If you take a city tour in Buenos Aires you will realized that the obelisk was cut short. Although in truth, the tip of the obelisk is now located elsewhere in the city of Buenos Aires is now in the forecourt of Malba, Figueroa Alcorta and San Martin de Tours Avenue. But what’s going on, why? Well, it is the symbol of democracy, a work of contemporary art, exactly a site-specific (a type of work that is done to produce an alteration in a specific place). The author is the artist Leandro Erlich.
The artist managed the trick of putting truncated obelisk, above the real apex of the Obelisk, a construction that hides the tip, imitating material monument and creates the illusion of the Obelisk continues and ends suddenly, without tip. But really the tip is hidden under a sort of cap metal material that mimics the Obelisk. Of course, this is a trick (Erlich is an artist who usually works using “perceptual tricks” in their visual works).
The work was done with the cooperation of various ministries of the government of Buenos Aires, Malba and the company Fate. The latter two financed the work, even if it seems small, required a complex process of realization: a year of production, engineers, planners, the artist and his assistants working together; and cranes and permissions to enable the cap: the artistic “cap” is made of iron and weighs no less than 3 tons!
Yesterday the people passing by that area was amazed looking up. “Why they took off the tip?” He asked a Colombian tourist stunned. “Oh, it lacks the tip!” Said a boy who was prowling around listening to music. “When I left the subway was the first thing I saw,” said one British tourist. It is that the thing does not pass unnoticed at all: it is the Obelisk, one of the greatest icons of the city. There is a tiny thing, there is something minor.
The artist’s work told why he decided to “get” the apex to Buenos Aires icon and remove the Malba (ie, build their “double”, an imitation apex of Obelisk in the village museum): “I wanted to create the possibility of fulfill the fantasy of meeting inside the Obelisk, “he said,” democratize access. It is something that could never be done, because inside are not ripe for the public between, there is a small staircase and also the Obelisk was never intended for that. ”
When explaining why he chose the Obelisk and no other monument in Buenos Aires, Erlich suggests that is an icon of the city. “It is its symbol par excellence. Always he aroused a particular fascination for artists and people in general. And besides, it’s a meeting place: a reference “.
You could say that this is a work in two phases: the first occurs at the Obelisk same. The second, in the village of Malba: who is moved there may enter the apex of the Obelisk for free. Once inside, you will notice that there are four video screens with four views, four perspectives of the city of Buenos Aires are videos taken from real Obelisk own windows. Two of the videos show two different parts of the Avenida 9 de Julio; the other two sides of the Corrientes Avenue. The videos were filmed by the artist in 4K (ie, high definition); but do not show the landscape of the city in real time.
The Obelisk was built in 1936 by modernist architect Alberto Prebisch (his grandson was yesterday hovering around the monument, also looking up to see what was happening with his tip). Since the inauguration were many artists who worked imagining works based on it: from Grete Stern and Horacio Coppola in the 30 to Minujin and Leandro Katz 70.
With the completion of this work in the public space and one of the hottest points and icons of the city, Malba celebrates its 14th anniversary tomorrow, on the day of spring.
