El Zanjon

El Zanjon is a historic home that found new life when local historian Jorge Eckstein bought the property and began renovations in 1985. The original plan for Eckstein was to renovate the building and turn the space into a part restaurant, part art gallery for his artist wife. As they began renovations on the crumbling building, they realized that there were more layers, literally, than originally thought to the building. Above ground, the house is a beautiful 1830s, Spanish-style mansion complete with an open air-cistern and a lookout tower. After the wealthy family abandoned this house, most probably in the 1870s due to the yellow fever outbreak in San Telmo, the space became a communal home for immigrants and squatters for over 100 years. When Eckstein began the renovations, the home was filled with over 100 years of trash and debris. 139 truckloads of debris later, it was realized that the mansion was actually build upon another full living space that dated back to the 16th century and had been built on top of the original river's path through San Telmo. Since this time, the river has been rerouted (the smell and the rodents were not a great part of this area...moving the river helped) but the tunnels build to contain the river for hygiene reasons remain. This museum is a beautiful restoration of the original house and displays many artifacts found during the renovation, items that represent daily life in many different time periods.

El Zanjon
Location: Defensa 755, San Telmo
Phone: (54-11) 4361-3002
Hours: It is best call first for availability prior to visit. Spanish tours every hour Mon - Fri 11:00am - 4:00pm; every 30 minutes Sun 1:00pm - 6:00pm. English tours available, again, call first. Visitation to museum only available through a tour, open admission not available.
Admission: $30 pesos for hour tour, $15 pesos for 30 minute tour

This museum also offers a venue for private parties and events. Contact eventos@elzanjon.com.ar for information.

Mini-Messi and World Cup Fever

Pausing from my Museum Week posts, I am inclined to write a about a little event that you may have heard of called The World Cup.

La Copa Mundial has taken Argentina by storm.

Thank you Married & Mobile for this amazing pic

Soccer/Futbol is the complete focus of the country until July 11 (or until Argentina loses). The Saturday of their first game, Buenos Aires was a ghost town. Shops were closed, traffic was non-existent. There are a number of places set up in the city for people to watch the games for free, as posted on this amazing blog: My Buenos Aires Travel Guide, we are surely planning on joining the crowds at Plaza San Martin for at least one of the games (possibly when my brother Chris is in town next week, Hooray!). The Argentinean team started off strong by winning their first match against Nigeria 1-0. This resulted in a huge, hilarious, blow-up Maradona head to be paraded around the center of the city known here as the Obelisco, known to us as the miniature Washington Monument). Diego Maradona is currently the coach of the Argentine national team, but is more famous for his "Hand of God" goal during the 1986 World Cup games, his highly publicized issues with drugs and weight, and his most recent venture, a reality TV show star. I would like to send a personal shout out to Coach Maradona, thank you for providing constant entertainment during the game, I look forward to more hilarity in the games to come.

Don't worry, we are also following the US team's progress, and were quite satisfied with the 1-1 draw with England in their first game, even if the goal was a partial fluke, we'll take it!

Mini-Messi-Caden cheering from afar

Tomorrow morning, 8:30 Bs.As. time marks the second game for team Argentina, this time against South Korea. We will be cheering for our adopted team, so much so that we have already begun recruiting our friend's children for the 2030 World Cup. Those colors really bring out his baby blues!

The World Cup has been easy to get interested in, even for this non-soccer-loving girl. I can trace it back to the traumatic experience I had with soccer back in the day when my family lived in Atlanta. I was in third grade, and EVERYONE played soccer, so my parents signed me up. Somehow I ended up as the only girl on an all boy-extremely competitive, semi-ghetto team of thugs that hated me. This was compounded by the fact that I was terrible. The season came to a climax when, during a game, a boy on my team (if I remember right, he had a gold front tooth - as an 8-year-old) deliberately kicked the ball as hard as he could into my belly. This is the only time in my life that I've had the wind knocked out of me. I still harbor hard feelings towards this kid, Bubba or Beau or Trent or some other ridiculous southern boy's name.

Jonathan Brandis, my childhood crush.

At the end of the season my mom, being a good team mom, arranged for a team party where everyone received a trophy and had a special trophy made for me that was a girl, instead of a boy, kicking a soccer ball. This raised some sort of controversy among the team and the parents - redic. Needless to say, I've hated soccer ever since. Not even hunky heartthrob Jonathan Brandis (may he rest in peace) and his role in the girl-soccer movie Ladybugs could change my mind, and at that time, if anyone could make me like soccer, Jonathan Brandis could.

Not that I've totally turned around, but now that we're in Argentina, I do enjoy the World Cup.

I'm loving the blue and white stripes worn by every man, woman, child and dog in this city and I'm even, dare I say, liking the whole vuvuzelo debate. It's funny to walk down the street and hear that crazy humming of the vuvuzelos - you know there is a TV close by with the game on. And who doesn't love the infamous "Goooooooolllllllllllllllllll!" cry whenever someone scores!? It's a country full of soccer/futbol-loving-passion. Vamos Argentina!

Museo Fortabat

Lornie and I staying out of the rain

More correctly named Coleccion de Arte Amalia Lacroze de Fortabat, this museum is a lesser known spot that just recently opened in October 2008 and is such a hidden find (or just too new) that it only shows up in 1 of my 4 tour books. Kudos to the thorough writers at Eyewitness Travel.

