Quinquela Martín Biography

Benito Chinchella [hispanized Quinquela by himself] Martín (1890 - 1977) is known as el pintor de La Boca, because that neighborhood, its port and its people are the main themes of his work.

            Abandoned as a baby child by his biological family, at the age of seven he was adopted by Justina Molina and Manuel Chinchella, a Genovese immigrant from whom Benito took his last name and his first occupation: loading and unloading coal from the tied up ships in Vuelta de Rocha.       

            He started to paint intuitively in his childhood. Except for some lessons in a cultural institution, Benito hadn’t any formal education; his training was self-taught, and his lifetime inspiration, the port’s life. His technique demonstrates both the heterodoxy of his painting and his art conception: since 1918, almost his entire work was painted with a palette knife.     

            Despite the early success he achieved, Quinquela never left La Boca and made many donations to the neighborhood, among others, the current school-museum “Pedro de Mendoza” next to Caminito.

            Many years before his death, he prepared his own coffin, “because a man who has lived surrounded by colors can’t be buried in a plain box”. He lies in that water-coloured coffin in which top Quinquela had painted a sailing ship. 

 QUINQUELA'S HANDS

 "ACCIDENTE EN EL PUERTO" ("ACCIDENT IN THE PORT"). ETCHING

 "CREPÚSCULO" ("TWILIGHT"). OIL PAINTING

The meaning behind "facturas" names

            If you are already in Argentina, surely you have tasted our facturas: those sweet little cakes we eat for breakfast or in the afternoon. There are many kinds of facturas and each of them has its particular name: medialunas, sacramentos, cañoncitos, vigilantes…

What is the origin of these strange names? At the end of the 19^th and beginning of the 20^th century, the baker’s labor union was (as most of the working movement of that period in Argentina) anarchist, so they gave name to facturas with sacrilegious and mocking references to their enemy institutions, the Catholic Church and the Army.

Bolas de fraile (“friar balls”), suspiros de monja (“nun sighs”), sacramentos and cañoncitos (“little cannons”) are linguistic traces of that political struggle.

A BANNER OF THE BAKER'S LABOR UNION IN A WORKER'S DEMONSTRATION

The verbal form HAY

The verbal form HAY is the result of the contraction of the verb HABER in third person + the adverb AHÍ.

"RECORDAR" Etymology

           COR, CORDIS means “heart” in Latin. From there comes the Spanish noun CORAZÓN, of course, but also the verb RECORDAR (“to remember”).

           So, if you remember something in Spanish, you are basically doing it with your heart.

El Obelisco

           One of the greatest icons of the city, El Obelisco was designed by the architect Alberto Prebisch and it was built (in only 31 days!) to commemorate the fourth centenary of the first foundation of Buenos Aires (1536). It is located where the Argentinian flag was raised for the first time in the city. 

Here four photos of its construction and opening in 1936.

Carlos Gardel Biography

Carlos Gardel (1887?, 1890? - 1935) is considered the creator of the tango vocal technique and the author of some of the most beautiful melodies in tango history. The people gave him some friendly nicknames that express the familiar admiration he have produced: “Carlitos”, “el zorzal criollo”, “el morocho del Abasto”, "La Sonrisa" and the ironic and humorous “el mudo” ("the mute").

A popular saying summarizes the quality of his singing: still after Gardel’s death, porteños say “Gardel cada día canta mejor” (“Gardel sings better and better each day”), as if his voice were something alive and always present among us.

He recorded between 1912 and 1935. Some of his well known songs are Mano a mano, Volver, El día que me quieras, Mi Buenos Aires querido, Melodía de arrabal, Por una cabeza, Lejana tierra mía, Golondrinas, Cuando  tú no estás, Soledad.

CARLITOS IN THE STUDIO

"EL DÍA QUE ME QUIERAS", FROM THE FILM EL DÍA QUE ME QUIERAS (1935)