also in Argentina prepared by the...
(a mixture of corn, beans, meat, bacon, onion, and gourd), humita
Humita
Humita is a Native American dish from pre-Hispanic times, and a traditional food in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Peru. It consists of masa harina and corn, slowly cooked in oil....
s and yerba mate
Mate (beverage)
Mate , also known as chimarrão or cimarrón, is a traditional South American infused drink, particularly in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, southern states of Brazil, south of Chile, the Bolivian Chaco, and to some extent, Syria and Lebanon...
, all originally indigenous Amerindian staples, the latter considered Argentina's national beverage. Other popular items include chorizo
Chorizo
Chorizo is a term encompassing several types of pork sausages originating from the Iberian Peninsula.In English, it is usually pronounced , , or , but sometimes ....
(a spicy sausage), facturas (Viennese-style
Viennese cuisine
Viennese cuisine is the cuisine that is characteristic of Vienna, Austria, and its residents. Viennese cuisine is often treated as equivalent to Austrian cuisine, but while elements of Viennese cuisine have spread throughout Austria, other Austrian regions have their own unique variations...
pastry) and Dulce de Leche
Dulce de leche
Dulce de leche is a thick,creamy, caramel-like milk-based sauce or spread.Literally translated, dulce de leche means "sweet from milk". It is prepared by slowly heating sweetened milk to create a product that derives its taste from caramelised sugar. It is a popular sweet in Latin America, where...
, a sort of milk caramel
Caramel
Caramel is a beige to dark-brown confection made by heating any of a variety of sugars. It is used as a flavoring in puddings and desserts, as a filling in bonbons, and as a topping for ice cream, custard and coffee....
jam.
The Argentine barbecue, asado
Asado
Asado is a term used both for a range of barbecue techniques and the social event of having or attending a barbecue in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile and southern Brazil. In the former countries asado is also the standard word for barbecue. An asado usually consists of beef alongside various...
as well as a parrillada, includes various types of meats, among them chorizo, sweetbread
Sweetbread
Sweetbreads or ris are culinary names for the thymus or the pancreas especially of the calf and lamb...
, chitterlings
Chitterlings
Chitterlings are the intestines of a pig, although cattle and other animals' intestines are similarly used, that have been prepared as food. In various countries across the world, such food is prepared and eaten either as part of a daily diet, or at special events, holidays or religious...
, and morcilla (blood sausage
Blood sausage
Black pudding, blood pudding or blood sausage is a type of sausage made by cooking blood or dried blood with a filler until it is thick enough to congeal when cooled. The dish exists in various cultures from Asia to Europe...
). Thin sandwiches, sandwiches de miga
Sandwiches de miga
Sandwiches de miga are popular food items in Argentina where they are consumed mainly at parties. The sandwiches de miga are similar to the English cucumber sandwich, which is a typical tea-time food, and resembles the Italian Tramezzino. They are single or double layered sandwiches, made from a...
, are also popular. Argentines have the highest consumption of red meat
Red meat
Red meat in traditional culinary terminology is meat which is red when raw and not white when cooked. In the nutritional sciences, red meat includes all mammal meat. Red meat includes the meat of most adult mammals and some fowl ....
in the world.
The Argentine wine
Argentine wine
The Argentine wine industry is the fifth largest producer of wine in the world. Argentine wine, as with some aspects of Argentine cuisine, has its roots in Spain...
industry, long among the largest outside Europe, has benefited from growing investment since 1992; in 2007, 60% of foreign investment worldwide in viticulture
Viticulture
Viticulture is the science, production and study of grapes which deals with the series of events that occur in the vineyard. When the grapes are used for winemaking, it is also known as viniculture...
was destined to Argentina. The country is the fifth most important wine producer in the world, with the annual per capita consumption of wine among the highest. Malbec grape, a discardable varietal in France (country of origin), has found in the Province of Mendoza an ideal environment to successfully develop and turn itself into the world's best Malbec
Malbec
Malbec is a purple grape variety used in making red wine. The grapes tend to have an inky dark color and robust tannins, and are long known as one of the six grapes allowed in the blend of red Bordeaux wine. The French plantations of Malbec are now found primarily in Cahors in the South West...
. Mendoza accounts for 70% of the country's total wine production. "Wine tourism" is important in Mendoza province, with the impressive landscape of the Cordillera de Los Andes and the highest peak in the Americas, Mount Aconcagua, 6952 m (22,808 ft) high, providing a very desirable destination for international tourism.
Literature
Argentina has a rich literary history, as well as one of the region's most active publishing industries. Argentine writers have figured prominently in Latin American literature since becoming a fully united entity in the 1850s, with a strong constitution and a defined nation-building plan. The struggle between the Federalists (who favored a loose confederationConfederation
A confederation in modern political terms is a permanent union of political units for common action in relation to other units. Usually created by treaty but often later adopting a common constitution, confederations tend to be established for dealing with critical issues such as defense, foreign...
of provinces based on rural conservatism) and the Unitarians (pro-liberalism and advocates of a strong central government that would encourage European immigration), set the tone for Argentine literature of the time.
The ideological divide between gaucho epic Martín Fierro
Martín Fierro
Martín Fierro is a 2,316 line epic poem by the Argentine writer José Hernández. The poem was originally published in two parts, El Gaucho Martín Fierro and La Vuelta de Martín Fierro . The poem is, in part, a protest against the modernist tendencies of Argentine president Domingo Faustino Sarmiento...
by José Hernández, and Facundo by Domingo Faustino Sarmiento
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento
Domingo Faustino Sarmiento was an Argentine activist, intellectual, writer, statesman and the seventh President of Argentina. His writing spanned a wide range of genres and topics, from journalism to autobiography, to political philosophy and history...
, is a great example. Hernández, a federalist, was opposed to the centralizing, modernizing and Europeanizing tendencies. Sarmiento wrote in support of immigration as the only way to save Argentina from becoming subject to the rule of a small number of dictatorial caudillo
Caudillo
Caudillo is a Spanish word for "leader" and usually describes a political-military leader at the head of an authoritarian power. The term translates into English as leader or chief, or more pejoratively as warlord, dictator or strongman. Caudillo was the term used to refer to the charismatic...
families, arguing such immigrants would make Argentina more modern and open to Western European influences and therefore a more prosperous society.
Argentine literature of that period was fiercely nationalist. It was followed by the modernist
Modernist literature
Modernist literature is sub-genre of Modernism, a predominantly European movement beginning in the early 20th century that was characterized by a self-conscious break with traditional aesthetic forms...
movement, which emerged in France in the late 19th century, and this period in turn was followed by vanguardism
Vanguardism
In the context of revolutionary struggle, vanguardism is a strategy whereby an organization attempts to place itself at the center of the movement, and steer it in a direction consistent with its ideology....
, with Ricardo Güiraldes
Ricardo Güiraldes
Ricardo Güiraldes was an Argentine novelist and poet, one of the most significant Argentine writers of his era, particularly known for his 1926 novel Don Segundo Sombra, set amongst the gauchos.-Life:...
as an important reference. Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
, its most acclaimed writer, found new ways of looking at the modern world in metaphor and philosophical debate and his influence has extended to writers all over the globe. Borges is most famous for his works in short stories such as Ficciones
Ficciones
Ficciones is the most popular anthology of short stories by Argentine writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges, often considered the best introduction to his work. Ficciones should not be confused with Labyrinths, although they have much in common. Labyrinths is a separate translation of Borges' material,...
and The Aleph.
Some of the nation's notable writers, poets and intellectuals include: Juan Bautista Alberdi
Juan Bautista Alberdi
Juan Bautista Alberdi was an Argentine political theorist and diplomat. Although he lived most of his life in exile in Montevideo and Chile, he was one of the most influential Argentine liberals of his age.-Biography:...
, Roberto Arlt
Roberto Arlt
Roberto Arlt was an Argentine writer.-Biography:He was born Roberto Godofredo Christophersen Arlt in Buenos Aires on April 2, 1900. His parents were both immigrants: his father Karl Arlt was a Prussian from Posen and his mother was Ekatherine Iobstraibitzer, a native of Trieste and Italian speaking...
, Enrique Banchs
Enrique Banchs
Enrique Banchs was an Argentine poet. He published all his work in the space of four years at the beginning of the 20th century, then lay dormant until his death. In his four works, Las barcas , El libro de los elogios , El cascabel del halcón and La urna...
, Adolfo Bioy Casares
Adolfo Bioy Casares
Adolfo Bioy Casares was an Argentine fiction writer, journalist, and translator. He was a friend and collaborator with his fellow countryman Jorge Luis Borges, and wrote what many consider one of the best pieces of fantastic fiction, the novella The Invention of Morel.-Biography:Adolfo Bioy...