Coleccion de Arte Amalia Lacroze de Fortabat

Location: Olga Cossenttini 141, Puerto Madero

Phone: (54-11) 4310-6600
Hours: 12:00pm - 9:00pm Tues - Sun, Closed Mon
Admission: $15 pesos for adults, $8 pesos for kids under 12, seniors, students and educators

We stumbled upon this museum during one of the many days of rain we had during Jon's parent's visit. The approx. 65,000 square foot building is impressive enough to warrant the entry fee, it is incredibly modern and almost exclusively steel and glass. A unique design detail is the retractable aluminium roof made of individual shields that change with the location of the sun, similar to a robotic sunflower. The building has four floors of art exhibits divided into themed rooms, each room larger than the last. There are also these crazy state-of-the-art escalators throughout the museum that accelerate when you step onto them, quite fancy.

According to the ever-trusted Wikipedia, Ms. Amalia Lacroze de Fortabat is worth over US$2 billion and therefore, Argentina's wealthiest woman. I have no doubts that this is true, considering that this entire museum is merely a sampling of her private art collection. She has an unbelievable art collection including a portrait of herself done by Andy Warhol, one of my favorites - the painting pictured to the right "Bouquet de Printemps" by Marc Chagall and an assortment of Argentine artists and international artists alike. The second floor is dedicated to objects in her collection, carvings and sculptures, some of which date back to over 2,000 BC. This museum will appeal to almost everyone considering that the collection is so diverse, many styles and eras are represented, and for the individuals that don't particularly like museums or art, the building is enough to keep you interested.

There are guided tours everyday (except Sunday and Monday when they're closed) at 3:00 and 5:00pm. English tours can be arranged in advance for groups by calling the museum or emailing visitas@coleccionforabat.org.ar. They also have fancy-shmancy iPhone audio tour that allows you to explore the museum at your own pace and touch the thumbnail icon of selected pieces when you are ready for the explanation. I cannot remember if there is an additional cost for the tour - and the website does not list a price - so this may be included in the admission price. There is also a restaurant adjacent to the museum, La Coleccion, that offers decent food at reasonable prices (for that area of town) and a great view of the port.

Museo Nacional De Bellas Artes

One of the museum's many exhibitions

The Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes is difficult to miss considering that it is located on one of the busiest streets in Buenos Aires and is almost directly adjacent to the Flor de Metal, one of the most recognized sights in the city.  That, and the building is red.  

Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes

Location: Av. Del Libertador 1473, Recoleta 

Phone: (54-11) 4803-8814/4803-0802/4803-4691
Hours: 12:30pm - 8:30pm Tues - Fri, 9:30am - 8:30pm Sat, Sun & Holidays, Closed Mon
Admission: Free! 

This museum opened its doors on Christmas day, 1895 in the building that is currently the Galerias Pacifico mall on Florida Street.  The collection lived through a couple of location changes until it settled into its current location, previously a major waterworks building, in 1932.  The museum is quite large with something like 35 exhibition rooms that are organized by era, artist origin and style.  According to Eyewitness Travel, there are over 12,000 pieces in the museum's collection, although only 700 can be displayed at one time.  The museum has two floors, although the second floor has been under construction each time I have been there (as of April 2010).  

Two Dancers in Red and Yellow, 1898
Edgar Degas

There is an impressive collection of Argentine artwork from artists like Antonio Segui, Leon Ferrari, Xul Solar and Fernando Fader.  The highlight of my visits were the number of big name European artists they had displayed - Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Renoir, Degas, Picasso, etc, etc.  Not only is the collection of big name artists larger than I would have thought, but the pieces are completely accessible to visitors.  No velvet rope, no Plexiglas shields, just a little tape line on the floor requesting that you stand at least 4 inches away from the artwork.  There is even a pleasant female voice that kindly requests that you "Stand behind the yellow tape" should you forget and get too close. 

The Museo de Bellas Artes offers $35 peso audio tours in English and Spanish, the complete tour is 80 minutes long.  I love that it is so easy to walk in and out of this museum, with free admission it is a great place to go to pass time. 

Xul Solar Museum

As I was reflecting on my previous blog posts, I noticed that there is a severe discrepancy between the number of posts I've done involving restaurants (23) and the number of posts I've done involving museums (1). I have some catching up to do; consider this Museum Week!

The most recent museum I have been to is...
Xul Solar Museum
Location: Laprida 1212, Barrio Norte
Phone: (54-11) 4821-5378
Hours: 12:00pm - 7:30pm Tues - Fri, 12:00pm - 7:00pm Sat, Closed Sun & Mon
Admission: $10 pesos

Xul Solar (1887 - 1963) was born Oscar Agustín Alejandro Schulz Solari changing his name to Xul Solar somewhere around 1916. This name is believed to be an ode to his artistic themes of light (Xul backwards is the latin word for light, lux) and energy (lux + solar = solar energy) and is thought to be Argentina's greatest abstract Expressionist. The museum was established in 1993 and the museum building was renovated and modernly designed to reflect Xul's work. The work displayed in the museum was selected by Xul to display to the private club of intellectuals he established in 1939. Xul was most known for his avant-guard style watercolor paintings, the colorful shapes and images depicting religious and astrological symbols. However, Xul Solar was a studied man in many disciplines; music, architecture, language, astrology and religion. In addition to his intriguing paintings Xul is known to have invented two different spoken languages, invented new musical instruments and created new games including tarot cards.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays at 4:00pm and Saturdays at 3:30pm there is a standing tour 50 minute tour that is included in the admission price. The tour is in Spanish, which is a great way to practice for those learning the language, and the tour guides also speak English, so you can catch up on anything missed in between points on the tour. This museum is one of the lesser known spots in Buenos Aires, but certainly worth the trip if you are spending an extended period of time in the city.