A fleeting city, a lasting story: narrative and visual culture in Oski and Fernando Birri’s La primera fundación de Buenos Aires

Abstract

In this article we briefly reconstruct the trajectory of Oscar Conti (Oski), Argentinian cartoonist, graphic humorist and illustrator. This reconstruction is used to underline some particular characteristics of our subject who are related to his graphic style, who is indebted to an enormous visual culture. Afterwards, we analyze this style under the concept of visual culture, attempting to trace the particular mixture of images, both from “high” and “low” culture, that helped produce it. In the same way, we observe the way in which Oski narrates in single images. Finally, we reconstruct the collaboration between Oski, Fernando Birri and León Ferrari in the film La primera fundación de Buenos Aires, trying to get across the way in which the filmmakers animate one of Oski’s static paintings. How do the different images that form part of Oski’s visual culture coexist? How do image and narrative combine in his work? How does the narrative unfold through the montage of the film?