Buildings as a disguise -out of the ¨architecture¨ category-

Heidi Weber Museum. Centre Le Corbusier

http://www.centerlecorbusier.com/frameset2.html

The Centre Le Corbusier is a great example of an ideology. Beautiful in its plasticity, no need for decoration, or extra ¨twists.¨ 

Sometimes, architects carry the label of their buildings. They design them as stamps, that can be built anywhere in the world, for any society. Absurd.

Sometimes, the buildings are so literal in their ¨main idea,¨ what we used to call ¨la idea rectora,¨ that they do not show architecture any more. They are just a scenography of the ridicule. 

My husband says that I shouldn´t promote those type of examples, but I remember one of my students, in her first year of architectural design, she liked Gehry´s metaphor of the guitar, and she designed a building with the shape of a guitar. Being her a junior,  it was very difficult for me to explain why she shouldn´t work like this. 

So, this post is dedicated to students. And I hope with these few words and pictures they could understand that not all buildings belong to the category of ¨architecture,¨ but ¨construction¨ instead.

¨This photo, lifted from the Tumblr Chaz Hutton, depicts seven New York City architects decked out for the 1931 Beaux-Arts costume ball as the buildings they designed. From left to right: A Stewart Walker as the Fuller Building, Leonard Schultze as the Waldorf-Astoria, Ely Jacques Kahn as the Squibb Building, William Van Alen as the Chrysler, Ralph Walker as 1 Wall Street, DE Ward as the Metropolitan Tower, and Joseph H. Freelander as the Museum of New York.¨ From 

http://la.curbed.com/archives/2012/10/here_are_some_architects_disguised_as_their_own_buildings.php

Photo via Flavorwire.  ¨Also in China, land of architectural craziness it is,  this Piano House, masterminded a few years ago by Hefei University of Technology architecture students to house plans for the new Shannan district in Huainan City and bring notoriety to the region.¨ From:

http://curbed.com/archives/2013/01/02/here-now-nine-nutso-buildings-disguised-as-other-things.php

¨Dubbed “Galije” and located on a parcel of untouched coastline land, the resort is envisioned as a way to combine exclusivity with a responsible, sustainable embedding of the structure in its surrounding landscape. “The split/limbo we found ourselves in was to design an iconic exclusive luxury resort in projecting total of 100,000 library program that should be invisible. An exclusive residence under cover. As a result we designed the whole project as an offset to the terrain and covered it with a blanket of the original landscape. Where a higher density was needed we lift the blanket to create a hill. The iconic hotel is formed by pulling the blanket in front of the cliff to create a even more dramatic overhang. The more flat parts of the landscape hold the villa’s organized around their private patios facing the sea,” From 

http://inhabitat.com/aston-martin-resort-disguised-as-a-giant-mountain-of-lush-green/

Building Disguised As A Building.Oxford Street, London. By Bob Comics

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8424687@N08/4961292564/

Coke building in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. From http://www.tripadvisor.com/

Changes of habitat in the XIX Century, in the words of Virginia Woolf

Storm clouds gather and lightning strikes over the Houses of Parliament

thetimes.co.uk

I ended 2012 reading Virgina Woolf´s Orlando, which I enjoyed, specially the beginning of chapter V, where she explains the evolution of the century through a climate change.

And as a consequence, the clothes, the houses, the interior design, the landscape, were changed, due to the damp that filled everything, including the hearts.
I think the following paragraphs are a beautiful way of explaining the European habitat (though she refers to England). Of course there are many great passages in the book, but these are my favorite ones:

THE GREAT CLOUD WHICH HUNG, not only over London, but over the whole of the British Isles on the first day of the nineteenth century stayed, or rather, did not stay, for it was buffeted about constantly by blustering gales, long enough to, have extraordinary consequences upon those who lived beneath its shadow. A change seemed to have come over the climate of England. Rain fell frequently, but only in fitful gusts, which were no sooner over than they began again. The sun shone, of course, but it was so girt about with clouds and the air was so saturated with water, that its beams were discoloured — and purples, oranges, and reds of a dull sort took the place of the more positive landscapes of the eighteenth century. 