, Silvina Bullrich
Silvina Bullrich
Silvina Bullrich was a best-selling Argentine novelist, as well as an accomplished journalist, translator and screenwriter.-Life and work:...
, Eugenio Cambaceres
Eugenio Cambaceres
Eugenio Cambaceres Argentine writer and politician. In the 1880s he wrote four books, with Sin rumbo being his masterpiece. His promising literary career was cut short when he died of tuberculosis....
, Julio Cortázar
Julio Cortázar
Julio Cortázar, born Jules Florencio Cortázar, was an Argentine writer. Cortázar, known as one of the founders of the Latin American Boom, influenced an entire generation of Spanish speaking readers and writers in the Americas and Europe.-Early life:Cortázar's parents, Julio José Cortázar and...
, Esteban Echeverría
Esteban Echeverría
José Esteban Antonio Echeverría was an Argentine poet, fiction writer, cultural promoter, and political activist who played a significant role in the development of Argentine literature, not only through his own writings but also through his organizational efforts...
, Leopoldo Lugones
Leopoldo Lugones
Leopoldo Lugones Argüello was an Argentine writer and journalist.-Early life:Born in Villa de María del Río Seco, a city in Córdoba Province, in Argentina's Catholic heartland, Lugones belonged to a family of landed gentry...
, Eduardo Mallea
Eduardo Mallea
Eduardo Mallea was an Argentine essayist, cultural critic, writer and diplomat. In 1931 he became editor of the literary magazine of La Nación.-Work:...
, Ezequiel Martínez Estrada
Ezequiel Martínez Estrada
Ezequiel Martínez Estrada was an Argentine writer, poet, essayist, and literary critic. An admired biographer and critic, he was often political in his writings, and was a confirmed anti-Peronist...
, Tomás Eloy Martínez
Tomás Eloy Martínez
Tomás Eloy Martínez was an Argentine journalist and writer.-Life and work:Born in San Miguel de Tucumán, Martínez obtained a degree in Spanish and Latin American literature from the University of Tucumán, and an MA at the University of Paris...
, Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo
Victoria Ocampo Aguirre was an Argentine writer and intellectual, described by Jorge Luis Borges as La mujer más argentina ....
, Manuel Puig
Manuel Puig
Manuel Puig was an Argentine author...
, Ernesto Sabato
Ernesto Sabato
Ernesto Sabato , was an Argentine writer, painter and physicist. According to the BBC he "won some of the most prestigious prizes in Hispanic literature" and "became very influential in the literary world throughout Latin America"...
, Osvaldo Soriano
Osvaldo Soriano
Osvaldo Soriano, Journalist and writer. Born January 6, 1943 in Mar del Plata, Argentina – died on January 29, 1997 in Buenos Aires.-Biography:...
, Alfonsina Storni
Alfonsina Storni
Alfonsina Storni was one of the most important Latin-American poets of the modernist period.-Life:Storni was born in Sala Capriasca, Switzerland to an Argentine beer industrialist living in Switzerland for a few years. There, Storni learned to speak Italian...
and María Elena Walsh
María Elena Walsh
María Elena Walsh was an Argentine poet, novelist, musician, dramaturge, writer and composer, mainly known for her songs and books for children.-Biography:...
.
Music
Tango, the music and lyrics (often sung in a form of slang called lunfardoLunfardo
Lunfardo is a dialect originated and developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the lower classes in Buenos Aires and the surrounding Gran Buenos Aires, and from there spread to other cities nearby, such as Rosario and Montevideo, cities with similar socio-cultural situations...
), is Argentina's musical symbol. The Milonga
Milonga
Milonga can refer to an Argentine, Uruguayan, and Southern Brazilian form of music which preceded the tango and the dance form which accompanies it, or to the term for places or events where the tango or Milonga are danced...
dance was a predecessor, slowly evolving into modern tango. By the 1930s, tango had changed from a dance-focused music to one of lyric and poetry, with singers such as Carlos Gardel
Carlos Gardel
Carlos Gardel was a singer, songwriter and actor, and is perhaps the most prominent figure in the history of tango. He was born in Toulouse, France, although he never acknowledged his birthplace publicly, and there are still claims of his birth in Uruguay. He lived in Argentina from the age of two...
, Hugo del Carril
Hugo del Carril
Pierre Bruno Hugo Fontana otherwise known as Hugo del Carril was an Argentine film actor, film director and tango singer of the classic era.-Early life:...
, Roberto Goyeneche
Roberto Goyeneche
Roberto Goyeneche was an Argentine tango singer of Basque descent, who epitomized the archetype of 1950s Buenos Aires' bohemian life, and became a living legend in the local music scene.He was known as El Polaco due to his blond hair, and thinness, like the Polish immigrants of the time...
, Raúl Lavié
Raúl Lavié
Raúl Lavié is an Argentine entertainer prominent in the Tango genre.-Life and work:Raúl Alberto Peralta was born in Rosario, Argentina in 1937. He first sang on a local radio station in 1955 and was subsequently invited to perform on Radio Belgrano and Radio El Mundo in Buenos Aires...
, Tita Merello
Tita Merello
Laura Ana Merello best known as Tita Merello was a prominent Argentine film actress, tango dancer and singer...
and Edmundo Rivero
Edmundo Rivero
Leonel Edmundo Rivero was an Argentine tango singer, composer, and impresario.-Early days:Rivero was born in the southern Buenos Aires suburb of Valentín Alsina. Joining his father in some of his travels, he was exposed to the lifestyle and the music of the gauchos of Buenos Aires Province from...
. The golden age of tango (1930 to mid-1950s) mirrored that of Jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
and Swing in the United States, featuring large orchestral groups too, like the bands of Osvaldo Pugliese
Osvaldo Pugliese
Osvaldo Pedro Pugliese was an Argentine tango musician. He developed dramatic arrangements that retained strong elements of the walking beat of salon tango but also heralded the development of concert-style tango music.Some of his music, mostly since the 50s, is used for theatrical dance...
, Anibal Troilo
Aníbal Troilo
Aníbal Carmelo Troilo was an Argentine tango musician.Anibal Troilo was a bandoneon player, composer, and bandleader in Argentina. His orquesta típica was among the most popular with social dancers during the golden age of tango , but he changed to a concert sound by the late 1950s...
, Francisco Canaro
Francisco Canaro
Francisco Canaro was an Uruguayan-Argentine violinist and tango orchestra leader.His parents, Italians emigrated to Uruguay, and later - when Francisco Canaro was less than 10 years old, they emigrated to Buenos Aires in the late nineteenth century. Canaro was born in San José de Mayo, Uruguay,...
, Julio de Caro
Julio de Caro
Julio de Caro was an Argentine composer, musician and conductor prominent in the Tango genre.-Life and work:...
and Juan D'Arienzo
Juan D'Arienzo
Juan d'Arienzo was an Argentine tango musician, also known as "El Rey del Compás" . Departing from other orchestras of the golden age, D'Arienzo returned to the 2x4 feel that characterized music of the old guard, but he used more modern arrangements and instrumentation...
. Incorporating acoustic music
Acoustic music
Acoustic music comprises music that solely or primarily uses instruments which produce sound through entirely acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means...
and later, synthesizers into the genre after 1955, bandoneon
Bandoneón
The bandoneón is a type of concertina particularly popular in Argentina and Uruguay. It plays an essential role in the orquesta típica, the tango orchestra...
virtuoso Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Piazzolla
Ástor Pantaleón Piazzolla was an Argentine tango composer and bandoneón player. His oeuvre revolutionized the traditional tango into a new style termed nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music...
popularized "new tango"
Nuevo tango
Tango Nuevo - either a form of music in which new elements are incorporated into traditional Argentine tango, or an evolution of tango dance that began to develop in the 1980s...
creating a more subtle, intellectual and listener-oriented trend. Today tango enjoys worldwide popularity; ever-evolving, neo-tango is a global phenomenon with renown groups like Tanghetto
Tanghetto
Tanghetto is a musical group based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and one of the most important on the neo tango scene.The style of Tanghetto is a blend of tango and electronic music. Formed in 2001 by producer and composer/songwriter Max Masri . Then Max Masri asked guitarist and composer Diego S...
, Bajofondo and the Gotan Project
Gotan Project
Gotan Project is a musical group based in Paris, consisting of musicians Philippe Cohen Solal , Eduardo Makaroff , and Christoph H. Müller .-History:...
.
Argentine rock
Argentine rock , is composed or made by Argentine bands or artists, in the Spanish language. For nearly half a century it has been a major popular genre, and it is considered part of the popular music tradition of Argentina alongside Argentine Tango, and Argentine folk music.The moment when...
