The Latin American Architecture Documentation Center (CEDODAL), always under the direction of the architects Ramón Gutiérrez and Graciela María Viñuales -who founded it more than twenty-five years ago-, has taken a step forward in the preservation and use of its documentary collection, made up of a huge collection of Ibero-American historical documents and an important set of architectural archives; many of them acquired with the personal resources of their managers and others received as donations.
Five years ago, this Argentine non-governmental institution had signed an agreement with the Organization of Ibero-American States (OEI), through its Documentary Center for Latin American Art and Architecture, with its headquarters in Buenos Aires. Under the framework of that agreement, the OEI received the Library and Newspaper Library gathered at CEDODAL (some 20,000 books and 15,000 magazines), and now, in a tripartite effort, the Library of National Congress, which will receive the Documentary Fund Archive, is joining this challenge and will host it in its national newspaper library, where it will be digitized so that everyone can have access to it in person or remotely.
In this last act, held days ago, the director of the OEI, Luis Scasso, highlighted that “Ramón and Graciela's attitude is very generous with this donation. We are not used to living in a time where generosity is expressed through detachment because when it detaches itself from things, it also detaches itself from all previous work”.
These words allude to the efforts of both architects -who started the CEDODAL Library with their own personal library, and increased it with countless purchases that were financed with their personal resources- but also include the work of so many architects than in Argentina and elsewhere of Latin America, noting that said institution offered a space for storage and study, they donated complete archives of enormous historical and documentary value. "It has been almost six decades of work for the rescue and appreciation of architecture and urbanism in Argentina and in our continent”, Ramón Gutiérrez expresses it. We did it supported by our three children first and a legion of students, colleagues and friends right away”.
The continuity of that dream is guaranteed, and that is the greatest joy. This is how Ramón Gutiérrez, director of CEDODAL, tells it: “This common good had an origin that should not be lost, it was an Ibero-American good and therefore the OEI paradigmatically fulfilled the scenario of our desire that it not lose the profile of our objectives. Second, for having essentially consolidated the management and task of forming CEDODAL from our country. We are aware of our debt to the public university in training and to CONICET for enabling our insertion in research. For this reason, we were committed to keeping this Library and Newspaper Library in Argentina, which is a way of returning the personal investment that education, science and culture made in us. The Library of Congress offers us a framework of excellence to achieve the enhancement of the new objectives”.
In the near future, already digitized, the dream of Graciela M. Viñuales and Ramón Gutiérrez will be available to the public.