 Under this bruised and sullen canopy the green of the cabbages was less intense, and the white of the snow was muddied. But what was worse, damp now began to make its way into every house — damp, which is the most insidious of all enemies, for while the sun can be shut out by blinds, and the frost roasted by a hot fire, damp steals in while we sleep; damp is silent, imperceptible, ubiquitous. 

Damp swells the wod, furs, the kettle, rusts the iron, rots the stone.  So gradual is the process, that it is not until we pick up some chest of drawers, or coal scuttle, and the whole thing drops to pieces in our hands, that we suspect even that the disease is at work. Thus, stealthily and imperceptibly, none marking the exact day or hour of the change, the constitution of England was altered and nobody knew it. Everywhere the effects were felt. The hardy country gentleman, who had sat down gladly to a meal of ale and beef in a room designed, perhaps by the brothers Adam, with classic dignity, now felt chilly. Rugs appeared; beards were grown; trousers were fastened tight under the instep. The chill which he felt in his legs the country gentleman soon transferred to his house; furniture was muffled; walls and tables were covered; nothing was left bare. 

Then a change of diet became essential. The muffin was invented and the crumpet. Coffee supplanted the after-dinner port, and, as coffee led to a drawing-room in which to drink it, and a drawing-room to glass cases, and glass cases to artificial flowers, and artificial flowers to mantelpieces, and mantelpieces to pianofortes, and pianofortes to drawing room ballads, and drawing-room ballads (skipping a stage or two) to innumerable little  dogs, mats, and china ornaments, the home — which had become extremely important- was completely altered.

Outside the house — it was another effect of the damp — ivy grew in unparalleled profusion. Houses that had been of bare stone were smothered in greenery. No garden, however formal its original design, lacked a shrubbery, a wilderness, a maze. What light penetrated to the bedrooms where children were born was naturally of an obfusc green, and what light penetrated to the drawing-rooms where grown men and women lived came through curtains of brown and purple plush. 

But the change did not stop at outward things. The damp struck within. Men felt the chill in their hearts; the damp in their minds. In a desperate effort to snuggle their feelings into some sort of warmth one subterfuge was tried after another. Love, birth, and death were all swaddled in a variety of fine phrases. The sexes drew further and further apart. No open conversation was tolerated.

The architectural structures of Nature

Mr. Ron Neumeyer Delta, Canada Specimen: Blowfly Proboscis Technique: Brightfield
Is it a dome?

I remember one of our colleague professors had a picture in the bathroom, beautiful illustrations of a fly, a floor plan, cross sections, elevations. I've been always delighted with it.

Because, though the flies are absolutely nasty and ugly, there's the beauty of the structure of nature, and most interesting, its representation as an architectural drawing.

A few days ago, I came across with the gallery of Olympus Bioscapes (link below) and thought that organicism in its most complex forms is a fashion in architectural concepts and competitions, not all of them can be built, but, on the contrary, nature has its own architectural forms, let's see some examples. 

Mr. Piotr Rotkiewicz San Diego, CA, USA Specimen: Fossil Skeleton of Polycystine Radiolaria Technique: Darkfield Illumination
Is it a tower?

Mr. Harry Taylor Kensworth, Dunstable, Bedfordshire, UK Specimen: Dahlia flowerhead Technique: Brightfield (in reverse), 50x Objective
Is it a spiraled Pantheon?

http://www.olympusbioscapes.com/gallery/2012/

Cities´ illustrations from the Nüremberg Chronicle

Nüremberg

The Nuremberg Chronicle is an illustrated Biblical paraphrase and world history that follows the story of human history related in the Bible; it includes the histories of a number of important Western cities. Written in Latin by Hartmann Schedel, with a version in German translation by Georg Alt, it appeared in 1493. It is one of the best-documented early printed books—an incunabulum —and one of the first to successfully integrate illustrations and text.