, called rock nacional, is the most popular music among youth. Arguably the most listened form of Spanish-language rock, its influence and success internationally owes to a rich, uninterrupted development. Bands such as Soda Stereo
Soda Stereo
Soda Stereo were an Argentine rock band who are recognized as one of the most influential and important Latin American and Ibero-American bands of all time...
or Sumo
Sumo (band)
Sumo was a 1980s Argentine alternative rock band, merging post-punk with reggae and ska. Headed by Italian-born Luca Prodan, it remained underground for most of its short activity, but was extremely influential in shaping contemporary Argentine rock. Sumo introduced British post-punk to the...
, and composers like Charly García
Charly García
Charly García is a singer-songwriter, pianist and keyboardist from Argentina with a long career in rock music, forming successful groups such as Sui Generis and Serú Girán, cult status groups like La Máquina de Hacer Pájaros, and as a solo musician.-Early years:Charly García was the eldest son in...
, Luis Alberto Spinetta
Luis Alberto Spinetta
Luis Alberto Spinetta , is an Argentine musician. He is one of the most influential rock musicians of South America, and together with Charly García is considered the father of Argentine rock. He was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in the residential neighbourhood of Belgrano...
, and Fito Páez
Fito Páez
Rodolfo "Fito" Páez Ávalos is an Argentine popular rock and roll pianist, lyricist, Spanish language singer and film director.-Early career:...
are referents of national culture. Mid-1960s Buenos Aires and Rosario were cradles of the music and by 1970, Argentine rock was well established among middle class youth (see Almendra, Sui Generis
Sui Generis
Sui Generis is one of the most important rock bands in Argentine history, enjoying enormous success and popularity during the first half of the 1970s and a following that lasts to the present throughout South America...
, Pappo
Pappo
-, 1968:-, 1969:# # # # # # # # # -Rock de la mujer perdida, 1970:...
, Crucis). Seru Giran
Seru Giran
Serú Girán was an Argentinian rock supergroup. From 1978 the group consisted of Charly García , David Lebón , Pedro Aznar , and Oscar Moro . It is considered one of the best in the history of Argentine rock, both musically, and conceptually and staging...
bridged the gap into the 1980s, when Argentine bands became popular across Latin America and elsewhere (Enanitos Verdes, Fabulosos Cadillacs, Virus
Virus (Argentine band)
Virus is an Argentine New wave music band, led by Federico Moura until his death on December 21, 1988 from AIDS-related complications. His brother Marcelo then became lead singer, until the band gave its final performance on September 29, 1990, in a support slot to David Bowie. Virus reunited in...
, Andrés Calamaro
Andrés Calamaro
Andrés Calamaro , is an Argentine musician, composer and Latin Grammy winner. His former band Los Rodríguez was a major success in Spain in the 1990s. He became one of the main icons of the Argentine rock in the last two decades and has sold over 1.3 million copies.-Abuelos de la Nada:Calamaro was...
). There are many sub-genres: underground, pop-oriented and some associated with the working class (La Renga
La Renga
La Renga are a hard rock and Heavy Metal band from Argentina, formed in 1988.They have a moderate success with the albums A Dónde Me Lleva La Vida and Bailando en una pata, between 1993 and 1995, but it was the release of Despedazado por Mil Partes, in 1996, that made them nationally famous.With...
, Attaque 77
Attaque 77
Attaque 77 is an Argentine rock group formed in 1987.-History:Formed in 1987 as a group of friends who got together to play their favorite songs, most of them by The Ramones, their favorite band and the one that influenced them the most...
, Divididos
Divididos
Divididos is an Argentine rock band.The band was formed in 1988 after the death of Luca Prodan and the consequent dissolution of the band Sumo...
, Hermética
Hermética
Hermética was an Argentine band considered to be one of the most important bands in the history of Argentine heavy metal.-Biography:After the dissolution of V8 in 1987, its members split and formed their own groups; Osvaldo Civile created Horcas, Alberto Zamarbide, Miguel Roldán and Adrián Cenci...
, V8 and Los Redonditos
Patricio Rey y sus Redonditos de Ricota
Patricio Rey y Sus Redonditos de Ricota were an independent rock band originally from La Plata, Argentina whose tours in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s drew a cult-like following....
). Current popular bands include: Babasonicos
Babasónicos
Babasónicos is an Argentine rock band, formed in the early 1990s along with others such as Peligrosos Gorriones and Los Brujos. After emerging in the wave of Argentine New Rock bands of the late '80s and early '90s, Babasonicos became one of the banner groups of the "sonic" underground rock...
, Rata Blanca
Rata Blanca
Rata Blanca is a heavy metal band from Argentina formed in the 1980s.-Biography:The band was founded by Walter Giardino after he left V8. Rata Blanca played together for about two years before their debut on August 15, 1987 in the theater "Luz y Fuerza" in Buenos Aires...
, Horcas
Horcas
Horcas is a heavy metal band from Argentina created in 1988 by Osvaldo Civile, former guitarist for V8, Argentina’s landmark heavy metal outfit in the 1980s. After quitting V8 in 1985, and impressed by the new generation of thrash metal bands from the Bay Area led by Metallica, Civile set out to...
, Attaque 77, Bersuit, Los Piojos
Los Piojos
Los Piojos were a rock band from Argentina, highly popular, and one of the seminal bands of the 1990s Argentine suburban rock movement.As with most suburban rock bands, their formative sound owes a significant amount to the style of the Rolling Stones...
, Intoxicados
Cristian Álvarez (musician)
Cristian Pity Álvarez is an Argentine rock musician born June 28 in 1972 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was raised at the Piedrabuena Complex, western part of the city....
, Catupecu Machu
Catupecu Machu
Catupecu Machu is an Argentine rock band, usually classified as within Rock en Español. Its current band members are Fernando Ruíz Díaz in voices and guitar; Sebastián Cáceres in bass guitar; Javier "Il Grosso" Herrlein in drums and accordion; and Macabre in keyboards and samplers.-Biography:The...
, Carajo
Carajo
Carajo is a rock band from Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was formed in 2001 with Marcelo "Corvata" Corvalan on bass and vocals, Andres "Andy" Vilanova on drums and Hernan "Tery" Langer on guitar and backing vocals...
and Miranda!
Miranda!
Miranda! is an Argentine electro pop band formed in 2001. Band members include Alejandro Sergi , Juliana Gattas , Lolo Fuentes , Bruno de Vincenti , and since 2003, Nicolás Grimaldi...
.
Colón Theater
To Redirect to homonymous theatre in Bogotá see Teatro de Cristobal ColónThe Teatro Colón is the main opera house in Buenos Aires, Argentina, acoustically considered to be amongst the five best concert venues in the world.The present Colón replaced an original theatre which opened in 1857...
. Classical musicians, such as Martha Argerich
Martha Argerich
Martha Argerich is an Argentine pianist.-Early life:Argerich was born in Buenos Aires and started playing the piano at age three...
, Eduardo Alonso-Crespo
Eduardo Alonso-Crespo
Eduardo Alonso-Crespo is an Argentine composer of classical music.- Biography :Argentine composer and conductor Eduardo Alonso-Crespo was born in San Miguel de Tucumán in 1956, and grew up in the neighboring city of Salta, in Northwestern Argentina...
, Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim, KBE is an Argentinian-Israeli pianist and conductor. He has served as music director of several major symphonic and operatic orchestras and made numerous recordings....
, Eduardo Delgado
Eduardo Delgado
Eduardo Delgado is an Argentine classical pianist and teacher, currently living in California. Born in Rosario, Argentina, he is a recipient of the Vladimir Horowitz Award and has received grants from the Mozarteum Argentino, Martha Baird Rockefeller, and the Concert Artists Guild. In 1999, he was...
and Alberto Lysy
Alberto Lysy
Alberto Lysy was a prestigious Argentine violinist and conductor.-Life and work:Alberto Lysy was born in Buenos Aires to Ukrainian immigrants in 1935. At age five, his father introduced him to the violin. Lysy left school at age 13 to devote more time to the instrument, and was subsequently...
