MACN - Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales - Part 2

MACN's building is fantastic with lots of nature-related architectural details like friezes of indigenous fauna and clever metal spider webs in the doors. Unfortunately most of the museum has been cheaply modernized with bland lightbox displays and long texts, like in this room above.

MACN - Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales - Part 1

The Natural Science museum in Buenos Aires [or MACN] is located in Parque Centenario which is between Caballito and Villa Crespo, roughly in the geographic center of Capital Federal. It shouldn't be confused with the better known [and better] natural science museum in La Plata [see pictures here and here]. The La Plata museum is worth the day-trip but the museum in Buenos Aires is an interesting place if you've run out of other things to see.

Photographically these types of museums are a nearly perfect subject; exotic, colorful, accessible, immobile and dramatically lit. Perhaps that's why these sorts of diorama photos, I'm thinking of Sugimoto's Dioramas, have become such a cliche. Anyway, I've never made any claims to originality with this blogs' photos, so without further ado, here's some more photos:



See also my post on the museum from last year.

Palo Borracho in Barracas

Pixelated House

I don't know how I would classify the style of this house. They seem to have anticipated the computer-age. Also, it seems the jpg compression algorithm really doesn't like the pattern on this house.

Bricked up in Barracas

It's common to fill-in the windows with bricks or cinder blocks when they're not occupied to prevent squatters, who can be hard to evict because of Argentine law. What surprised me about this building is that it doesn't even appear to be abandoned. There's a garage on the ground floor and the building on the left looks occupied on the upper floor. This was pretty close to La Boca where a huge number of buildings are squatter occupied so perhaps the owners are being extra-vigilant.

Chalets in Barracas

I like how this little chalet is crowded in by taller buildings on all sides.


When I first went exploring around Barracas I was surprised to find Chalet-style houses, some really huge. I'd thought of the neighborhood as gritty and industrial, which it is, mostly, but obviously there's money here. I had bad luck on this day. The batteries in both my cameras died while I was walking around.

Vox Pop for The Argentimes

Each edition of The Argentimes has a section called Vox Pop where people on the street are asked for their thoughts about recent events. I went out at lunchtime around Plaza de Mayo with one of the reporters and we asked people about the recent elections. We did this on June 30th, a couple of days after the mid-term elections in which the Kirchner's lost their majority in Congress. Unfortunately the second is only in the printed edition of the paper so I can't link to their quotes. People's reactions were generally pleased at the results, not surprising since Cristina's popularity has been hovering around 30% for most of the last year.

I'm a little shy when it comes to photographing people. This was good practice in approaching people. Doing it in a journalistic context certainly helped. In generally people were more than happy to provide a quote and have their picture taken. I'd say about half the people we approached agreed.

Tranqui Yanqui Fashion Show

Images from Saturday night's Fashion show by American performance artist Tranqui Yanqui. He creates illustrations, objects and clothes mixing up iconography of hip-hop culture, Uncle Sam, fileteado among other influences. Tranqui is, as he describes it on his website:

Un pibe gringo de Miami, que hace algunos performances aca en la ciudad de Buenos Aires.

Provocando preguntas, confusión, y curiosidad. Yo soy parte de mi arte; que incluye tambien el fashion, el dibujo, la pintura, el quilombo.

We have some friends in common and in addition to that, my boyfriend was one of the models in the show. For more images, my friend Beatrice has a set of photos up on Flickr.

For more info on Tranqui Yanqui [Nick Mahshie] go check out these articles from La Nacion, the Buenos Aires Herald and The Argentimes.

Graffiti Mundo at Casa L'Inc

Jo and Marina, the women behind Graffiti Mundo which I featured here a couple of months ago. This past Saturday they hosted an opening at the Casa L'inc gallery featuring a show they curated of street artists they show on their tour. The art works are now for sale on their website.


Each artist painted the wall on which their works were hung. I thought it was an ingenious way to tie the works to their street origins.


That guy in the middle is totally checking me out.


Choripan para todos!!!

