In this opportunity, the invitation is to walk through the palace garden, a magical place so often used to connect the Errázuriz Alvear family with the nature of that landscape. Today, in the garden there is a fountain that once housed two cinemas, and today in the center there is a small decorative figure: a boy holding a small alligator from which he pours water into the fountain.

With a contemporary vision, Cabutti playfully recreates those alligators made of various materials that populated the exotic fauna of Buenos Aires palaces during the last century, thus transforming the fountain, with a floor of 120,000 blue glass beads, into the blue sea of the Colombian Caribbean, from which other alligators emerge while some more are installed on the terrace.

Designed in 1911 by architect René Sergent, this former French neoclassical palace was the residence of the family formed by Josefina de Alvear and Matías Errázuriz Ortúzar. After living in Europe for a decade, the couple acquired a valuable collection of European and Oriental art (most of which is now part of the museum's patrimony). In 1936, the national state bought the house and the collections. A year later, the National Museum of Decorative Art was created, which today has more than 6,000 objects, ranging from Roman sculptures to handcrafted creations of contemporary silverware.

Achille Duchêne called the prince of gardens, was in charge of the design of the palace gardens. Surrounded by shrubs and rose bushes is the swan fountain, which once held dozens of birds, one of the garden's main attractions. A path of orange and cypress trees leads to a second, smaller fountain: the turtle fountain. In the style of classical French gardens, there are paths, steps, ponds, and benches. At the entrance, visitors are greeted by geometric anthropomorphic figures with Mayan and Aztec reminiscences by Cabutti.

In her works, many monumental works, others fragile pieces of glass, Cabutti reflects on colonial and political, origins and their resonances in the present. In this installation, the artist wonders whether decorative elements sweeten political or contextual issues that imply colonization. According to Cabutti, "no sculptures or fountains were made that had to do with the Latin American reality, but they were fountains designed by a European artist, with themes that did not correspond to the time because the theme of Africanness is quite recent in the studies in Argentina."

"Se va el caimán" is the title of a popular song in Latin America. For this reason, Cabutti links this song to a museum that is conquering its own public, a museum whose origin has not been popular and whose programs currently allow not only to see the heritage from a contemporary point of view but also with other proposals to revisit, rethink and renew the museum's public. 

"Se va el caimán, se va el caimán"

The exhibition takes place in three interrelated rooms and is defined as "the opening of the archives" of the creator's work "from a contemporary point of view, inviting to a journey with summoning ideas, sense of humor, suggestion and poetry", according to the curator.

Some milestones of her production linked to rock and collaborative art that she made with Charly García, Luis Alberto Spinetta, and Federico Moura are exhibited in different formats and supports. Also on display are videos, drawings, animations, gigantographies, collages, sculptures, corporeal elements and scenographic devices, costumes, and figurines from throughout his career.

On the other hand, Renata Schussheim's plastic work is exhibited in Cronopios Hall. Visitors will find projected images that coexist with two theatrical myths: the Red Queen, a character from "Alice", a show by Oscar Araiz inspired by Lewis Carroll's tale; and the Queen of the Night from Mozart's opera "The Magic Flute", staged by Sergio Renán.

Dedicated to theater, opera, musicals, and ballet, Hall C exhibits costumes and figurines that gave life to hundreds of characters from several of the shows in which Renata participated. A dozen costumes of different styles, made throughout her work, form a striking red army. Room J, dedicated to music, particularly rock, houses a gigantography of the drawing created for the cover of the album "Música del alma" by Charly García, and a deconstruction of that work that presents excerpts from it. There is also an unpublished documentary short film, made with fragments of concerts, interviews, and video clips.

The artist's large production had a leading presence last year at the Biennial of Young Art, where she exhibited the sculpture of a mermaid with red hair, on a platform, facing a landscape of changing nature and amid enveloping music, integrating the visual arts exhibition, which brought together other creators.

Schussheim was also in charge of the visual identity of the Biennial, that is, everything that surrounds it, not only the facade of the building but also the graphics, posters, flyers, and merchandising such as posters or notebooks, a work done together with designer Martín Gorricho.

Sense of humor, suggestion, and poetry are the key words of Renata's "Al Rojo Vivo", a reference to Argentine pop art that accompanied and inspired entire generations, from the peak of Argentine rock in the 80s and the awakening of the democratic spring, until today.

Official website: 

Artists: