Jorge Santander investigates the phenomenon of renaming public spaces ‘Malvinas Argentinas’ since the 1982 war, and wonders what impact this has on society’s, and especially war veterans’, view of the islands.

Camera and Editing: Jorge Santander
Photos: Beatrice Murch and Patricio Murphy

What does midnight look like in the Paris of South America? For those of us cursed with a golden-age mentality, Buenos Aires can be a reprieve from all the baggage that comes with modern reality.

This city is captivated by nostalgia, and even if a venue wasn’t born decades ago, many owners pay close attention to details in the hope of capturing a little of the magic of bygone eras. The bar at the Sofitel hotel transports customers to Montmarte with themed evenings every Thursday, whilst Sunday strolls in San Telmo’s markets act as a gateway to the past.

But once all of yesteryear’s magic gets into your system, where does one go when the lights go down? And just where, prey tell, do you plan to wear that poodle skirt?

From the city’s shadowy jazz bars to sultry milonga halls to lively peñas folklóricas, this week’s Top 5 brings you our pick of places to live out your dream era.

Club 74 gets its funk on Saturday nights (Courtesy of Club 74)

Disco Night at Club 74

Legend has it that the 80s stunted the growth of Club 74. Born in 1958, the club progressed with the ages until deciding to remain in a disco time capsule a few decades ago. The white stucco walls match the white stucco couches, giving the whole place an igloo-like feel.

The Saturday night fever is still burning every weekend, with a DJ who pretends he’s never heard of Lady Gaga. A surprisingly mixed crowd boogies on the dance floor – some dancing to remember, and some channeling moves they’ve surely only seen on TV.

The club has a celebratory atmosphere – there are usually several birthday parties going on – and it’s a refreshing escape from the moody indie-rock scene of today.

Saturday is definitely the night to go, as it’s the only night of the week when the dance-floor lights up, in true retro fashion like a flashing Rubix cube. And really, what good are revolving mirror balls without the neon lights?

Club 74 is also renowned for its themed parties, and April’s Madonna/Michael Jackson tribute doesn’t sound like one you can miss.

For more information on Club 74 visit club74.com.ar

Swing Dancing on Friday nights (Photo: Lauren White)

Swing Dancing at Teatro Mandril 

There’s more than one way to swing in Buenos Aires, and if you choose the kind on offer at San Nicolas’s quirky Teatro Mandril, cameras are even allowed.

A little alcohol helps to loosen up limbs as the crowd make eyes at each other around a dimly-lit, college fundraiser-style bar. Every brand of hipster seems to be gathered there on a Friday night; the retro hipster, the punk hipster, the popular girl-turned hipster, even the odd Dad hipster.

Around midnight everyone starts to gather in the back room, near the stage and dance floor. Drinks are abandoned and tables shuffled against walls to allow for the gyrations of 200 or so guests.

Guys and girls are split and line up facing each other as a male and female instructor teach the sexes their corresponding steps. After a few minutes of learning basic steps the couples grab a partner and the room transforms into a fire inspector’s nightmare. Patrons spill into every spare corner and the dance floor becomes a mere suggestion of where you should be. After about 10 minutes of practice, the sea of men and women splits again to learn more complex moves.

The party loosens up around 1:00am when the swing orchestra starts playing, and those with less ability slink back to their drinks. A few men and women own the dance floor into the early hours, while the rest watch in awe or just abandon the moves and dance with friends.

To see a video of the type of music on offer at Teatro Mandril, click here.

Milonga de los Consagrados with Orchestra Ernesto Franco playing on the stage. (Photo: Cherie Magnus)

Tango Milonga at Centro Región La Leonesa

A gentleman lets his fingers walk up the bare back of his partner; the woman’s platinum-blonde bob allowing for full exposure of her elegant shoulder blades. Only when she is spun around do you realise the woman is pushing 60 years old, and dancing better than anyone you might have seen at more touristy milongas.

Welcome to La Leonesa, where the only clues to people’s ages are their faces and their elbows. Both men and women dress to impress. Some arrive in pairs and are seated at the black and white-clothed tables surrounding the dancefloor by a burly bouncer-type host in a velvet blazer. From then on, eyes dart around the room hoping to be caught.

After receiving their cue to dance, the women’s eyes take a rest, with many choosing to follow their partner’s lead with their eyes closed.

The large hall lends a slightly eerie, echoed quality to the music, and its yellowed Victorian wallpaper only adds to the authenticity for traditionalists.

Vendors seem to have found their target market here, as you can’t escape the kiosks of tango heels, posters and apparel positioned on the way into the hall.

