Lawrence.com

Buenos Aires, Argentina — Arnoldo Ponce fiddles with his tie, daubs the perspiration beading on his forehead and watches anxiously for the crowd to react to his paintings. Like many artists on opening night, he is nervous.

But for Ponce, the showing of his landscapes at a Buenos Aires exhibition hall is not about selling art: It's about finding self-esteem despite a life lived on the streets amid hunger and homelessness.

Ponce, who has lived his early years shuttling between orphanages and poor houses, has come together with 20 other homeless Argentines to take up paintbrushes and form a group called "Painters Without Homes."

It's opening night as a crowd gathers to see their paintings at Manzana de Las Luces, a cultural center in downtown Buenos Aires. Ponce's not used to being an artist, nor having his works on display.

Striking works

The works are striking, whether rendered in oils or water colors: two cypress trees etched against a desolate landscape; or a Salvador Daliesque portrait of a woman in a blue veil with piercing green eyes who seems to be melting away.

There are even paintings of Argentine cowboys in creased leather sombreros -- called gauchos here -- rendered by homeless urban painters who have only stepped onto the sweeping grasslands of the Pampas in their imaginations.

And all the paintings are on sale for prices ranging from as low as $4 to $10 -- money that will give homeless artists newfound income and an alternative to panhandling.

"I first joined the group because it gave me a means to eat," said Ponce, who finds painting a relief from begging on the streets. "I started painting just this year without ever picking up a paintbrush before. It allows me to express myself."

For a man born in a humble adobe house on the flatlands of Santa Fe province north of here, Ponce said painting has giving him food for inspiration.

Behind the artist is his master painting -- titled "Hope" -- which prominently features a woman with outstretched handing grasping at a green-hued sky.

"She represents Argentina," he said, likening her to Argentina's economic travails during the past four years as the country plunged into debt default and devaluation. "Our country is like the woman, a country that has been left with next to nothing but still clings to hope of better days ahead."

'Natural-born painters'

A century ago, Argentina was one of the richest countries in the world. But today the country is reeling from a record 22 percent unemployment and a poverty rate approaching 50 percent.

"Painters Without Homes" is the brainchild of local artist Sylvia Olguin. She wanted an activity to complement the work of a local organization that ran a soup kitchen for some 140 homeless at the cultural center where the exhibit is being held.

With her own money, she bought brushes, paints and other supplies needed to set up an art studio at Manzana de las Luces. The artists now take courses from her, then paint their works and hope for sales.

"Many of my students are natural-born painters, people that never would have known they had talent if they didn't come here in search of food," said Olguin, noting many were first drawn to the center because of the soup kitchen.

"They have the blood of true artists," she added, pointing out that the raw experiences of life on the streets pour through these paintings.

Indeed, the problem of homelessness in Argentina has taken on staggering proportions in the last four years as the country endures a prolonged economic crisis that exploded last December into street riots and political upheaval that saw five presidents in a matter of days.

Finding shelter

According to the government of Buenos Aires, some 2,000 people live on the streets in this city of 12 million. Experts estimate as many as 500,000 others are struggling to find shelter in abandoned houses and buildings throughout the capital.

Among them is Julian Sequeira, 19, who lives with his family in a squatter's house in Barracas, a traditionally working-class neighborhood of Buenos Aires.

"First, I came to La Manzana for its soup kitchen, but then I realized that I could do something else, I could paint. It's a way for me to express myself. Generally, I paint about social conflicts in the country," said Sequeria, who specializes in collages.

On the other side of the room, Julio Gonzalez, another painter in the group, is eavesdropping as people talk about his work. His pictures depict life on sprawling plains and farms he has actually never seen.

"My curiosity is what drove me to paint," said Gonzalez, 62, who has long subsisted on piecemeal jobs -- called "changas" -- and food handouts from a local Catholic charity.

But the program gives the students more than just a way to earn a living.

"With painting, I have been able to get back some of my self-esteem and have realized that I have much to be thankful for," said Juan Carlos Nunez, 41 and homeless.

Olguin is proud of her charges and said they have found more than just artistic freedom.

"The majority of the students live on the street, in parks or alongside the train tracks," she said. "These workshops are their space, their place to find their own personal liberation."