Farewell to Doctor Héctor César Gotta, true master of photographic heritage

2013. From left to right: Andrea Cuarterolo, César Gotta and Abel Alexander at the inauguration of the exhibition of the Argentine works assembled by the American Mike Kessler. Exhibition at the Hilario Gallery. Arts Letters Trades. Photography: Carlos Gabriel Vertanessian.

2017 - At the J. Paul Getty Museum in Malibu (Los Angeles). Dr. César Gotta next to one of his albums exhibited there. Photography: Carlos Gabriel Vertanessian.


ABEL ALEXANDER


Argentine photographic historian (b. 1943), researcher, restorer, collector and curator of photographic collections. Gratia Artis Award (2021) awarded by the National Academy of Fine Arts of Argentina.


He is the co-author of numerous books, essays, catalogs, and articles on Argentine historical photography. In 2021 he presented his first title of exclusive authorship: These papers are stronger than bricks (Editorial ArtexArte. Colección Pretéritos Imperfectos. Buenos Aires). For decades he has worked as a journalist specializing in old photography for the Clarín newspaper in Buenos Aires.


He is a 5th generation descendant of the German daguerreotypist and photographer Adolfo Alexander (1822-1881).


He curator of numerous exhibitions on daguerreotypes and old photographs nationwide. He has directed various Photographic Museums and Historical Photo Libraries. In 1985 he was a founding member of the Center for Research on Ancient Photography in Argentina "Dr. Julio F. Riobó".


Around 1992, together with Miguel Ángel Cuarterolo and Juan Gómez, he started the renowned Congresses on the History of Photography of national and international significance through 12 meetings.


He currently chairs the Ibero-American Society for the History of Photography (SIHF).


For 15 years, together with Juan Travnik, he organized exhibitions on national historical photography at the FotoGalería del Teatro San Martín, in the City of Buenos Aires.


From 2006 to 2018, he served as Historical-Photographic Advisor of the "Benito Panunzi" Photo Library of the "Mariano Moreno" National Library, in Buenos Aires.


He has edited various photographic collections such as "Photography in Argentine History", "Escenas de la Vida Cotidiana", "A Century of Argentine Photography" and other titles on this historical theme.


In September 2017, he participated as co-author and guest speaker in the exhibition "Photography in Argentina (1850-2010). Continuity and Contradiction" organized by the J. Paul Getty Museum in Malibu, California.


In 2021 he was appointed Corresponding Academician at the National Academy of History of the Argentine Republic.


By Abel Alexander

Towards 1990, unexpected news broke through the small group of researchers dedicated to a new historical theme, as our old photography was at that time. The exclusive Agfa Photogallery inaugurated a special exhibition dedicated to national heritage photography at its headquarters, with unpublished images of a quality that surprised all attendees.


The curator Feliciano Jeanmart -artist photographer and adviser to that German company- presented the then unknown collector with glowing praise; It was Dr. Héctor César Gotta (1936-2023), a renowned radiologist and professor at the University of Buenos Aires who, at that time, revealed to us the origin of his extraordinary collection. It was born by the fortuitous discovery of a considerable archive of large negative plates -many belonging to the mythical Argentine Amateur Photographic Society-, a group that was ready to throw away in the corridor of a Buenos Aires laboratory linked to its Faculty . That day -remembered our experienced radiologist- he held several of those glass plates up to the light and discovered marvelous urban records of Buenos Aires towards the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th; it was about hundreds of images about the city that he loved and that made him fall in love forever. His new passion had been born and he would never leave him again.


The Agfa exhibition was his great baptism and, from that moment on, his relationship with historical photography will have him as one of the great protagonists, always linked to the rescue of his heritage. After so much time of cultural oblivion, he urged then to preserve that legacy that was disappearing in plain sight due to a fatal ignorance of society.