Regulars say the best times to go are Thursday night’s Niño Bien event, or Saturday afternoons. You can dance if you want to, but you should know it’s very likely you’ll be out-shined by someone. Something about this place suggests it was no one’s first spin around the floor.

To read more more information on Centro Región La Leonesa click here 

The art deco entrance of Virasoro Bar (courtesy Virasoro Bar)

Jazz Evening at Virasoro

Although not included on our Top 5 Jazz Clubs, Virasoro has a quaint appeal for a more tightly-knit, interactive jazz experience. Before going on stage, the band greets and jokes with the incoming crowd in the nook of a lobby. After a few beers they get up to play, leaving sheet music strewn about the floor. The venue’s unpretentious, art deco space holds a small crowd of mostly young enthusiasts who come with a small group of friends or as a pair.

The band performs in front of a continuously rolling, black-and white projection that plays jazz performances and interviews by yesterday’s great players.

The screen casts a blue-grey light on the seven band members, who play about three steps away from an audience consisting of only around eight crowded tables.

After a few glasses of wine, the candle-lit ambiance and gentle beats put you in a more subdued state, making it hard to focus on film screenings.

The only downside was the impatient waiters. Make sure you have your selection ready, and with a solid Spanish accent to hand, or be expected to, well, wait.

For more information on Virasoro Jazz Bar, visit virasoro.com.ar

Folklórica Los Cardones (courtesy Los Cardones)

Peña Folklórica Los Cardones

When a gringo pictures Argentina, Los Cardones is likely what he sees. Peña folklórica originated in the northern provinces of the country (Salta in particular) in the 1950s, and the culture has trickled down to Buenos Aires and beyond.

This large bar has walls block-coloured in bright yellow and orange, windows framed by flowery vines, and a photo of Jesus on the cross hung prominently behind the stage. The club pays homage to Salta by featuring a small menu of traditional regional fare, and a large photo of Salta’s cathedral that blankets nearly half of the wall.

Traditional folklórica is performed with three guitarists, one drummer, and perhaps a violinist. This is frequently varied however, with some acts featuring only one smiling guitarist, and an occasional drummer that seemed to be part of the crowd until he was given the nod to go up on stage. The atmosphere is friendly, loud and proud. The audience is frequently encouraged to join in by clapping with the music, and is never told to “shhh” like in other bars.

Raul, the club’s MC, introduces each performance with the same enthusiasm you’d expect if he were opening for his own son.

“We’re the first peña folklórica in Buenos Aires,” he boasts several times before the musical acts begin, and encourages the crowd to sit so close to the stage they’re almost on it.

For more information on Los Cardones, visit cardones.com.ar

'Decir Si', the play by Griselda Gambaro performed in 1981 (Photo: Julie Weisz)

“If they will not stage our plays in the official theatres,” Argentine playwright Robert “Tito” Cossa wrote in a 1981 article, “if they will not mention us on the television channels, if we do not appear in any of the second-rate syllabi in our main theatre schools, do we Argentine playwrights even exist?”

Soon after Cossa’s condemnation of artistic censorship, he and 20 other Argentine playwrights launched ‘Teatro Abierto’ (Open Theatre), a movement that would become one of the most important artistic resistances during the dictatorship.

In a massive festival that generated over 25,000 spectators, some of the nations principal playwrights, directors and actors came together to stage one-act plays that directly or indirectly spoke out against the dictatorship and proved that yes, Argentine playwrights do exist.

This Thursday marks 30 years since the first play premiered.

An Idea Takes Shape

During the dictatorship, Cossa recalls: “We lived with fears, precautions, and doubts. We didn’t know all the terrible, criminal, and brutal things that were happening, but we knew about the disappearances. We had friends who were disappeared.”

Unlike other forms of expression such as film and journalism that were subject to strict censorship during the dictatorship, there was no censorship for plays before they were staged. According to Cossa, “we premiered what we wanted to, and they didn’t prohibit us.”

After the premier, some plays, like Eduardo Pavlovsky’s intense family drama ‘Telarañas’ (1977), were banned. However, many plays with decidedly political undercurrents premiered to great public and critical success. One need only think of Cossa’s ‘La Nona’ (1976) in which a ravenous grandmother ends up killing her children; or Ricardo Monti’s ‘Marathon’(1980), a dance contest that turns into a critique of fascism.

