Nick Caistor
The cityscape of La Paz, Bolivia’s political and
business capital is one of the most dramatic in the world.
At more than 3,500 metres above sea level, La Paz
sprawls along a huge gorge that cuts through the Andean altiplano plateau.
More than a million people live there, and in the city
centre glass skyscrapers are rapidly replacing the old single storey buildings,
many of them with corrugated roofs, and the older colonial stone buildings.
But almost as many people live in El Alto, the city
that has grown up on the top of the altiplano above La Paz, close to the
international airport.
It is here that most of the Quechua and Aymara
migrants who flock to Bolivia’s metropolis choose to settle: land prices are
much lower, and the opportunity to build homes much greater, with fewer
planning restrictions and more space.
Most of El Alto’s buildings are nondescript brick and
corrugated iron constructions.
But El Alto is now home to some of the enterprising
indigenous business people who have thrived under President Evo Morales, as
trade within the country has soared thanks to sustained economic growth over
the past decade.
A new indigenous middle class is emerging, and they
want to flaunt their success. Increasingly, the greatest status symbol they can
have is a building designed by Freddy Mamani Silvestre.
Silvestre was born 43 years ago, the son of an aymara
bricklayer, and first came to El Alto as a young boy. Now his five brothers
work for him.
Between them they have built some 80 of these El Alto
‘palaces’ locally dubbed as ‘cohetillos’ or little space rockets.
“I want society to value what we are doing,” says
Mamani Silvestre. “I consider myself an artist because I started working like
this as a small boy.”
Mamani Silvestre designs the highly-coloured ornate palaces with sketches
on paper, and claims never to have used a computer or other digital aids. He
says the bright colours come from the vivid textiles made by Aymara women like
his mother.
His buildings are usually five storeys high, with
shops on the ground floor, two storeys above them given over to a huge
salon-cum-ballroom, apartments on the floor above that, and a smaller penthouse
built on the roof for the owners known as the ‘chalet’.
One writer has described the interiors as:
‘spellbinding tapestries of bright paint, LED lights and playful Andean motifs:
chandeliers anchored to butterfly symbols, doorways that resemble owls and
candy-coloured pillars that could hold up a Willy Wonka factory… One soaring
wedding hall evokes the inside of a reptile, with arching roof beams like
dragon ribs and huge orange curlicue mouldings that could be alligator eyes.”
Mamani Silvestre’s creations can cost as much as $US
500, 000 but he has an overflowing order book - the new rich of Bolivia want to
show off their wealth.
“There have always been rich Aymara, but before Evo,
they were timid. They didn’t want to draw attention to themselves,” Mamani
Silvestre told one journalist. “Now they say: ‘This is where the successful
Aymara live.’ They are proud of Evo, and they say: ‘I have wealth, I can show
it off. I don’t have anything to hide.’”
At the same time, these altiplano entrepreneurs hope
to earn their investment back not only by renting the apartment but by hiring
out the salons for quinceañera celebrations and weddings, occasions when no
expense is spared in the Aymara community.
Dismissed by some as mere kitsch, others see his work
as the continuation of a very Andean kind of architecture, and photographs of
the ‘spaceships’ recently caused a stir when they were exhibited at London’s
prestigious Architectural Association early in 2015.
The photographs were taken from a book on Freddy
Mamani Silvestre’s work by Elizabetta Andreoli and Ligia D’Andrea, Arquitectura
andina de Bolivia: la obra de Mamani Silvestre.
Andreoli herself has no doubt about the value of the
new architectural phenomenon: ‘at its heart is a fundamentally contemporary
urban version of indigenous cultural elements,’ she says.
What is most remarkable, Andreolio argues, is that these aspiring newly
rich Bolivians no longer feel the need to follow the architectural norms of the
developed world, but have the self-confidence to assert their own identity.
Republished from LAB where you can also find photos of a range of building in El Alto
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