Yesterday the Museum of the External Debt opened at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Buenos Aires. The museum graphically follows the evolution of the Argentine debt, which began with a 700,000 pound loan from Baring Brothers in 1824 and grew in the last part of the twentieth century from 8,279 million dollars in 1976 to 191,000 million in 2004.
The exhibition includes historical material, but also illustrates the debt through works of art: a speeding "financial bicycle," an installation by the Escombros group "Golden dreams and a cardboard nightmare" designed to remind people of the megalomaniac projects that ended with mass trash-picking for subsistence (it is a cardboard train car painted gold, filled with cardboard). Along the way one can admire portraits and speeches of past presidents and finance ministers who provided the source material, as well as duelling currencies issued between 1969 and 2005.
Eduardo López, the designer of the exhibit, notes:
"It is an atypical museum. When a person visits other museums in the world, they see paintings, sculptures, art, that is, patrimony. This museum is just the opposite, it shows the patrimony that does not exist, which the country has lost."
The exhibit is scheduled to be open for six months. So hurry to Buenos Aires and bring back a catalog for me.
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