Teatro Tabaris is packed to standing room only in 1981 (Photo: Julie Weisz)

Still, the environment was far from friendly towards playwrights. From 1977 to 1979, the number of theatergoers dropped by nearly 25%. Most of the important playwrights, being leftist, were excluded from official theatres and cinema, and were forced to premier their works in small independent theatres. Osvaldo Dragún, an Argentine playwright and one of the main architects of Teatro Abierto, characterised the experience as working on “little floating islands” isolated from the mainland of official artistic representation.

By 1980, as Cossa remembers, “a small light at the end of the tunnel appeared, suggesting that the dictatorship might end. The repression had begun to ease.” The majority of what human rights groups estimate were 30,000 disappearances had already occurred. General Jorge Rafael Videla was poised to hand over power to General Roberto Eduardo Viola and the Falklands/Malvinas War was still come.

The flames of resentment felt by many Argentine playwrights were fanned in 1980 when, at the command of the military, the National Conservatory of Dramatic Arts eliminated the course on contemporary Argentine theatre from the curriculum.

After the incident, a group of Argentine playwrights began to meet every week over pastries and mate. In these meetings, Cossa remembers that they “got up to date on what was going on” and about who had left the country, and they “consoled one another” through the difficult time.“We were exhausted,” adds Cossa, “and we felt like we had to react. But rather than pick up arms we did what we knew how to do, which is theatre.”

Through these meetings, Teatro Abierto was born. Dragún, who passed away in 1999, brought to the table an idea suggestedby a group of young people: a series of short plays that addressed the censorship and prohibition they faced.

The playwrights involved in the meetings wrote each original one-act plays. Late at night in bars on Avenida Corrientes the playwrights began to plan for the event. Dragún remembers, they met “quietly, so as not to frighten anyone. Not even ourselves. The police sirens were louder than our voices.”

A Movement Is Born

With Teatro Abierto, members of the theatre community came together to stage 21 plays. The rehearsals happened “wherever possible, at whatever hour possible. The morning, the afternoon, the night, at dawn”, Dragún explained.

In May of 1981, the playwrights decided to go public in a press conference covered by nearly all the city’s major publications.

The buzz began during open rehearsals for the plays, and lines stretched around the block to purchase tickets. On opening night at the Teatro del Picadero theatre, actor Jorge Rivera López read the declaration of the principals of Teatro Abierto: “Because theatre is an eminently social and communitarian cultural phenomenon, we are trying, through the quality of the shows and the low ticket prices, to recover a mass audience; because we feel that all of us together are much more than the sum of each one of us alone.”

A different trio of plays costing less than the price of a movie ticket, was performed each afternoon in seven-day cycles for two months. Plays included Griselda Gambaro’s ‘Decir sí’, a chilling allegory of the victim/perpetrator dynamic set in a barbershop, ‘Gris de ausencia’, Roberto Cossa’s examination of life in exile, and Eduardo Pavlovksy’s ’Tercero incluido’, which staged a war ritual enacted between a couple in bed.

Teatro Tabaris, a larger space, could accommodate more viewers. (Photo: Julie Weisz)

The Fire

A week into the performances came what Cossa describes as a “great political error” on the part of the dictatorship. Early morning on 6th August of 1981, the night that Frank Sinatra crooned across town, the Teatro del Picadero was destroyed by a fire. While it has not been confirmed that the fire was an intentional act by the dictatorship to squelch the movement, most assume as much.

But rather than ending the performances, the fire only energized the movement. A press conference held the next day was attended by Nobel Prize winner Adolfo Peréz Esquivel, and Ernesto Sábato. Jorge Luis Borges expressed his support in a telegram. Out of numerous theatres that offered their space, organisers chose Teatro Tabarís, expanding the nightly capacity from the 300 seat limit of the Teatro del Picadero to 700 seats. According to Cossa, after the fire the movement became “political in nature”.

After 1981 

The success of Teatro Abierto inspired other movements such as Danza Abierta, Poesia Abierta, and Cine Abierto. But although the organisers also continued the festival until 1985, they had difficulty generating the same excitement. The years following 1981 were met with mixed critical reviews and a dwindling public interest.

Much was due to the changing political times and the fact that Teatro Abierto was built as a reaction to a “closed” society, and – as Argentina approached democracy – the tenets of Teatro Abierto began to lose their vigor.

In 1982 the lack of connection between the festival and the political context was even more dramatic. The competition for plays to be included closed in mid-March, and on 2nd April, Argentine forces attacked the Falkland Islands. As playwright Mauricio Kartun, whose play was included in the 1982 festival, writes” “The festival started in October without any material that alluded to the conflict” that had been going on at that point for nearly six months.

