Caminito - Boca, Buenos Aires

Boca is a neighborhood in Buenos Aires near the river that has had an interesting past. If I remember what I read correctly, it started out as marsh, was turned into a port town, then went into decline, then many immigrants moved in who worked in the shipyard, taking the leftover paint to paint their houses. The neighborhood is INCREDIBLY colorful. We also read that Italians were a large portion of the immigrants, who as everyone knows, opts for colorful buildings. Then the neighborhood inherited a particular coolness so the artists and students started moving in. Apparently the tango and art is big throughout the neighborhood. Although its pretty touristy now, you can still get a sense of energy about the place that has probably always existed.

Home in Boca are the Boca Juniors, the popular futbol (soccer) team in the city. All the stores and restaurants surrounding the stadium are painted in the supporting colors of blue and gold. We took some pictures when walking by but we are going to a game tomorrow night and will undoubtedly have more stories and photos.

 

As I mentioned, many artists moved into Boca. There are tons of paintings for sale all around the neighborhood. We saw some amazing art! Although there were a great deal of paintings and photos depicting the tango and/or the colorful neighborhood, the styles were far from similar. You could tell all the artists had different visions of the same subject - making each stand unique and interesting. I have found that Europe tends to have the same styles repeating (at least within a particular city) so it was a little different seeing what everyone had to offer. I gravitated toward one man who spoke perfect English (which helped) because he has toured all over the world as a Tango teacher and performer as well as an artist and sometimes both (he has a show that he somehow tangos and paints at the same time??)!!! I bought one of his small paintings and he drew a tango couple out of my name and the accordion like instrument used for tango music out of Scott's on the back of the painting. very cool :)