My Buenos Aires: Weird Architecture, Graffiti, Gigantografias & Ford Falcons

It's been a couple of weeks since I've taken a good walk around some random neighborhood in Buenos Aires. These are a few miscellaneous images from my trip a walk a couple of weeks ago:


I don't like this photo above but it represents a certain visual style that's inescapable here; the large printed signs that cover most facades and fill up the city's visual space with their bright colors and home-grown designs. Then also the graffiti too.


I like to say I'm anti-nostalgic in my photography. I hate all those photos of Cuba with the old American cars. But I can't help myself. I'm a sucker for Ford Falcons.


And more weird architecture. This looks like a house on top of a warehouse. It reminded me a little of the Boston City Hall.

Therapy in Buenos Aires

Some of my photos were just published in The Argentimes in an article on psychoanalysis in Argentina.


Pictured above is Dr. Andres Raskovsky who is quoted in the article. That's his couch in the first photo. Below are some more photos of my friend Andres who is a psychologist and attends to patients from his apartment in Villa Crespo. It's a modest office but I appreciate his attention to detail and little touches:




I also posted a photo of Andres' consultorio back in May.

Electra at La Ratonera

On Thursday I had the opportunity to photograph the final dress rehearsal of a small production of Sophocles' Electra. The show debuts this Sunday at La Ratonera, an alternative theatre and cultural space in Villa Crespo. I guess you could call this Off-Corrientes theatre although, ironically, La Ratonera is actually located on Avenida Corrientes, just in another neighborhood. Click here for more info about the show.

Photojournalism show at Palais de Glace

Until July 26th at Palais de Glace in Recoleta is a show reviewing Argentine photojournalism from last year. I enjoyed reliving last year's news; the smoke, the campo strike, random crime. Taken individually the show's 400 images are striking but collectively I found it a bit exhausting. I find a react this way to a lot of photojournalism. Downstairs is a curious show by the photographer Marcos Zimmerman. Called Desnudos Sudamericanos the show is a series of portraits of men, mostly working class, in Argentina, Chile, Peru, Boliva, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, naked. Most of the settings could be right out of a cheap porn film except that the photographs themselves are exquisite in their composition, lighting, posing and attention to contextual detail. I was puzzled by the nudity. It seemed like an awkward hook, unnecessary. Anyway, if you're in Buenos Aires, you can go see for yourself or browse his website. Finally at the newly reopened Fundacion Proa in La Boca is a show of Dusseldorf photographers [Gursky, Struth, etc] with their cold, precise, gorgeous and ginormous prints.

Talleres Rivon

I liked the bright yellow against the drab gray building and sky. The Peuegot 206 also adds a bit of contemporary detail. Talleres Rivon has a website. Despite the ravages of 1990s neoliberalism, Buenos Aires has a lot of industry. Most of the big factories are located outside of the Capital in the conurbano but there's a lot of light industry and warehouses located amongst the resential neighborhoods of Buenos Aires proper.

White Accents

Three color houses with white accents. I like the pastel color palette of Buenos Aires, especially in winter.

Bizarro Houses in Monte Castro

I was out walking in one of the far out neighborhoods in Buenos Aires, Monte Castro, when I came across this one block of really bizarre looking houses. I've come across this tacky 1970s style before, mostly in Zona Norte or nearby Villa Devoto. These houses were all bunched together on a single block, the 4900 of Jose de Maturana. The surrounding streets are much more modest and simple. It must have been some vacant lot all developed at the same time.






This blog has been evolving of late. I've been taking my Mamiya 7 around the city in search of Chalet style houses, which are mostly found in the outlying neighborhoods. I also take along my very small Canon SD1000 which I use mostly for visual note taking and to capture random stuff. It's mostly been this random stuff that I've been putting up on the blog lately.

In other news there's a sanitary emergency for swine flu. Schools are closed but, so far, not restaurants or discos. I've seen a few people wearing face masks but I've seen many older women covering their mouths with scarves.

Villa Luro Yellow

I always love it when owners of different sides of the same structure give them different paint jobs. I also really liked this shade of yellow as well as the red and green.

Landscaping

The owner of this groundfloor apartment is clearly making the most of a limited space for landscaping.