, and classical composers such as Juan José Castro
Juan José Castro
Juan José Castro was an Argentine composer and conductor.Born in Avellaneda, Castro studied piano and violin under Manuel Posadas and composition under Eduarno Fornarini, in Buenos Aires. In the 1920s he was awarded the Europa Prize, and then went on to study in Paris at the Schola Cantorum under...
and Alberto Ginastera
Alberto Ginastera
Alberto Evaristo Ginastera was an Argentine composer of classical music. He is considered one of the most important Latin American classical composers.- Biography :...
are internationally acclaimed. All major cities in Argentina have impressive theaters or opera houses, and provincial or city orchestras. Some cities have annual events and important classical music festivals like Semana Musical Llao Llao
Semana Musical Llao Llao
Semana Musical Llao Llao is a classical music festival in Argentina. The festival was created in 1993 and is held at the Llao Llao Hotel, near Bariloche. The Festival breaks through the Argentine tradition, and brings classical music to the foothills of the Andes...
in San Carlos de Bariloche
San Carlos de Bariloche
San Carlos de Bariloche, usually known as Bariloche, is a city in the , situated in the foothills of the Andes on the southern shores of Nahuel Huapi Lake and is located inside Nahuel Huapi National Park...
and the multitudinous Amadeus in Buenos Aires.
Argentine folk music is uniquely vast. Beyond dozens of regional dances, a national folk style emerged in the 1930s. Perón
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer, and politician. Perón was three times elected as President of Argentina though he only managed to serve one full term, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency...
's Argentina would give rise to Nueva Canción
Nueva canción
Nueva canción is a movement and genre within Latin American and Iberian music of folk music, folk-inspired music and socially committed music...
, as artists began expressing in their music objections to political themes. Atahualpa Yupanqui
Atahualpa Yupanqui
Atahualpa Yupanqui was an Argentine singer, songwriter, guitarist, and writer. He is considered the most important Argentine folk musician of the 20th century....
, the greatest Argentine folk musician, and Mercedes Sosa
Mercedes Sosa
Haydée Mercedes Sosa, known as La Negra, was an Argentine singer who was popular throughout South America and some countries outside the continent. With her roots in Argentine folk music, Sosa became one of the preeminent exponents of nueva canción. She gave voice to songs written by both...
would be defining figures in shaping Nueva Canción, gaining worldwide popularity in the process. The style found a huge reception in Chile, where it took off in the 1970s and went on to influence the entirety of Latin American music
Latin American music
Latin American music, found within Central and South America, is a series of musical styles and genres that mixes influences from Spanish, African and indigenous sources, that has recently become very famous in the US.-Argentina:...
. Today, Chango Spasiuk
Chango Spasiuk
Horacio "Chango" Spasiuk is an Argentine chamamé musician and accordion player.Of Ukrainian grandparents, El Chango had a strong Polka music influence from his early days; Eastern European musical influences were also already present in the chamamé music of the region...
and Soledad Pastorutti
Soledad Pastorutti
Soledad "La Sole" Pastorutti is an Argentine folk singer, who brought the genre to the younger generations at the end of the 20th century, and the beginning of the 21st....
have brought folk back to younger generations. Leon Gieco
León Gieco
Raúl Alberto Antonio Gieco, better known as León Gieco is a pop-folk music composer and interpreter. He is known for mixing popular folkloric genres with Argentine rock, and for lyrics with social and political connotations...
's folk-rock bridged the gap between Argentine folklore and Argentine rock, introducing both styles to millions overseas in successive tours.
Painting and sculpture
Argentine painters and sculptors have a rich history dating from both before and since the development of modern Argentina in the second half of the 19th century. Artistic production did not truly come into its own until after the 1852 overthrow of the repressive regime of Juan Manuel de RosasJuan Manuel de Rosas
Juan Manuel de Rosas , was an argentine militar and politician, who was elected governor of the province of Buenos Aires in 1829 to 1835, and then of the Argentine Confederation from 1835 until 1852...
. Immigrants like Eduardo Schiaffino
Eduardo Schiaffino
Eduardo Schiaffino was an Argentine painter, critic, intellectual and historian. A member of a group known as the Generation of '80, he founded the National Museum of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires and sparked the development of painting in his country.-Biography:Schiaffino was born in Buenos Aires in...
, Eduardo Sívori
Eduardo Sívori
Eduardo Sívori was an Argentine artist widely regarded as his country's first realist painter.-Life and work:...
, Reynaldo Giudici, Emilio Caraffa
Emilio Caraffa
-Life and work:Emilio Caraffa was born in Catamarca, Argentina, in 1862. His family relocated to Rosario, where he attended the local National College , and learned to draw and sketch...
and Ernesto de la Cárcova
Ernesto de la Cárcova
Ernesto de la Cárcova was an Argentine painter of the Realist school.-Life and work:Ernesto de la Cárcova was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1866. Taking an early interest in the canvas, he studied at the local Society for the Stimulus of Fine Arts under painter Francisco Romero...
left behind a realist heritage influential to this day.
Impressionism
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
did not make itself evident among Argentine artists until after 1900, however, and never acquired the kind of following it did in Europe, though it did inspire influential Argentine post-impressionists
Post-Impressionism
Post-Impressionism is the term coined by the British artist and art critic Roger Fry in 1910 to describe the development of French art since Manet. Fry used the term when he organized the 1910 exhibition Manet and Post-Impressionism...
such as Martín Malharro
Martín Malharro
Martín Malharro was an Argentine painter of the Post-impressionist school.-Life and work: Martín Malharro was born in the central Buenos Aires Province city of Azul in 1865. His childhood interest in painting led to domestic violence at home, from which he left for Buenos Aires in 1879...
, Ramón Silva
Ramón Silva
Ramón Silva was an Argentine painter of the Post-impressionist school.-Life and work:Ramón Silva was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1890...
, Cleto Ciocchini, Fernando Fader
Fernando Fader
Fernando Fader was a French-born Argentine painter of the Post-impressionist school.-Life and work:Fernando Fader was born in Bordeaux, France in 1882. His father, of Prussian descent, relocated the family to Argentina in 1884, settling in the western city of Mendoza before returning to France a...
, Pío Collivadino
Pío Collivadino
Pío Collivadino was an Argentine painter of the post-impressionist school.-Life and work:Pío Collivadino was born in Buenos Aires, in 1869...
, Cesáreo Bernaldo de Quirós
Cesáreo Bernaldo de Quirós
Cesáreo Bernaldo de Quirós was an Argentine painter of the post-impressionist school.- Life and work :De Quirós was born in Gualeguay, Entre Ríos Province, in 1879. He began to paint at age eight, and shortly afterwards, created a facial composite sketch that resulted in a fugitive criminal's...
, Realism
Realism (arts)
Realism in the visual arts and literature refers to the general attempt to depict subjects "in accordance with secular, empirical rules", as they are considered to exist in third person objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation...
and aestheticism continued to set the agenda in Argentine painting and sculpture, noteworthy during this era for the sudden fame of sculptor Lola Mora
Lola Mora
Lola Mora was a sculptor, born in a barn in the , though generally considered native to Trancas, province of Tucumán, where she was recorded and baptized. She is known today as a rebel and a pioneer of women in her artistic field...
, a student of Auguste Rodin
Auguste Rodin
François-Auguste-René Rodin , known as Auguste Rodin , was a French sculptor. Although Rodin is generally considered the progenitor of modern sculpture, he did not set out to rebel against the past...
's.
As Lola Mora had been until she fell out of favor with local high society, monumental sculptors became in very high demand after 1900, particularly by municipal governments and wealthy families, who competed with each other in boasting the most evocative mausolea
Mausoleum
A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or persons. A monument without the interment is a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be considered a type of tomb or the tomb may be considered to be within the...
for their dearly departed. Though most preferred French and Italian sculptors, work by locals Erminio Blotta
Erminio Blotta
Erminio Blotta was an Argentine self-taught sculptor of Italian origin.-Biography:He was born in Morano Calabro...
, Ángel María de Rosa
Ángel María de Rosa
Ángel María de Rosa was an Argentine sculptor and philanthropist.-Life and work:Ángel María de Rosa was born in Junín, a pampas city in northern Buenos Aires Province, in 1888...
and Rogelio Yrurtia
Rogelio Yrurtia
Rogelio Yrurtia was a renowned Argentine sculptor of the Realist school.-Life and work:Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina to Basque immigrants in 1879, Rogelio Yrurtia enrolled in the local Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts in 1899. A talented student, he quickly earned a scholarship on which...
resulted in a proliferation of soulful monuments and memorials made them immortal. Not as realist as the work of some of his belle-époque predecessors in sculpture, Yrurtia's subtle impressionism inspired Argentine students like Antonio Pujía
Antonio Pujía
Antonio Pujía is a well-known Argentine sculptor.-Life and work:Antonio Pujía was born in Polia, a small town in the Calabria region of Italy, in 1929, and relocated to Buenos Aires with his mother in 1937...