Latin scholars refer to it as Liber Chronicarum (Book of Chronicles) as this phrase appears in the index introduction of the Latin edition. English speakers have long referred to it as the Nuremberg Chronicle after the city in which it was published. German speakers refer to it as Die Schedelsche Weltchronik (Schedel's World History) in honour of its author.

The illustrations in many copies were hand-coloured after printing.

Two Nuremberg merchants, Sebald Schreyer (1446-1503) and his son-in-law, Sebastian Kammermeister (1446-1520), commissioned the Latin version of the Chronicle. They also commissioned George Alt (1450 – 1510), a scribe at the Nuremberg treasury, to translate the work into German. Both Latin and German editions were printed by Anton Koberger, in Nuremberg. The contracts were recorded by scribes, bound into volumes, and deposited in the Nuremberg City Archives. The first contract, from December, 1491, established the relationship between the illustrators and the patrons. Wolgemut and Pleydendurff, the painters, were to provide the layout of the Chronicle, to oversee the production of the woodcuts, and to guard the designs against piracy. The patrons agreed to advance 1000 gulden for paper, printing costs, and the distribution and sale of the book. A second contract, between the patrons and the printer, was executed in March, 1492. It stipulated conditions for acquiring the paper and managing the printing. The blocks and the archetype were to be returned to the patrons once the printing was completed.

The author of the text, Hartmann Schedel, was a medical doctor, humanist and book collector. He earned a doctorate in medicine in Padua in 1466, then settled in Nuremberg to practice medicine and collect books. According to an inventory done in 1498, Schedel's personal library contained 370 manuscripts and 670 printed books. The author used passages from the classical and medieval works in this collection to compose the text of Chronicle. He borrowed most frequently from another humanist chronicle,Supplementum Chronicarum, by Jacob Philip Foresti of Bergamo. It has been estimated that about 90% of the text is pieced together from works on humanities, science, philosophy, and theology, while about 10% of the Chronicle is Schedel’s original composition.

The Chronicle was first published in Latin on 12 July 1493 in the city of Nuremberg. This was quickly followed by a German translation on 23 December 1493.

REFERENCE: Wikipedia.org

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Chronicle

Reference for images:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Chronicle

Brujas

Constantinople

Florence

Krakow

Jerusalem

Mainz

Paris

Cologne

Praga

Viena

Constantinople

Roma

The world map

The demolitions of historical Beijing in the work of Jiang Pengyi

I like these artistic photographs, the author is Jiang Pengyi, a Chinese artist who claims:

¨My photographs of city, still objects and massive skyscrapers reduced to miniature sizes communicate my recurrent themes of excessive urbanization, redevelopment and demolition in the Beijing city¨

All pictures and text downloaded from:
http://www.blindspotgallery.com/en/artists/2010/jiang-pengyi

"WE call for papers." A list of predatory publishers

This image from http://www.atheistnexus.org/group/atheistswholovescience/forum/topics/beware-predatory-publishers

I've received many of those interesting invitations to publish in "great journals." I usually considered them as scams, they look serious, but when you navigate on their web pages, at some point you'll see how much you'd pay in case your paper was selected.

I was sent a link with a list, for 2013, I'm sharing the first part of the post, then follow the link to read the list:

Beall’s List of Predatory Publishers 2013

By Jeffrey Beall

Released December 4, 2012

The gold open-access model has given rise to a great many new online publishers. Many of these publishers are corrupt and exist only to make money off the author processing charges that are billed to authors upon acceptance of their scientific manuscripts.

There are two lists below. The first includes questionable, scholarly open-access publishers. Each of these publishers has a portfolio that ranges from just a few to hundreds of individual journal titles.

The second list includes individual journals that do not publish under the platform of any publisher — they are essentially independent, questionable journals.

In both cases, we recommend that researchers, scientists, and academics avoid doing business with these publishers and journals. Scholars should avoid sending article submissions to them, serving on their editorial boards or reviewing papers for them, or advertising in them. Also, tenure and promotion committees should give extra scrutiny to articles published in these journals, for many of them include instances of author misconduct.