The festivals in 1983 and 1985 emphasized Teatro Abierto’s commitment to freedom of expression. The 1983 festival opened with a huge march from the Teatro del Picadero to Avenida Corrientes behind a banner that read “for a popular theatre, without censorship.” In 1985, the last year, organisers staged a two-day celebration of theatre throughout the country called the “teatrazo“. Performances took place in non-traditional venues, from plazas to train stations to warehouses to buses. The plays that year, however, were panned by critics.

Despite the fact that the movement continued after 1981, Cossa affirms, “what I always remember is the first year.”

30th Anniversary

A certain aspect of the legacy of Teatro Abierto has been carried out in the present-day theatre movement, Teatro x la identidad, which has claimed status as the child of Teatro Abierto because, as organiser Amancay Espíndola explains, “we are in search of the children of the disappeared people that Teatro Abierto spoke about.” Their festival is also modeled on Teatro Abierto, in its inclusion of short plays, its attempts to involve famous members of the theatre community and its attempt to represent “through theatre what is happening,” says Espíndola.

Of course there are important differences: Teatro x la identidad was launched by the Abuelas of Plaza de Mayo with a specific mission to find children of the disappeared; whereas Teatro Abierto was formed in response to frustration around artistic censorship during the dictatorship.

Gris de Ausencia performed in 1981 (Photo: Jullie Weisz)

Teatro x la identidad is prominently featuring Teatro Abierto in this year’s cycle by re-staging of two plays that premiered in the 1981 cycle: Cossa’s ‘Gris de Ausencia’ and ‘El Acompañamiento’ by Carlos Gorostiza. Teatro x la identidad will also pay homage to Teatro Abierto with activities on 1st August in front of the Picadero theatre. And the political council Comuna 3 organised a festival in front of the Picadero on 23rd July, which they follow with a ceremony to honour the protagonists in Teatro del Pueblo on 28th July, the official anniversary of Teatro Abierto.

On the 30th anniversary things are also looking up for the Picadero theatre, which has not been a working theater since the 1981 fire. After ownership changed hands numerous times, and the space narrowly escaped demolition, a new owner took charge again at the end of June of this year. Sebastián Blutrach is a theater producer who has worked with well-known Argentine playwright, Daniel Veronese. Blutrach intends to open the space this summer, perhaps in time for the anniversary.

For years, the banging of drums, hauling of banners and marching feet of thousands have stepped their way across the famous Plaza de Mayo square in the centre of Buenos Aires.

Nunca Mas banner from día de la memoria 2011 (Photo: Beatrice Murch)

The 24th March marks a collosal day of bustling, emotive marches for human rights on the Plaza, pleading ‘Memoria,’ (memory) ‘Verdad’ (truth) and ‘Justicia’ (justice), insisting the government and the public never forget the state terrorism that engulfed the entire country from 1976-1983, and that those responsible have their sentences concluded. This year in particular marks 35 years since the golpe de estado, and shows the wounds that Argentina still hold open with the haunting past it holds.

The end of March is a special and moving time for the whole country, as it marks the beginning of a brutal military dictatorship which lasted seven years, from 1976-83. Following the Kirchner administration’s campaign to recognise the importance of public memory, by instating two national holiday days from the 24th-25th to “never forget” those who were disappeared, killed and all affected by the violent regime (which started in 2002); many more spaces for public and private memory have been created.

Aside from marches, there are also various other sites where memory demonstrations and activities are held publically and privately across the country. Over the years many public memorials have been built, including Parque de la Memoria with a huge memorial dedicated to the disappeared, and the ex-navy mechanics schoool the ESMA as a memory site.

Teatro por la identidad: memory and an ongoing identity search

One of the most influential forms of artistic expression during the years of media silence over memory, has in fact been the theatre. The theatre group ‘Teatro Por la Identidad’ (TXI) began in the year 2000, with an objective to work alongside Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo (one of the protagonist human rights group’s still fighting for their loved ones to be returned to them) in their search for the missing children of the disappeared. Head of the Abuelas Estela Carlotto and her team have dedicated themselves to finding the children of captives, who were born inside the concentration camps, and stolen from their parents (believed to be around 500).

TXI is made up of a group of people who come from many different backgrounds. Actors, musicians, producers, technicians, scenery artists all work together to communicate messages of hope for those who still haven’t found their identity but have doubts, while also bringing to light testimonies of those who discovered their relation to someone affected by the regime. Grouped together were a set of different drama works, some in aid of remembering, others initially helping to boost the search of the Abuelas.