, whose internationally prized female torsos always surprise admirers with their whimsical and surreal touches, while Pablo Curatella Manes
Pablo Curatella Manes
Pablo Curatella Manes was a prolific Argentine sculptor.-Life and work:Born in La Plata in 1891 to Clara Manes, a Greek Argentine immigrant, and Antonio Curatella, from Italy, Curatella Manes first acquired an interest in sculpture during his frequent childhood visits to the newly-inaugurated La...
' sculptures drew from cubism.
Becoming an intellectual, as well as artistic circle, painters like Antonio Berni
Antonio Berni
Delesio Antonio Berni was a figurative artist, born in Rosario, province of Santa Fe, Argentina. He worked as a painter, an illustrator and an engraver. His father, Napoleón Berni, was an immigrant tailor from Italy...
, Lino Enea Spilimbergo
Lino Enea Spilimbergo
Lino Enea Spilimbergo was an Argentine artist and engraver, and he is considered to be one of the country's most important painters....
and Juan Carlos Castagnino
Juan Carlos Castagnino
Juan Carlos Castagnino was an Argentine painter, architect, muralist and sketch artist.Born in the city of Mar del Plata, he studied in the Escuela de Bellas Artes in Buenos Aires, and became a disciple of Lino Enea Spilimbergo and Ramón Gómez Cornet.By the end of the 1920s, he became a member of...
were friends as well as colleagues, going on to collaborate on masterpieces like the ceiling at the Galerias Pacifico
Galerías Pacífico
Galerías Pacífico is a shopping centre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, located at the intersection of Florida Street and Córdoba Avenue.-Overview:...
arcade in Buenos Aires, towards 1933.
As in Mexico and elsewhere, muralism became increasingly popular among Argentine artists. Among the first to use his drab surroundings as a canvas was Benito Quinquela Martín
Benito Quinquela Martín
Benito Quinquela Martín , 1890 – January 28, 1977) was an Argentine painter born in La Boca, Buenos Aires. Quinquela Martín is considered the port painter-par-excellence and one of the most popular Argentine painters...
, whose vaguely cubist pastel-colored walls painted in his Buenos Aires neighborhood of La Boca
La Boca
La Boca is a neighborhood, or barrio of the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires. It retains a strong European flavour, with many of its early settlers being from the Italian city of Genoa. In fact the name has a strong assonance with the Genoese neighborhood of Boccadasse , and some people believe that...
during the 1920s and 1930s have become historical monuments and Argentine cultural emblems, worldwide. Lithographs, likewise, found a following in Argentina some time after they had been made popular elsewhere. In Argentina, artists like Adolfo Bellocq
Adolfo Bellocq
Adolfo Bellocq was an influential Argentine artist known for his lithographs.Born in Buenos Aires, Bellocq was self-taught in the art of xylography and engraving. He was appointed Director of the Lithography Workshop at Buenos Aires' renowned Ernesto de la Cárcova Fine Arts School, in 1928...
used this medium to portray often harsh working conditions in Argentina's growing industrial sector, during the 1920s and 1930s. Antonio Seguí
Antonio Seguí
- Biography :Seguí is the oldest son of a middle-class and has three siblings. In the years from 1951 to 1954 he traveled through Europe and Africa, was visiting student at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid and at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Paris,...
, another lithographer, transferred his naïve style into murals in numerous nations, as did Ricardo Carpani
Ricardo Carpani
Ricardo Carpani was an Argentine artist.-Life and work:Born in Tigre, a northern suburb of Buenos Aires, his family moved to the city proper in 1936, and there Carpani finished his secondary school studies...
, though in a realist style.
Futurism
Futurism was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century.Futurism or futurist may refer to:* Afrofuturism, an African-American and African diaspora subculture* Cubo-Futurism* Ego-Futurism...
and cubists
Cubism
Cubism was a 20th century avant-garde art movement, pioneered by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture...
like Xul Solar
Xul Solar
Xul Solar was the adopted name of Oscar Agustín Alejandro Schulz Solari , Argentine painter, sculptor, writer, and inventor of imaginary languages.-Biography:...
and Emilio Pettoruti
Emilio Pettoruti
Emilio Pettoruti was an Argentine painter, who caused a scandal with his avant-garde cubist exhibition in 1924 in Buenos Aires. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Buenos Aires was a city full of artistic development...
earned a following as considerable as that of less abstract and more sentimental portrait and landscape painters, like Raúl Soldi
Raúl Soldi
Raúl Soldi was an Argentine painter whose work treated various subjects, including landscapes, portraits, the theater and the circus, and nature. His theatrical figures are renowned for their melancholy appearance...
. Likewise, traditional abstract
Abstract art
Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
artists such as Romulo Macció
Romulo Macció
Romulo Macció is an Argentine painter associated with the local avant-garde art movement that took shape in the 1960s.-Life and work:...
, Anselmo Piccoli
Anselmo Piccoli
Anselmo Piccoli was an Argentine Abstract artist.-Life and work:Anselmo Piccoli was born in Rosario, Argentina in 1915. Politically active as a Socialist during secondary school, Piccoli found time to attend the local Gaspary Academy, where he was trained as a painter...
, Eduardo Mac Entyre
Eduardo Mac Entyre
Eduardo Mac Entyre is an Argentine painter well-known for his Pop art, particularly his geometric designs.Born in Buenos Aires to a Scottish father and Belgian mother, Mac Entyre began pursuing his talent for sketches at the age of twenty...
, Luis Felipe Noé
Luis Felipe Noé
Luis Felipe Noé is an artist, writer, intellectual and teacher from Buenos Aires, Argentina where he is known as Yuyo. In 1961 he formed Otra Figuración with three other Argentine artists. Their eponymous exhibition and subsequent work greatly influenced the Neofiguration movement...
and Luis Seoane
Luís Seoane
Luis Seoane was a lithographer and artist. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina on June 1, 1910, of Galician immigrants, he spent much of his childhood and youth in Galicia . He was educated in A Coruña...
coexisted with equal appeal as the most conceptual mobile art creators such as the unpredictable Pérez Celis
Pérez Celis
Celis Pérez was an Argentine artist usually referred to as Pérez Celis. He earned international recognition for his paintings, sculptures, murals and engravings.-Life and work:...
, Gyula Kosice
Gyula Kosice
Gyula Kosice, born Fernando Fallik in Košice is a naturalized Argentine sculptor, plastic artist, theoretician and poet, one of the most important figures in kinetic and luminal art and luminance vanguard....
of the Argentine Madí Movement and Marta Minujín
Marta Minujín
Marta Minujín is an Argentine Conceptual artist.-Life and work:Marta Minujín was born in the San Telmo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. She met a young economist, Juan Carlos Gómez Sabaini, and married him in secret in 1959; the couple had two children...
, one of Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
's most esteemed fellow Conceptual art
Conceptual art
Conceptual art is art in which the concept or idea involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns. Many of the works, sometimes called installations, of the artist Sol LeWitt may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions...
ists.
The emergence of avant-garde genres in Argentine sculpture also featured Pablo Curatella Manes
Pablo Curatella Manes
Pablo Curatella Manes was a prolific Argentine sculptor.-Life and work:Born in La Plata in 1891 to Clara Manes, a Greek Argentine immigrant, and Antonio Curatella, from Italy, Curatella Manes first acquired an interest in sculpture during his frequent childhood visits to the newly-inaugurated La...
and Roberto Aizenberg
Roberto Aizenberg
Roberto Aizenberg was a painter and sculptor...
, and constructivist
Constructivism (art)
Constructivism was an artistic and architectural philosophy that originated in Russia beginning in 1919, which was a rejection of the idea of autonomous art. The movement was in favour of art as a practice for social purposes. Constructivism had a great effect on modern art movements of the 20th...
s such as Nicolás García Uriburu
Nicolás García Uriburu
Nicolás García Uriburu is an Argentine contemporary artist, landscape architect and ecologist.-Life and work:Born in Buenos Aires in 1937, García Uriburu began painting at an early age and, in 1954, secured his first exhibition at the local Müller Gallery...
and Leon Ferrari
León Ferrari
León Ferrari , is a contemporary conceptual artist.Born in Buenos Aires, Ferrari employs methods such as collage, photocopying and sculpture in wood, plaster or ceramics. He often uses text, particularly newspaper clippings or poetry, in his pieces...
, one of the world's foremost artists in his genre, today. In the 1960s and 1970s, many of these figures' abstract art found their way into popular advertising and even corporate logos.