There are still many high-quality journals available for scholars to publish in, including many that do not charge author processing fees. An additional option is author self-archiving of articles in discipline-specific and institutional repositories.

The author is grateful to the many colleagues who have shared information about potential predatory publishers. Last year’s list included 23 publishers, and this year’s has over 225, evidence of the rapid growth in the number of predatory journals and publishers. This list will be updated throughout the year at the blog Scholarly Open Access, http://scholarlyoa.com.

http://scholarlyoa.com/2012/12/06/bealls-list-of-predatory-publishers-2013/

Art pictures through Google Street View

Harbor View Elementary School. Digital intervention by Myriam B. Mahiques

I´m one of those who are tempted to use Google Earth, Google street view, Google maps, for my publications on urban morphology, and sometimes for digital art and exercises of urban forms and colors.

It seems that the tools in Google Street View has also generated a new type of photographers, and I´m not saying ¨American,¨ because I´ve read that similar techniques are used in Canada, for example.

Let´s see the work of Doug Rickard, pictures and text from the article by John Foster:

http://observatory.designobserver.com/johnfoster/feature/a-new-american-picture-doug-rickard-and-street-photography-in-the-age-of-google/32028/

New Orleans by Doug Rickard, 2008/9

Detroit by Doug Rickard, 2009/10

¨Rickard, an artist as a child (his teachers would exclaim to his parents that he would surely “do something special” with his artistic talent), discovered photography in adulthood — a discovery that would become an obsession. He began to codify this obsession in early 2008, when he created the now highly popular websites American Suburb X and These Americans. These sites, largely extensions of his personal journey, obsessions and self-education, are now highly regarded by photography aficionados, educators and historians for their high quality of writing and massive visual archives. ASX receives approximately 80,000 unique visitors a month and is “Liked” by 38,000 Facebook “fans.” 

These Americans is known in part for being a view into Rickard’s personal found-image archive. With such a strong interest in history, Rickard was used to looking at the past. But for these new web projects he turned his attention to the present, exploring the statistics, demographics and socio-economics of contemporary America’s neglected communities. While doing this he began to experiment with ordinary and static images resulting from keyword searches on Google. 

But by the next year — in mid-2009 — he discovered Google Street View. In a telephone interview that lasted well over an hour, the 43-year-old-old Rickard told me that the idea for his recent photographic work emerged as a sort of “epiphany” within 24 hours of using Street View. The project was, he explained, the result of a sort of “perfect storm,” in that it combined his love of photography and its history with his background in American history and sociology. Also, practicality was a component in the form of his inability to travel America, a restriction of the scenarios in real life — a demanding day job and a young family. According to Rickard, this epiphany fused immediately into a crystal-clear idea: He would use Street View as his camera and, working from a room in his home, travel the roads of neglected American cities and neighborhoods in a 21st-century “road trip.” This single idea would utterly consume his life for close to two years, resulting in the important body of work “A New American Picture,” a selection of which hangs today in the Museum of Modern Art in New York.¨

El debate sobre el zoológico de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires

El templo hindú de los elefantes. Foto de Martín Lucesole

Reproduciré hoy fragmentos del artículo de Virginia Mejía para La Nación Revista acerca del debate sobre el futuro del zoológico de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, y dejaré el link para su lectura completa.

Mientras lo leía, recordaba películas de ciencia ficción e incluso el comic Futurama, donde algunos personajes ya no existen, sino sus imágenes holográficas; de hecho ya hay conciertos de música que explotan el tema de los cantantes fallecidos. Y pensaba si algún día el zoológico no contará más con animales reales, sino sus holografías y si, a fuerza de costumbre, será una experiencia más entre tantos avances tecnológicos.

