BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA – Nelly Berta Vázquez, 77, walks down a wide corridor in Casa del Teatro, a house for veteran artists in Buenos Aires, Argentina’s capital. The well-known Argentine tango vocalist softly sings the melancholic songs that she used to perform around the world.
The memory of a particular song that she recorded a version of in 1979, “Mentira,” causes her to pause. The recollection fills her with emotion and amplifies her voice.
The volume succeeds in attracting Vázquez’s peers, who appear in the hallway to listen. It is not common to hear her sing, she acknowledges.
Vázquez has lived for two years in Casa del Teatro, an old art deco building with long corridors, narrow windows, and marble and wooden walls. Here, she has found the company of fellow artists and the care that she longed for.
“Artists who find themselves alone, they always are going to have someone here,” she says emotionally.
Casa del Teatro, which means, “theater house,” is a nonprofit civil organization in Recoleta, an elegant neighborhood in Buenos Aires. For the past 76 years, the organization has sheltered elderly artists who dedicated their lives to their work and now have found themselves homeless for economic or family reasons. In addition to shelter, the residents enjoy companionship and access to local cultural events.
Founded in 1938 through the initiative of lyrical singer Regina Pacini de Alvear, the house has 45 rooms for artists, says Julio Baccaro, the organization’s president. To qualify to live there, applicants must be older than 65 with art careers that spanned at least 15 years. They also must have little or no retirement savings, may not own property, and must be physically and psychologically self-sufficient.
Currently, 35 artists live in Casa del Teatro, Baccaro says. The 10-floor building has three museum galleries, two shops, a library, a theater, and a room to meet with family and friends.
Residents receive individual rooms, three daily meals in a communal dining room, and basic health services at an infirmary. The rooms are austere – barely 2 meters (6.6 feet) by 5 meters (16.4 feet), with a bed, a chest with drawers, a telephone and a small refrigerator – but everything is free.
Most importantly, Casa del Teatro enables artists to live with others in an environment where they are recognized and appreciated for the contribution they made to Argentine culture, Baccaro says. To him, one of the best advantages is also the possibility for artists to live in a neighborhood full of theaters and cafes and to have the liberty to leave whenever they want to.
“Artists are about going out a lot, especially at night, because that is what they are used to and that is how they did it their whole life,” he says. “If we restrict their schedules, we would be limiting the cultural life that they have.”
The reasons why artists, many of whom were successful in their time, apply for a room in Casa del Teatro are almost always the same: loneliness and economic problems, Baccaro says. He attributes the loneliness to age.
“The kids leave,” he says. “The house gets too big, and people start getting a bit lonely. Friends disappear because they leave or they are dying.”
Art and family rarely go well together, Vázquez says. Artists typically distance themselves from their families as a result of having nontraditional schedules and spending time traveling. Eventually, it becomes difficult to reconstruct the links that they lost.
Financially, artists work through contracts instead of maintaining a steady job throughout their lives, meaning they did not have an employer to contribute to their retirement funds, Baccaro says. Also, as they get older, they start to receive fewer job offers. If they do not know how to handle their finances well, they easily can fall into economic troubles.
Vázquez’s golden era as a tango singer was from the 1970s to the 1980s, when she performed and recorded with Argentine greats and toured around the world, she says. During that time, she delivered two presentations to benefit the artists living in Casa del Teatro, but she never imagined she would end up living there.
“Singing, who was going to tell me that I was going to end up here?” she asks. “I had everything. I had four apartments.”
Her economic troubles started when she got divorced at age 51, she says.
“I lost everything after the divorce,” she says.
Later, after returning from a tour in Japan in 1998, she began to lose her voice, the popularity of her work declined, and the singers she performed with began to retire or to die. As a result, her work opportunities declined.
She rented a room and only went out to eat with a neighbor. When her neighbor died, she decided to seek shelter in Casa del Teatro. She never had children, so her brother and two adult nephews were her only family.
“I felt very alone,” she says. “My brother offered to me to go live in his house, but I did not want to be a burden.”
Vázquez is happy in Casa del Teatro because she has company, she says. She goes out to eat with other residents, and she gets together with a friend in the house to drink mate, an infusion popular in the region.
Aldo Romero, actor, writer, assistant director and producer of Argentine cinema, says that Casa del Teatro helps people who, as artists, gave their youth to the public.
“I think it is a very important help for the artists who live there,” Romero says.
People should not assume that Casa del Teatro residents did not know how to manage their earnings, he says. Instead, they should emphasize how valuable they were and still are in their professions.
Nahir Baini, a Buenos Aires resident, says that a TV documentary about a deceased actress who once lived in Casa del Teatro attracted her to visit its museums. The museums exhibit the personal belongings of the country’s famous artists.
The lack of visitors amazed Baini, she says. The entry fee is only 1 peso (12 cents).
“It gives you the feeling that people are no longer interested in these artists who had so much success in another time,” she says. “I think they are people who we need to value because they gave so much happiness to people, that a way to recognize them is to take care of them now that they are older and they need a hand.”
Subsidies from the national government and the municipal government help to fund the house, Baccaro says. The organization also counts on private donations and income from the rent of its theater and shops, a series of theater performances, and a yearly fair that sells clothes and objects donated by artists and other citizens.
Casa del Teatro has partners – mainly benefactors – who give a small donation each month and an elected executive committee that also contribute funds. Everyone who works there – except for the cleaning staff, cooks and nurses – are volunteers.
Despite Casa del Teatro’s multiple forms of financing, it constantly has to deal with financial problems, Baccaro says. The performances in the 342-seat theater that the organization houses are not always sold out, and donations are lower than they were in the past.
“Casa del Teatro is always in need of resources because it is a very large and old building,” he says.
These problems are not unique to Casa del Teatro, though. Argentina suffers high inflation levels, and the steady increase in prices is a constant theme that creates a climate of economic uncertainty throughout society. For example, the price of food and beverages rose 3.3 percent from December 2013 to January 2014, and the cost of medical care and health services increased 5.9 percent, according to figures from the national government.
The organization has several ideas to generate more funding for the house, Baccaro says. These include announcing all plays on Facebook to increase ticket sales and hosting a second annual fair.
It also wants to persuade more artists to become partners who contribute a monthly donation. Baccaro is petitioning various institutions that comprise actors, such as unions, to contribute but has been unsuccessful so far.
In any case, life in Casa del Teatro continues. Its members continue with their daily routines and occasional cohabitation problems that Baccaro mediates.
But they also support one another. When Vázquez finishes singing in Casa del Teatro’s hallway, another resident approaches and hugs her.
“You sing better with time,” the resident says and kisses her on the cheek.
The singer says goodbye to the resident and promises that they will get a bite to eat later that afternoon.
“We are like a big family,” Vázquez says emotionally.
GPJ translated this article from Spanish.