Generally possessing of a strong sentimental streak, the Argentine public's taste for naïve art and simple pottery cannot be overlooked. Since Prilidiano Pueyrredón's day, artists in the naïve vein like Cándido López
Cándido López
Cándido López was an Argentine painter and soldier. Born in Buenos Aires, he is considered one of Argentina's most important artists. He is most famous for his detailed paintings and drawings of battles of the War of the Triple Alliance, in which he also fought, losing his right arm...
have captured the absurdity of war, Susana Aguirre and Aniko Szabó the idiosyncrasies of everyday neighborhoods, Guillermo Roux
Guillermo Roux
Guillermo Roux is an Argentine painter known for his watercolors, collages and frescoes.Roux was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and his father, Raúl Roux, was a well-known Uruguayan painter. He studied in the Buenos Aires School of Fine Arts until 1948, and in 1956 he travelled to Rome...
's watercolors, a circus atmosphere, and Gato Frías, childhood memories. Illustrator Florencio Molina Campos
Florencio Molina Campos
Florencio Molina Campos was an Argentine illustrator and a painter known by his typical traditional scenes of the Pampa. His work represents gauchesco scenes with a bit of humor....
's tongue-in-cheek depictions of gaucho
Gaucho
Gaucho is a term commonly used to describe residents of the South American pampas, chacos, or Patagonian grasslands, found principally in parts of Argentina, Uruguay, Southern Chile, and Southern Brazil...
life have endured as collectors' items.
To help showcase Argentine and Latin American art and sculpture, local developer and art collector Eduardo Constantini
Eduardo Constantini
Eduardo Francisco Costantini is an Argentine real estate developer, businessman, philanthropist and head of the venture capital firm Consultatio, based in Buenos Aires.-Life and times:...
set aside a significant portion of his personal collection and, in 1998, began construction on Buenos Aires' first major institution specializing in works by Latin American artists. His foundation opened the Buenos Aires Museum of Latin American Art (MALBA)
MALBA
The Latin American Art Museum of Buenos Aires is a museum located on Figueroa Alcorta Avenue, in the Palermo section of Buenos Aires.Created by Argentine businessman Eduardo Constantini, the museum is operated by the not-for-profit Fundación MALBAConstantini, and was inaugurated on September 21,...
in 2001.
Sports
The official national sport of Argentina is patoPato
Pato is a game played on horseback that combine elements from polo and basketball. It is the national sport of Argentina.Pato is Spanish for "duck", as early games used a live duck inside a basket instead of a ball. Accounts of early versions of pato have been written since 1610. The playing field...
, played with a six-handle ball on horseback, but the most popular sport is association football. The national football team
Argentina national football team
The Argentina national football team represents Argentina in association football and is controlled by the Argentine Football Association , the governing body for football in Argentina. Argentina's home stadium is Estadio Monumental Antonio Vespucio Liberti and their head coach is Alejandro...
has won 25 major international titles including two FIFA World Cup
FIFA World Cup
The FIFA World Cup, often simply the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of Fédération Internationale de Football Association , the sport's global governing body...
s, two Olympic gold medals and fourteen Copa América
Copa América
The Copa América —previously known as South American Championship—is an international football competition contested between the men's national teams of CONMEBOL, the sport's continental governing body...
s. Over one thousand Argentine players play abroad, the majority of them in European football leagues. There are 331,811 registered football players, with increasing numbers of girls and women, who have organized their own national championships since 1991 and were South American champions in 2006.
The Argentine Football Association
Argentine Football Association
The Argentine Football Association is the governing body of football in Argentina. It organises the Argentine football league and the Argentina national football team. It is based in Buenos Aires...
(AFA) was formed in 1893 and is the eighth oldest national football association in the world. The AFA today counts 3,377 football clubs, including 20 in the Premier Division. Since the AFA went professional in 1931, fifteen teams have won national tournament titles, including River Plate
Club Atlético River Plate
Club Atlético River Plate is an Argentine sports club based in the Nuñez neighborhood of Buenos Aires. It is best known for its professional football team, which currently competes in Nacional B, the second tier of Argentine football....
with 33 and Boca Juniors
Boca Juniors
Club Atlético Boca Juniors is an Argentine sports club based in La Boca neighborhood of Buenos Aires. It is best known for its professional football team, which currently plays in the Primera División....
with 24. Over the last twenty years, futsal and beach soccer have become increasingly popular. The Argentine beach football team was one of four competitors in the first international championship for the sport, in Miami, in 1993.
Basketball is the second most popular sport; a number of basketball players play in the U.S. National Basketball Association
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...
and European leagues including Manu Ginóbili
Manu Ginobili
Emanuel David "Manu" Ginóbili is an Argentine professional basketball player. Coming from a family of professional basketball players, he is a member of the Argentine men's national basketball team and the San Antonio Spurs in the National Basketball Association .Ginóbili spent the early part of...
, Andrés Nocioni
Andrés Nocioni
Andrés Marcelo Nocioni is an Argentine professional basketball player. He is under contract with the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers, but is playing for Peñarol de Mar del Plata during the NBA lockout. A regular member of the Argentine national team, Nocioni was part of the team that won a gold medal at...
, Carlos Delfino
Carlos Delfino
Carlos Francisco Delfino is an Argentine professional basketball player. He also has Italian citizenship. Delfino plays at the small forward and shooting guard positions. He stands tall and weighs . He is also noted for his defensive skills...
, Luis Scola
Luis Scola
Luis Alberto Scola Balvoa is an Argentine professional basketball player. The power forward-center for the Argentine national team is currently signed with the NBA's Houston Rockets. He formerly was a Euroleague star with the ACB's Saski Baskonia...
and Fabricio Oberto
Fabricio Oberto
Fabricio Raúl Jesús Oberto is an Argentine professional basketball player. At and , he plays as a center. With Liga Nacional de Básquet in his native Argentina, Oberto began playing professionally in 1993 and later played overseas with teams in Spain and Greece...
. The men's national basketball team won Olympic gold in the 2004 Olympics
Basketball at the 2004 Summer Olympics
Basketball at the 2004 Summer Olympics took place at the Helliniko Olympic Indoor Arena in Athens, Greece for the preliminary rounds, with the latter stages being held in the Olympic Indoor Hall at the Athens Olympic Sports Complex....
and the bronze medal in 2008
Basketball at the 2008 Summer Olympics
Basketball contests at the 2008 Olympic Games were held from August 9, 2008 to August 24, 2008. Competitions were held at the Wukesong Indoor Stadium in Beijing, China...
. Argentina is currently ranked first by the International Basketball Federation
International Basketball Federation
The International Basketball Federation, more commonly known as FIBA , from its French name Fédération Internationale de Basketball, is an association of national organizations which governs international competition in basketball...
. Argentina has an important rugby union football
Rugby union in Argentina
Rugby union is a popular team sport played in Argentina. The first rugby match played in the country dates back to 1873, as the game was introduced by the British...
team, "Los Pumas
Argentina national rugby union team
The Argentina national rugby team, nicknamed Los Pumas, represents Argentina in international rugby union matches. The team, which plays in sky blue and white jerseys, is organised by the Argentine Rugby Union .Argentina played its first international rugby match in 1910 against a touring British...
", with many of its players playing in Europe. Argentina beat host nation France
France national rugby union team
The France national rugby union team represents France in rugby union. They compete annually against England, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales in the Six Nations Championship. They have won the championship outright sixteen times, shared it a further eight times, and have completed nine grand slams...
twice in the 2007 Rugby World Cup
2007 Rugby World Cup
The 2007 Rugby World Cup was the sixth Rugby World Cup, a quadrennial international rugby union competition inaugurated in 1987. Twenty nations competed for the Webb Ellis Cup in the tournament, which was hosted by France from 7 September to 20 October. France won the hosting rights in 2003,...
, placing them third in the competition. The Pumas are currently eighth in the official world rankings
IRB World Rankings
The IRB World Rankings is a ranking system for men's national teams in rugby union, managed by the International Rugby Board , the sport's governing body. The teams of the IRB's member nations are ranked based on their game results, with the most successful teams being ranked highest...
. Other popular sports include field hockey (particularly amongst women
Las Leonas
Argentina national women's field hockey team represents Argentina in women's field hockey. They are also known by the nickname Las Leonas, meaning "The Lionesses"...
), tennis, auto racing, boxing, volleyball, polo and golf.
The Vamos vamos Argentina
Vamos vamos Argentina
Vamos vamos Argentina is a very popular chant in Argentina, used by supporters in sports events, mainly in football matches of the national team and related celebrations.-Lyrics:In Spanish:English translation:...
chant is a trademark of Argentine fans during sporting events.