Ir al zoológico de Palermo era uno de mis paseos favoritos y no lo visito desde el año ´95 o ´96. En el año 2004 conocí el zoológico de la ciudad de Los Angeles y ahí me dí cuenta de la diferencia, es como si de pronto se hubiera caído el velo que tenía ante mis ojos: los animales viven en la montaña, en un medio agreste, los recorridos de montaña son distintos, no ví ningún pabellón victoriano, hombres y animales comparten la naturaleza. Y por supuesto, no hay basura ni descuidos.

Vamos al artículo:

Islote de columnas bizantinas. Foto de Martín Lucesole

"No hay nada más lindo que estar en casa", dicen los que saben sobre derecho animal: leones, panteras, jirafas, cocodrilos, hipopótamos, anacondas y demás especies que pululan desde hace años tras las antiguas rejas deberían, según esta máxima, regresar cuanto antes a la selva. En cambio, para los defensores del zoo victoriano tradicional, lo mejor es que estas excéntricas especies no abandonen sus jaulas: ellas son las responsables de atraer a la gran masa de público que, con el pago de su entrada, solventa los proyectos científicos de conservación y los innumerables programas de ayuda social que ofrece el predio. En tanto, los activistas moderados piden que cese la reproducción de nuevas crías, pero que los animales ancianos continúen habitando en sus actuales moradas para evitarles el estrés producido por los traslados.

Por otro lado, los 52 monumentos históricos diseminados en las 18 hectáreas de los antiguos jardines de Juan Manuel de Rosas tampoco escapan a la controversia: algunos exigen una auditoría que revele su auténtico valor patrimonial y bregan por la eliminación total de los carteles comerciales. Incluso hay quienes añoran que se convierta en un paseo gratuito con espacio de conservación al estilo del Central Park de Nueva York. (....)

Daniel Bonarda abre la puerta de la incubadora y saca con extremo cuidado un gigantesco huevo negro similar a una palta silvestre y madura. Con el brazo extendido a lo alto lo mira atentamente y me lo acerca para que lo observe. "Es de águila. ¡Ojalá nazca bien!", desea, satisfecho, y lo vuelve a guardar. El cuidador es parte de la casa: hace 25 años que trabaja en el lugar. Sus expertas manos ya acariciaron cientos de huevos, lomos de feroces bestias y demás alimañas que la naturaleza creó. Hijo de trabajadores del Zoo, está orgulloso de ser veterinario en la legendaria institución. "Lamentablemente la gente acá viene con el prejuicio de que cuidamos mal a los animales", dice mientras me conduce al hospital donde una gigantesca camilla de metal apta para fieras se impone en la inmaculada habitación.Después visitamos el Departamento de Investigaciones Bio-reproductivas, donde almacenan recursos genéticos, y los Centros de Conservación de Animales Autóctonos en Extinción. Áreas que dan cuenta de que además de la típica postal de la jirafa con kilométrico cuello por sobre las rejas en este zoológico se trabaja también en programas científicos. "Nos gustaría poder seguir con todos estos programas. Yo mismo liberé 6 cóndores en Río Negro", explica, aludiendo a uno de los proyectos más exitosos, el del Cóndor Andino, la imponente ave cordillerana en extinción que sólo cría un pichón cada tres años.

El aviario. Foto de Martín Lucesole

La entrada del zoológico. Foto de wikipedia.org

"Para los niños el mayor encanto de este jardín radica en que les permite ver a los animales en vivo y en directo", asegura Claudio Bertonatti, el director de la anterior y la actual concesión, dispuesto a resistir los embates de las organizaciones que están en contra del cautiverio. "Por eso queremos mostrar las especies bandera:..¨(...)

El libro ZooCheck, de Bill Travers (1992), describe algunos de los más frecuentes síntomas que muestran los animales que padecen esta enfermedad llamada zoocosis: caminan de arriba abajo, siguiendo el mismo recorrido sin cesar (típico en los felinos), dan vueltas en círculos, lamen repetitivamente las paredes, los barrotes o las puertas de la jaula, giran el cuello de forma antinatural y se mecen hacia delante y atrás de forma obsesiva (característico en los monos).

