Since I was born, I have lived in the state of Lara, in Venezuela. More specifically, I lived my first 17 years in the city of Barquisimeto, and from then until now (I am almost 20 years old) in the city of Cabudare. Currently, for the past 2 years, I have been studying a university degree in the field of arts, in Barquisimeto, my hometown. We often have very dynamic and fun classes that undoubtedly encourage enthusiasm in learning and moving forward with our artistic studies. An example of these incredible and fun classes was the one we had today, Wednesday, December 11th, for the subject known as History of the Arts.
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The teacher Ulidzan, who teaches the History subject at my university, decided to have a different class today and took us to explore the streets of the historic center of our city. This was something I had always done simply for errands or for fun, and never to learn something new. But this time I was able to see the places I already knew but learning new things about them.
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| This is the statue of the liberator Simon Bolivar located in the central square of the city. They say it is an exact replica of the one found in the central square of the country's capital, Caracas, showing Simon Bolivar in his full splendor, mounted on his horse prepared for battle. |
| Simón Bolívar is considered the liberator of some South American countries such as Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru and Panama. |
We started by meeting in Plaza Bolivar, where the teacher explained to us that every town or city has a central square, which is generally located next to a church and a government building, and that in the case of Barquisimeto, this would be Plaza Bolivar located in a whole block between streets 25 and 26 and avenues 16 and 17 of the city. She also explained to us that the statue of the national hero and liberator of our nation, Simón Bolívar, was commissioned to be built by what would have been many years ago the president of the state of Lara, Eustoquio Gómez.
She also explained, different from what I thought, that this square was not always called Plaza Bolivar but that previously it was called Plaza La Concepción, and that it was not always the central square of the city but that before it had been another square that currently bears the name of Plaza Jacinto Lara.
After a while of talking about the topic and teaching us several things that I can't remember clearly at the moment, we walked as a group towards the former headquarters of the government of the state of Lara where we were able to appreciate a gallery of very beautiful artistic works in my opinion. Here we discussed what we thought of some works and what they meant to us. One of the works that caught my attention the most was this one I will show you below.
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| Artwork by an unknown artist, exhibited in the gallery we visited. |
It is a mixed media work, I'm not exactly sure what material the surface of the work was made of but it was done with paint and represented different characteristics of the state of Lara, among them the small figure in the upper right part of the patron saint of the state of Lara, San Antonio de Padua, a representative image of the plains, some typical handicrafts or activities done in different towns of the state, and an indigenous woman representing the ancient peoples that inhabited the state and those that still remain in certain parts of the state. In this work, you can also read the inscription “nacidos en semiárido” (born in semiarid) and the name "Lara."
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| The first two images that I show here are of us arriving at the Concha Acústica Park. | The other two images are of the park itself and show the fish pond and the open auditorium. |
After talking about several works, we headed to the park called "Concha Acústica" which, something I did not know, is actually called "Parque San Juan Bautista la Salle" and was inaugurated in 1963. It consists of a small square at the top which has an artistic work that, as the teacher explained to us, is about the signing of the independence act of the state of Lara, although there are not many records of this. It also has long stairs surrounded by what seems to be a small forest leading to a second square below where there are various underground water sources or river veins, the largest of these containing fishes, and a kind of open-air auditorium which is why it is known as an acoustic shell. These auditoriums were used in ancient times to project the voice better since microphones or voice amplifiers did not exist at that time.
From here, the teacher said goodbye to us, and my friends and I stayed a little longer in that place that is really very peaceful and too beautiful. It was truly a very pleasant walk that I would like to repeat soon, either in the same places or in new ones to continue learning a little more about my home state.
All the photographs in this post are my property, taken with my Iphone XR phone