Theatre
Buenos Aires is one of the great capitals of theater. The Teatro Colón is a national landmark for opera and classical performances; built at the end of the 19th century, its acoustics are considered the best in the world, and is currently undergoing a major refurbishment in order to preserve its outstanding sound characteristics, the French-romantic style, the impressive Golden Room (a minor auditorium targeted to Chamber Music performances) and the museum at the entrance. With its theatre scene of national and international caliber, Corrientes AvenueCorrientes Avenue
Avenida Corrientes is one of the principal thoroughfares of the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires. The street is intimately tied to the tango and the porteño sense of identity...
is synonymous with the art. It is thought of as 'the street that never sleeps' and sometimes referred to as the Broadway of Buenos Aires. Many great careers in acting, music, and film have begun in its many theaters. The Teatro General San Martín
Teatro General San Martín
The Teatro General San Martin is an important public theater in Buenos Aires, located on Corrientes Avenue and adjacent to the cultural center of the same name...
is one of the most prestigious along Corrientes Avenue and the Teatro Nacional Cervantes
Cervantes Theatre (Buenos Aires)
The Cervantes National Theatre in Buenos Aires is the national stage and comedy theatre of Argentina.-History:The Cervantes Theatre of Buenos Aires owes its existence, in part, to the 1897 relocation to Argentina of Spanish theatre producer María Guerrero and her company, who popularized...
functions as the national stage theater of Argentina. The Teatro Argentino de La Plata
Teatro Argentino de La Plata
The Teatro Argentino de La Plata is the second most important lyric opera house in Argentina, after the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. The Teatro Argentino is located in a central block of the city of La Plata, the capital of Buenos Aires Province...
, El Círculo in Rosario
Rosario
Rosario is the largest city in the province of Santa Fe, Argentina. It is located northwest of Buenos Aires, on the western shore of the Paraná River and has 1,159,004 residents as of the ....
, Independencia
Teatro Independencia
The Teatro Independencia is the premier performing arts venue in Mendoza, Argentina.-History and overview:The theatre resulted from a provincial project for the creation of a hub for tourism along Independence Square, downtown...
in Mendoza and Libertador
Libertador Theatre
The Libertador San Martín Theatre is the premier stage theatre, opera house and concert hall in Córdoba, Argentina.-Overview:...
in Córdoba are also prominent. Griselda Gambaro
Griselda Gambaro
Griselda Gambaro is an Argentine writer, whose novels, plays, short stories, story tales, essays and novels for teenagers often concern the political violence in her home country that would develop into the Dirty War. One recurring theme is the desaparecidos and the attempts to recover their...
, Copi
Copi
Raúl Damonte Botana , better known by the nom de plume Copi , was an Argentine writer, cartoonist, and playwright who spent most of his career in Paris.-Biography:Damonte spent most of his youth in Montevideo...
, Roberto Cossa
Roberto Cossa
Roberto Cossa is a prominent Argentine playwright and theatre director.-Life and work:Roberto Cossa was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and raised in the quiet residential borough of Villa del Parque. He first performed in theatre at the age of 17 and, in 1957, he and friends founded the San...
, Marco Denevi
Marco Denevi
Marco Denevi was an Argentine award-winning author of novels and short stories, as well as a lawyer and journalist. His work is characterized by its originiality and depth, as well as a criticism of human incompetence. His first work, a mystery called Rosaura a las diez , was a Kraft award...
, Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza is a prominent Argentine playwright, theatre director and novelist.-Life and work:Carlos Gorostiza was born to Basque Argentine parents in the upscale Buenos Aires borough of Palermo...
, and Alberto Vaccarezza
Alberto Vaccarezza
Bartolomé Ángel Venancio Alberto Vaccarezza was an Argentine poet and playwright.Vaccarezza was born in Buenos Aires on April 1, 1886. He is usually credited as the foremost exponent of the sainete genre, having written its most popular play, El Conventillo de La Paloma...
are a few of the more prominent Argentine playwrights. Julio Bocca
Julio Bocca
Julio Bocca is one of the most important ballet dancers of the later part of the 20th century and arguably the most important Argentine dancer of all time....
, Jorge Donn
Jorge Donn
Jorge Donn, born in El Palomar, Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 25 February 1947, was an internationally-known ballet dancer, he was best known for his work with the Maurice Béjart's Ballet company, and his participation as lead dancer in Claude Lelouch's film Les Uns et les Autres. He died of AIDS on...
, José Neglia
José Neglia
José Neglia was a notable Argentine ballerino, who perhaps more than any other figure, helped popularize the classical ballet in his country.-Life and work:...
and Norma Fontenla
Norma Fontenla
Norma Fontenla was an Argentine prima ballerina.-Life and work:Fontenla was born in 1930, and while still a child, began attending the National Conservatory of Music and Scenic Art, in Buenos Aires. She was later accepted into the dance school of the Colón Theatre, the nation's premier opera house...
are some of the great ballet dancers of the modern era.
History
Juan José de Vértiz y Salcedo
Juan José de Vértiz y Salcedo was a Spanish colonial politician born in New Spain, and Viceroy of the Río de la Plata.-Biography:...
's creation of the colony's first comedy theatre (La Ranchería) in 1783. This development was complemented by the 1804 opening of the Teatro Coliseo in Buenos Aires, the nation's longest-continuously operating stage. The musical creator of the Argentine National Anthem, Blas Parera
Blas Parera
Blas Parera was a Spanish music composer. He lived his part of his life in Buenos Aires.He was born in Catalunya, Spain and, in 1797, he moved to Buenos Aires. He contributed in the defence of the port of Buenos Aires during the British invasions of the Río de la Plata...
, earned fame as a theatre score writer during the early 19th century. The genre suffered during the regime of Juan Manuel de Rosas
Juan Manuel de Rosas
Juan Manuel de Rosas , was an argentine militar and politician, who was elected governor of the province of Buenos Aires in 1829 to 1835, and then of the Argentine Confederation from 1835 until 1852...
, though it flourished alongside the economy later in the century. The national government gave Argentine theatre its initial impulse with the establishment of the Colón Theatre in 1857, which hosted classical and operatic as well as stage performances. Antonio Petalardo's successful 1871 gambit on the opening of the Teatro Opera
Teatro Opera
The Teatro Opera is a prominent cinema and theatre house in Buenos Aires, Argentina.-Overview:The Opera Theatre was developed in 1871 by Antonio Petalardo, a local businessman who foresaw a need for popular theatre catering to the city's booming population in subsequent years...
inspired others to fund the growing art in Argentina.
The 1874 murder of Juan Moreira
Juan Moreira
Juan Moreira is a well-known figure in the history of Argentina, an outlaw, gaucho and folk-hero, was indeed one of the more renowned Argentinian rural bandits.-Early life:...
, a persecuted troubadour
Troubadour
A troubadour was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages . Since the word "troubadour" is etymologically masculine, a female troubadour is usually called a trobairitz....
, provided dramatists with a new hero. Possessing all the elements of tragedy
Tragedy
Tragedy is a form of art based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of...
, the anecdote inspired Eduardo Gutiérrez
Eduardo Gutiérrez
Eduardo Gutiérrez was an Argentine writer. His works of gauchoesque nature acquired great popularity, specially Juan Moreira, a novel successfully adapted to the stage in 1884 that popularized the gaucho as a protagonist in Argentine theatre.-References:...
's 1884 play Juan Moreira and the work made the gaucho
Gaucho
Gaucho is a term commonly used to describe residents of the South American pampas, chacos, or Patagonian grasslands, found principally in parts of Argentina, Uruguay, Southern Chile, and Southern Brazil...
the inspiration for the Argentine stage in subsequent years. Spanish literature
Spanish literature
Spanish literature generally refers to literature written in the Spanish language within the territory that presently constitutes the state of Spain...
began to overtake the gaucho following the 1897 relocation to Argentina of Spanish theatre producer María Guerrero
María Guerrero
María Guerrero Torija was a prominent Spanish theatre actor, producer and director.-Life and work:María Guerrero Torija was born in Madrid, in 1867. She enrolled at the Official School of Declamation, in the prestigious Madrid Royal Conservatory, where she was trained in the theatre with dramatist...
and her company, who popularized professional stage theatre in the country. Making the Teatro Odeón
Teatro Odeón
The Teatro Odeón was a theater in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was built by Don Emilio Bieckert in the end of the 19th century. In July 1896, it hosted the first ever film screening in Argentina. It was demolished in 1991 in order to make space for the construction of a parking lot....
a nerve center for the medium, her evolved stagecraft
Stagecraft
Stagecraft is a generic term referring to the technical aspects of theatrical, film, and video production. It includes, but is not limited to, constructing and rigging scenery, hanging and focusing of lighting, design and procurement of costumes, makeup, procurement of props, stage management, and...
led to the creation of the national stage, the Cervantes Theatre
Cervantes Theatre (Buenos Aires)
The Cervantes National Theatre in Buenos Aires is the national stage and comedy theatre of Argentina.-History:The Cervantes Theatre of Buenos Aires owes its existence, in part, to the 1897 relocation to Argentina of Spanish theatre producer María Guerrero and her company, who popularized...
