Don Bartolo

Abstract

The objective of this article is to analyze the initiatives that appeared, after Bartolomé Mitre’s death, to build a memorial monument along Buenos Aires City and Buenos Aires Province. It goes through the debates that dispute if Mitre or Urquiza were considered as the founder of the national unit. Those debates led to to the revaluation of the representation of Don Bartolo. It is suggested that this figure worked, as a counterpoint to the great heroic narratives in dispute, and the critical fortune of this image that opened game to other relations between style and politics is examined. It recovers the intense condensation of passions and interests of the symbolic way in which he should be remembered, to restore, at least in part, the manners in which that image was linked to other speeches.