En realidad, los cuestionamientos a los zoológicos tradicionales o victorianos nacieron en los años 60. Por ese entonces, varias instituciones del mundo acusadas de funcionar como cárceles de animales comenzaron a reemplazar las viejas jaulas por recintos más espaciosos, con ambientaciones que asemejaban el hábitat natural de los animales. Años más tarde, la Estrategia Mundial en la Conservación de los Zoológicos (The World Zoo Conservation Strategy, de 1993) sugirió no ingresar fauna exótica y focalizarse en la recreación, educación, investigación y conservación. Según la organización internacional Elephant Voices, un elefante en cautiverio vive 40 años menos que uno en libertad.

Si bien no hay estadísticas oficiales se estima que hoy habitan en el Zoológico de Buenos Aires unos 2500 ejemplares: los de cautiverio, los de libre circulación y los que pertenecen al acuario, donde se realizan shows para los visitantes y cuyo funcionamiento también se cuestiona, ya que una ley de la ciudad de Buenos Aires prohíbe la exhibición y el circo con animales. (...)

¨las consecuencias del cierre de zoológicos en Europa en 2003 luego de los cuestionamientos al cautiverio no tuvieron buenos resultados. "Hubo mucha crueldad, los animales terminaron subastados y en cotos de caza, donde se los mataba para fabricar zapatos o sillones de cuero." Además, al bajar los ingresos económicos esto repercutió de inmediato en la calidad nutricional de la fauna. Con respecto a los traslados, aclara que "es una utopía pensar que alguien va a solventar semejante gasto. Un millón de dólares costó llevar un elefante de Alaska a Estados Unidos", asegura. ¿Y si se los aparta del público? Esta tampoco sería una solución. "Uno como activista pierde el control de los animales y se los aparta para ponerlos en pasillos oscuros, sin luz natural como si estuvieran en Alcatraz." (...)

Un área de servicios, la obviedad de la decadencia. Foto de Martín Lucesole

El arco de triunfo. De wikipedia.org

Los vecinos y visitantes tienen criterios muy disímiles sobre el futuro de la institución. Pedro Kesselman vive en los pisos 12 y 13 de un edificio que está justo enfrente del tradicional paseo. Parados en la orilla del lago Darwin, este abogado de 76 años señala a lo alto el balcón de su departamento de Plaza Italia. Asegura que desde que se mudó ahí, en 1984, mira todas las mañanas hacia el parque y observa el paulatino deterioro de las especies y el patrimonio. Para el letrado, el estado actual del predio deja mucho que desear. Junto a un grupo de vecinos disconformes de la Comuna 14 presentó una acción de amparo: "Pedimos que instalen más carteles educativos, que se eliminen los comerciales y los de venta de pochoclos", cuenta. Todo esto, es decir, las confiterías, quioscos y demás negocios, distorsionan el sentido educativo y científico original del lugar. "Es un cambalache del subdesarrollo. Incluso, hay que limpiar los lagos para que en verano no haya un olor desagradable que impregna todo el barrio", remarca. (....)

También cuentan que las alicaídas columnas bizantinas que descansan sobre un islote del lago Darwin fueron traídas de Trieste en 1912 y que son originales del período ostrogodo en Ravena. El conjunto parece a punto de colapsar a pesar de los intentos por sostenerlo con una estructura metálica negra y oxidada. Si bien los historiadores coinciden en que se trata de la pieza arqueológica más antigua de la ciudad, todavía es un misterio al que alude la exhortación en latín de la parte superior: ¡Cives pentapolis in turrem ascendite, algo así como "Ciudadanos de la Quinta Ciudad, ascended a las torres!"

Lo cierto es que cada una de las 52 piezas arquitectónicas del parque en cuestión encierra en sí misma una historia. Fueron construidas a partir de 1888 durante la gestión del célebre naturista Eduardo Holmberg con un estilo acorde según el país del cual provenían las bestias. Algunos ejemplos son el Templo Hindú (1903) para los elefantes, el Monario Azul y el Árabe (1899) para los simios, y el Templo Indostánico de Bombay (1901) para las vacas. Los chicos se paseaban arriba de un pony, de un camello o de un elefante. También había un tranvía que recorría los 18 kilómetros del predio que en sus orígenes formaban parte de los jardines de la estancia del caudillo Juan Manuel de Rosas. (....)