, in 1921.
The wave of European Immigration in Argentina created a need for a cultural shift in theatre addressed by Florencio Sánchez
Florencio Sánchez
Florencio Sánchez was a Uruguayan playwright, journalist and political figure. His artistic work unfolded in the River Plate region...
, a pioneer in professional theater locally and in Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...
. Local color became the primary inspiration for Roberto Arlt
Roberto Arlt
Roberto Arlt was an Argentine writer.-Biography:He was born Roberto Godofredo Christophersen Arlt in Buenos Aires on April 2, 1900. His parents were both immigrants: his father Karl Arlt was a Prussian from Posen and his mother was Ekatherine Iobstraibitzer, a native of Trieste and Italian speaking...
, Gregorio de Laferrère
Gregorio de Laferrère
Gregorio de Laferrère was an Argentine politician and playwright.-Life and work:Gregorio de Laferrère was born in Buenos Aires to Mercedes Pereda, a local heiress, and Alfonso de Laferrère, a prominent French Argentine landowner. One of three brothers, he earned his secondary school education at...
, Armando Discépolo, Antonio Cunill Cabanellas
Antonio Cunill Cabanellas
Antonio Cunill Cabanellas was an influential Catalan-Argentine playwright, theatre actor, director and instructor.-Life and work:...
and Roberto Payró
Roberto Payró
Roberto Jorge Payró was an Argentine writer and journalist.Payró founded the newspaper La Tribuna in the city of Bahía Blanca, where he published his first newspaper articles. He then moved to the city of Buenos Aires where he worked as an editor at the newspaper La Nación...
during the 1920s and 1930s, while also helping amateur theatre
Amateur theatre
Amateur theatre is theatre performed by amateur actors. These actors are not typically members of Actors' Equity groups or Actors' Unions as these organizations exist to protect the professional industry and therefore discourage their members from appearing with companies which are not a signatory...
revive locally. The Teatro Independiente movement created a counterwight to professional theatre and inspired a new generation of young dramatists in this vein such as Copi
Copi
Raúl Damonte Botana , better known by the nom de plume Copi , was an Argentine writer, cartoonist, and playwright who spent most of his career in Paris.-Biography:Damonte spent most of his youth in Montevideo...
, Agustín Cuzzani
Agustín Cuzzani
Agustín Cuzzani was an Argentine dramatist, known for his satiric vision and criticism of the capitalist society. He is famous for having created farsátira as a theatrical genre. His most famous and transcendental work is El centroforward murió al amanecer...
, Osvaldo Dragún
Osvaldo Dragún
Osvaldo Dragún was a prominent Argentine playwright and theatre director.-Life and work:Osvaldo Dragún was born in Colonia Berro, a Jewish agricultural settlement in Entre Ríos Province, Argentina. After his father's linseed farm suffered from recurrent locust problems, the family left the...
and Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza is a prominent Argentine playwright, theatre director and novelist.-Life and work:Carlos Gorostiza was born to Basque Argentine parents in the upscale Buenos Aires borough of Palermo...
.
Gorostiza and other self-trained dramatists also popularized Realism in the Argentine theatre after 1950, a genre advanced by Ricardo Halac, Roberto Cossa
Roberto Cossa
Roberto Cossa is a prominent Argentine playwright and theatre director.-Life and work:Roberto Cossa was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and raised in the quiet residential borough of Villa del Parque. He first performed in theatre at the age of 17 and, in 1957, he and friends founded the San...
and among others. Griselda Gambaro
Griselda Gambaro
Griselda Gambaro is an Argentine writer, whose novels, plays, short stories, story tales, essays and novels for teenagers often concern the political violence in her home country that would develop into the Dirty War. One recurring theme is the desaparecidos and the attempts to recover their...
and Eduardo Pavlovsky popularized the theatre of the absurd
Theatre of the Absurd
The Theatre of the Absurd is a designation for particular plays of absurdist fiction, written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, as well as to the style of theatre which has evolved from their work...
in Argentina after 1960, a genre that found local variant in the grotesque
Grotesque
The word grotesque comes from the same Latin root as "Grotto", meaning a small cave or hollow. The original meaning was restricted to an extravagant style of Ancient Roman decorative art rediscovered and then copied in Rome at the end of the 15th century...
works of Julio Mauricio and Roberto Cossa, whose La Nona became an iconic character in the Argentine theatre in 1977.
Argentina's last dictatorship
National Reorganization Process
The National Reorganization Process was the name used by its leaders for the military government that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983. In Argentina it is often known simply as la última junta militar or la última dictadura , because several of them existed throughout its history.The Argentine...
posed the greatest challenge to the development of local theatre since the Rosas era of the mid-19th century. Numerous actors, playwrights and technicians emigrated after 1976, though the dictators' own sense of the theatrical persuaded them to loosen pressures on artists around 1980. Seizing the opportunity, playwright Osvaldo Dragún
Osvaldo Dragún
Osvaldo Dragún was a prominent Argentine playwright and theatre director.-Life and work:Osvaldo Dragún was born in Colonia Berro, a Jewish agricultural settlement in Entre Ríos Province, Argentina. After his father's linseed farm suffered from recurrent locust problems, the family left the...
marshalled colleagues to restore an abandoned sparkplug factory to organize the improvisational Argentine Open Theatre
Argentine Open Theatre
The Argentine Open Theatre was an independent theatre company in Buenos Aires, Argentina.-Origins:The theatre in Argentina had developed alongside the nation's emergence as a modern economy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries...
in 1981, a triumph dampened by their Picadero Theatre's fire-bombing a week later.
The theatre thrived before and after the 1983 return to democracy
Argentine general election, 1983
The Argentine general election of 1983 was held on 30 October and marked the return of Democracy after the 1976's dictatorship self-known as National Reorganization Process...
. Established playwrights and directors such as Norman Briski
Norman Briski
Norman Briski is a well-known Argentine theatre actor, director and playwright, as well as a noted cinema and television actor.-Life and work:Naum Normando Briski was born in Santa Fe, Argentina, in 1938...
, Roberto Cossa, Lito Cruz
Lito Cruz
Lito Cruz is a prominent Argentine stage director and motion picture actor.-Life and work:Lito was born Oscar Alberto Cruz in the working-class La Plata suburb of Berisso in 1941, and began performing in local theatres at the age of 15. Graduating from a La Plata secondary school, he continued to...
, Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza
Carlos Gorostiza is a prominent Argentine playwright, theatre director and novelist.-Life and work:Carlos Gorostiza was born to Basque Argentine parents in the upscale Buenos Aires borough of Palermo...
, Pacho O'Donnell
Pacho O'Donnell
Mario O'Donnell , best known as Pacho O'Donnell, is an Argentine writer, politician and physician who specializes in psychoanalysis....
and Pepe Soriano
Pepe Soriano
Pepe Soriano is a prominent Argentine actor and playwright.-Life and work:Soriano was born and raised in Buenos Aires, Argentina...
and younger dramatists such as Luis Agostoni, Carlos María Alsina, Eduardo Rovner and Rafael Spregelburd. Works by these and other local authors, as well as local productions of international works, are among the over 80 theater works presented every weekend in Buenos Aires, alone. The stage also plays host to well-known comedy acts, such as those of satirist Enrique Pinti
Enrique Pinti
Enrique Pinti is a famous Argentine political humorist and actor.As a humorist, he performs stand-up shows with long monologues on Argentine politics and history, speaking at an extremely fast pace and resorting to a mix of common swearwords and elaborate insults to qualify notorious examples of...
, female impersonator Antonio Gasalla
Antonio Gasalla
Antonio Gasalla is a well-known Argentine actor, comedian, and theatre director.-Life and work:Antonio Gasalla was born in Ramos Mejía, a western suburb of Buenos Aires, in 1941...
, storyteller Luis Landriscina and the musical comedy troupe, Les Luthiers
Les Luthiers
Les Luthiers is an Argentine comedy-musical group, very popular also in several other Spanish-speaking countries such as Paraguay, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Spain, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay, Bolivia, Cuba and Venezuela. They were formed in 1967 by Gerardo Masana, during the height of a period of very...
.
External links
- Sistema Nacional de Consumos Culturales ("National System of Cultural Consumption") – Official website. It contains a report of a comprehensive, nationwide statistical study of cultural mores, undertaken in August 2005.
- Argentine Culture, Riches and Diversity