Personally we got involved around that date with César Gotta; We accompanied him in the acquisition of the earliest Argentine photography and witnessed how his collection of vintage works grew remarkably to form one of the best photographic collections in the country, especially linked to the second half of the 19th century. His enthusiasm and determination even led him to repatriate fundamental works from our heritage, such as the rescue from France of the album on Buenos Aires (1867) by the Italian Benito Panunzi, which had belonged to the family of General San Martín. Unforgettable anecdotes harvested in those searches; among them, the almost miraculous acquisition of several vintage albums by the famous Swiss photographer Samuel Rimathé


His cozy apartment in the Recoleta neighborhood -between old tango records and valuable stereoscopic viewers- was a meeting point for prominent national and international photographic researchers for years. From the very beginning, his valuable collection was generously available for any research project or historical publication. It was de rigueur to consult his large photographic library.


For decades, Dr. César Gotta selflessly collaborated through his old photographs with different national media; both in newspapers, "La Nación", "Clarín", as well as magazines, "Lugares", "Viva" and "Ferias & Congresos", to name the first that come to mind. The historical photos of him were part of several books of the renowned collection edited by the Antorchas Foundation under the direction of the historian Luis Priamo.


He actively collaborated with the Congresses on the History of Photography (1840-1940) and images from his collection were part of various research papers assigned for this purpose. For fifteen years he was the protagonist in the successful exhibitions held annually at the Photo Gallery of the San Martín Theater under the joint curatorship of Juan Travnik and Abel Alexander. The exhibition "Medicine in Argentina (1860-1960)" inaugurated in December 2009 had special relevance in said room.


Another of his relevant facets was the patrimonial recovery of thousands of Argentine medical photographs; especially on the voluminous private collection of the famous surgeons Enrique and Ricardo Finochietto. Starting in 1992, his medical images became the basis of an unpublished bibliographic collection entitled "Photographic Memories of Our Medicine"; Edited by César Gotta in collaboration with his friend and colleague Alfredo E. Buzzi and thanks to the support of the company Diagnóstico Médico of Buenos Aires.


Also, and in the field of historical medicine, his laborious research on the Argentine Hospital in Paris, inaugurated during the heat of the First World War, stands out; initiative whose reward earned him a trip to France where he gave several conferences on the matter. His thematic exhibitions presented at the Argentine Medical Association are remembered with unforgettable guided tours. We point out that he rescued from oblivion through a meticulous investigation and vintage photographs, the mythical Dances of the Boarding School.


Whenever we met, photography brought us together sharing juicy anecdotes and gratifying stories; I remember it in 2013 at the presentation of the Mike Kessler Collection at the Hilario gallery, where I had the high responsibility of studying those treasures presented for sale in the first catalog of the series that this house feeds each year. The doctor accompanied us with fervent enthusiasm, happy to see those iconographic marvels in our homeland. Also with Hilario we were part of a round table that, in 2019, was organized at the Espacio ArtexArte, Fundación Alfonso y Luz Castillo, within the framework of the activities prior to the BAphoto fair of that year; The topic was inescapable: photograph collecting, we approached it with enthusiasm and humor with César Gotta, Roberto Vega Andersen and whoever writes this profile, moved by such a loss. Together with Carlos Vertanessian, we had ventured into this topic in 2015.


In 2017, already with some health problems that affected his mobility, we found ourselves on the same flight that took us to the United States, summoned by the mega-exhibition organized by the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles entitled, "Photography in Argentina 1850 -2010 Contradiction and Continuity". Works from his collection were part of that pioneering exhibition and are highlighted in his Catalog Raisonné.


The dissemination of the importance of photographic heritage had him as an authorized spokesperson in radio and television interviews, as well as in newspapers and magazines; We give just as an example the excellent note dedicated to his collection by the journalist Soledad Gil responsible for "Lugares" Magazine (May 2021).


His death last Saturday, March 18, at the age of 86, caused enormous pain among family members and numerous friends who gathered for their last goodbye at the Parque Memorial de Pilar Cemetery and where he was fired with heartfelt words of recognition.


The Ibero-American Society for the History of Photography bids farewell to its outstanding member and adheres to these tributes to a good, generous man who knew how to set directions through multiple initiatives of his fruitful life.


Goodbye, dear Caesar!



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