In the Uruguayan seaside town of Josjosayignacio, I sat on a granite bench inside a small domed building as insects buzzed and frogs croaked. It was a sweltering day in late January, and my partner Felipe. I was gazing at the orange-red sunset through a hole in the white marble ceiling of “Ta Khut,” the first freestanding Skyspace installation in South America by American artist James Turrell. The artificial light inside the building fluctuates with the natural gradient of dawn and dusk, luring visitors into an almost meditative state of mind.
About thirty of us gathered that night, and all were stunned by the shadows that appeared before them—dandelions and violets at one moment, black and lavender at another. Soft thermal lightning crackled through the open roof, the world outside grew darker, and the sky was brighter. Forty minutes later, dazed, we emerged from the colorful cocoon into the night. Dozens more art pieces dot our 17-room Posada Ayana hotel and will be displayed tomorrow.
It was challenging to convince Felipe to come with me to Uruguay’s Atlantic coast for a long weekend filled with culture. He is the deputy director of an art museum in Santiago, Chile, and he connects the area with its main center, Punta del Este. Punta del Este is a flashy Miami where Brazilian models, Argentine footballers, and Chilean reality TV stars go to be photographed by the paparazzi. In other words, it is not a destination for aesthetes like him.
The crowd on the plane to Punta kept him in doubt, but Felipe began to come to himself as time went on. For lunch, we stopped in the low-key resort town of La Barra, about six miles east of Punta, to dine at caf El Tesoro, which shares space with the concept shop 3 Mundos. We tasted delicacies from around the world – tuna tartare with turmeric toasted tortillas and a rich burrata salad with pistachio pesto – surrounded by an assortment of art books, blown glass, and ceramics. Later that evening, after we’d spent some time at Skyspace, we all agreed on one thing: Regardless of Punta’s reputation, the town to its east was opening up a more international creative scene with huge potential.
About 40 minutes east of Punta, josjos, The once modest fishing village of Jose Ignacio is at the center of this transformation. In recent decades, it has blossomed into a luxury beachfront enclave filled with galleries, including a new ceramic studio for the Argentine sculptor Marcela Jacob; Boutiques, such as Rizoma’s octagonal Temple of Books; And statement buildings, including Edgardo Gimsamnez’s cartoon-style Casa Neptune, which recently began housing Fundacion Ama Amoedo’s art residence, where creatives from Latin American backgrounds gather for research and experimentation.
Joseph Ignacio is known as the Hamptons of South America, but that belies its playful nature. Yes, the houses here are worth millions of dollars, but most of them sit on dirt roads. And, unlike much of the Hamptons, the foliage here is not trimmed to tiresome perfection; it’s still wild and vibrant—a bit like the place itself.
Residents often credit Francis Mallmann for setting the tone. The eccentric, fire-loving Argentine chef made the place famous in 1978 when he opened a restaurant called Posada del Mar at the end of the Jose Ignacio Lagoon. At the end of 2020, he returned to a very different josjosore, Ignacio, debuting Chiringuito Francis Mallmann, a beachfront attraction Felipe and I visited the next day.
Part of the Costa Garzon development, which will add a boutique hotel in 2024, the restaurant is a high-end twist on South America’s informal beachfront stalls. “Here, you can eat and drink on the beach with no shoes on, then relax and go swimming,” said Malman, who happened to be there.
Felipe and I did just that — enjoying a rib-eye steak with salsa. We leave Josjo Ignacio the next day and head to the Luz Culinary Wine Hotel. This minimalist, six-suite hotel opened in November on a 35-acre estate filled with vineyards and olive trees. The hotel is conveniently located on the way to our next stop, Pueblo Garzon.
If Joseph Ignacio is the Hampton of the Southern Hemisphere, Pueblo Garzon, half an hour inland and surrounded by pastures, may well be its Marfa. A railway line that once brought life to the town closed in the 1960s, and the population plummeted from around 2,000 to 200 today. However, the city has always retained its fairytale charm. Over the past decade, many abandoned homes have been snatched up by artists and turned into galleries.
“When I first went in 2009, I felt like I had found a secret place that no one else knew about,” recalls American photographer Heidi Lund, who opened the Campo Creative Academy in 2017. “There is a strange, different landscape perfect for any artist.”
At Campo’s Canteen, where you can chat with local artists, we learn about the annual Campo Artfest, which put Pueblo Garzon on the map. Every December, more than 30 artists transform the town, complete with its old train station and palm-shaded square, into a creative playground. More permanent galleries are opening. On our walk, we counted a dozen, two of which arrived just a month ago.
The first is Walden Naturae, an ambitious outpost of the Walden Gallery, a contemporary art space in Buenos Aires. Hidden behind imposing brick-red walls, it showcases the work of local heavyweights, including hallucinatory pornographic photography by the late Argentine conceptual artist Oscar Bony. Another, La Galerilla, pays homage to the city’s glory days, outfitting emerging artists with converted freight train carriages to house site-specific installations, such as the whimsical, animal-story-inspired collage art of Lolo Bonfanti in Brazil.
On the last day of our trip, we returned to Punta del Este. We visited Uruguay’s first major contemporary art museum, the Atugari Art Museum Contemporaneo. Set in a 99-acre sculpture park, it opened in January with a series of 27 hypnotic daylight prints by Leon Ferrari and a major retrospective of environmental installation artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude, whose scope and scale impressed Felipe.
The permanent collection will include Uruguayan masters such as Maria Freire(a leading figure in the concrete art movement) and Joaquin Torres-Garcia (a pioneer of constructivism in Latin America), Paired with global ICONS such as Frank Stella and Peter Halley, in a windowless, black-walled low-rise gallery. “I call it ‘the Catacombs’ because it’s very dark,” explained Pablo Atchugarry, the Uruguayan sculptor whose foundation runs the museum. “The artwork is like a play like actors suddenly appearing on the stage.”
Most importantly, MACA has helped make this area, just east of Punta del Este, a true art destination. Of course, tourists will continue to flock to this stretch of the Uruguayan coast for sugary sandy beaches, beachfront feasts, and celebrity spotting. “Hopefully, now,” Mr. Achugari said, “they’ll see that it also has a beating cultural heart.”
