Traditionalism for Export: The Transnational Gaucho Network, as Seen through the Trajectory of Carlos Daws (1897-1948)

Abstract

This article analyzes the dynamics of the traditionalist movement on a regional scale based on the actions of one of its referents: Carlos Daws. The exploration of his activities, his personal connections, his institutional adherences and, in particular, his networks, generated towards different foreign locations, allows us to think about the international relations sustained by cultural exchanges; both those that were motivated by individual wills and interests, as well as those that acquired political support and revealed the cultural diplomacy between American countries. Carlos Daws’ public interventions since the foundation of his Creole circle “El Fogón” in 1897 until his death, and the subsequent acquisition of his museum by the national State in 1948, allow us to attempt a long-term analysis of the emergence, consolidation and expansion of traditionalism from Buenos Aires. We specifically study the organization of the local network that involved writers, collectors, painters and amateurs; and the relationships that were germinated with cultural figures and tourists from other latitudes, with special attention to the exchanges with the United States within the framework of Panamericanism. Through the private archive of Daws, which contains his correspondence and dozens of books that recompile news, documentation and images related to our object of study, and with the consultation of specialized periodical publications and the documentary collections conserved within the repositories of traditionalist institutions, we pretend to unveil part of the international networks that dynamized the Interamerican cultural relationships, parallel to official projections.