Tenth year anniversary celebration of 'Teatro X Identidad' at Ciudad Cultural Konex (courtesy of TXI)

Every year the theatre group holds a programme of different theatre works for the period of about a month, usually every Monday, across different theatres in Buenos Aires and in other national theatres around the country. Some are plays with a large cast, short plays with a smaller cast, some duologues, monologues, testimonies and speeches, usually built into a mixed programme; with no admission fee.

The idea from the start was to provide theatre sending a message of memory letting people tell their stories, whilst continuing the promotion of the Abuelas search. Their drama works are written and performed by both professional and amateurs in the field.

I first went to see TXI in 2005, in a downtown theatre in Buenos Aires, and was surprised by its honesty. By talking about the military regime, disappeared persons and concentration camps, one might get the notion that going to see TXI could be more of a downer. Obviously it depends on the bill you go to see, not all of the programmes are same. Some tell stories in a positive light while some include comedy sketches. What is nice about the shows is that they aren’t overtly complicated by glitz, it’s honest theatre. The spaces they choose are normally quite small, and intimate, letting the audience really connect with the action.

In 2010, TXI celebrated their tenth anniversary, and hosted a month’s worth of theatre shows across the country in aid of their cause. During their ten years of existence they have spread across Argentina and hold arts centres in Bariloche, Rosario, Paraná, Chaco, Tucumán, Morón and Córdoba, to name a few. Internationally they have received wide attention, particularly from México, where many Argentines exiled to during and after the military regime. They also have centres in Madrid, Cataluña, Barcelona, and Uruguay. In 2009 they were recognised by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), being awarded a prize for theatre and their contribution to memory in society.

They have a published book on the story of their organisation and works with Ediciones Colihue and have released dvds available for educational purposes.

Over the course of March they have held a few shows, but largely repeating past plays. The new cycle for 2011 is now being planned, and the central office is looking for fresh scripts and stories, with their criteria now published on their website. They will begin to accept new material from 5th April on Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s until the 27th. They are to present their new cycle of theatre works in August this year, programmed for Monday nights across Buenos Aires.

Chilean Minister of Interior and Public Security, Rodrigo Hinzpeter, said the Day of the Young Combatant “should begin leaving itsself behind”. Relatives of the politically executed repudiated the term.

“Our country has no desire for a group of citizens to alter the right that we all have to live in peace,” Hinzpeter said Monday.

He was referring to the demonstrations and public actions that usually occur on 29th March in Chile

Young Soldiers’ Day recalls the murder of the brothers Rafael and Eduardo Vergara Toledo during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

The National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation said the militants of the Revolutionary Leftist Movement were killed by federal agents in 1985 for political reasons

Given the Minister’s remarks, the president of the Association of Victims of Political Executions, Alicia Lira, noted the importance of exercising memory.

Lira expressed the importance of commemorating “a life that has been removed under state terrorism” because “it becomes a crime against humanity”.

Lira also recalled the political assassination on 29th March, 1985 of the communist militants Santiago Nattino, José Manuel Parada and Manuel Guerrero.

This evening there will be activities to remember the life of those killed by police during the Pinochet dictatorship.

Story courtesy of Agencia Púlsar, the news agency of AMARC-ALC

Today over 100 human rights, student, cultural and labour organisations, marched along Avenida de Mayo to Plaza de Mayo to commemorate ‘El Día de la Memoria’, a day of memory to remember the 30,000 people who ’disappeared’ under the military dictatorship in Argentina that began 34 years ago in 1976. The march was led by the Abuelas and Madres de Plaza de Mayo.

Estela de Carlotto, from the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo, was the first to speak at the rally and was accompanied by a 500 metre banner that contained the faces of thousands of the missing. The banner carried the slogan ‘For a bicentenary without impunity: Trial and punishment now’:  referring to the need to bring those responsible for the deaths and torture committed during the dictatorship to trial. She spoke about the need for justice and criticised a number of private companies such as Ford and Mercedes Benz, the head of Buenos Aires government, Mauricio Macri, and the metropolitan police. She said, “The accomplices of hunger are the same as 30 years ago.”  Other groups at the rally were protesting and remembering those who have ‘disappeared’ since the military dictatorship, under democracy.

President Cristina Kirchner held a rally at ESMA, the former naval mechanic school which was a detention centre of political prisoners during the dictatorship and is now an ‘Espacio para la Memoria’ (a space for memory). Cristina called for a “rebuilding of the country” and stated that she would resort to international courts if justice couldn’t be achieved in Argentina. She said, “Our past should not be judged, those who committed crimes indeed should be [judged].”

Members of the left-wing and anti-government group, Quebracho, led by Fernando Esteche, demonstrated at the Argentine Industrial Union headquarters. They covered their faces with scarves and carried wooden sticks and stones.