En 1994, el Parque 3 de Febrero -que abarca al Zoo- fue declarado Área de Protección Histórica y tres años más tarde, se lo consideró Monumento Histórico Nacional. A pesar de las leyes, el actual conjunto arquitectónico consiste en una serie de valiosas piezas descascaradas. Las innumerables pero precarias restauraciones efectuadas durante los años estuvieron a cargo de las concesiones privadas de turno, sin continuidad en los criterios de conservación.

"La concepción victoriana de que debe ser un lugar de exhibición de animales con una escenografía de monumento no puede convivir con la lógica moderna", explica Mónica Capano, ex secretaria de la Comisión para la Preservación del Patrimonio Histórico Cultural de la ciudad de Buenos Aires, en referencia al primer zoo tomado como modelo, el de Londres de 1847, que albergaba exóticas fieras enviadas de todas partes del mundo como tributo a la reina Victoria.

Para la especialista urge hacer un inventario y una auditoría de corte para determinar exactamente cuál es el patrimonio histórico arquitectónico del lugar y luego proceder a la restauración no sólo de los monumentos, sino también de las estatuas que parecen esconderse detrás de los arbustos o al final de los pasillos. Entre ellas se destaca una réplica de la Venus de Milo, pintada con varias capas de un color que dista años luz del original. Unos metros más lejos, refugiada tras una planta, está Diana y la Cabra. La diosa griega de la caza tiene un pie mutilado por vándalos.

"Pero lo más espantoso fue lo que sucedió con la réplica en escala del Arco de Tito, que durante años fue la entrada principal frente a plaza Italia, una típica postal de Buenos Aires", revela María Carmen Arias Usandivaras, presidenta de la ONG Basta de Demoler. Allí se utilizó gran parte del terreno de la entrada para construir una gigantesca boletería. Así fue como el imponente arco del Foro Romano quedó relegado a un costado para dar lugar a la cartelería comercial. "Preservar es restaurar, no modificar", destaca la especialista.

Como si esto fuera poco, la que fue una importante biblioteca sobre ciencias naturales, con 12.000 volúmenes, hoy está clausurada tras la misteriosa desaparición de varios incunables, como la colección privada de Estanislao Zeballos, fotografías de la Sociedad Zoológica de Londres de 1827 y la primera edición del Cosmos de Alexander von Humboldt.

Foto de Martín Lucesole

RECUPERAR EL PAISAJE CREADO POR CARLOS THAYS

El arquitecto Rodolfo Livingston, amante del Buenos Aires antiguo, confiesa que cuando pasa con los nietos en auto por la avenida del Libertador y Sarmiento se entristece al ver el Zoológico invadido por carteles y por "unos enormes cubos o depósitos espantosos que nada tienen que ver con ese lugar increíble que era parte de la fantasía de la gente". Autor de decenas de libros, Livingston propone crear un área pública gratuita, un espacio de conservación como existe en el Central Park de Nueva York. "A nadie se le ocurre poner allí carteles. Se respeta su historia. Lo mismo en el Coliseo Romano", compara.

Para el profesor se debe volver al concepto de que el Zoológico es un paseo público no exclusivo, un lugar emblemático, donde las generaciones puedan reconocerse. En ese sentido demanda que se respeten los jardines y lagos diseñados por el célebre Carlos Thays. "Era un genio -califica al paisajista-, pensó adónde iban cada uno de los árboles, de los lagos, los arbustos. Uno va caminando y los senderos se van torciendo", asegura aludiendo a Borges. (...)

http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1537452-que-zoologico-queremos#comentar

Lea sobre la muerte del oso polar en el zoo de Buenos Aires:

http://www.clarin.com/sociedad/pirotecnia-murio-polar-Zoo-porteno_0_835716602.html