CANVASING THE WORLD

♪ -My name is Sean Diediker, and I'm a painter.

I've always designed my paintings based on travel and chance.

I love exploring the human condition as I look to find beauty in true, unscripted reality and then documenting that experience with paint.

♪ ♪ I love merging the craft of Old World masters with modern-day media to create and share unique windows into humanity.

♪ Join me as I canvas the world to explore the interplay between art and the human condition, every episode a place, every episode a painting.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ If it's your first time in Buenos Aires, the multicultural vibration of the city might be a bit overwhelming.

♪ I decided to pace myself and explore the old ways before diving into the new.

♪ Enter La Fortuna, a country estate run by a traditional family for over 150 years and a step back in time.

♪ ♪ Don Chaza, the head gaucho at La Fortuna, rode up on his horse.

His son was with him, and it was very much a royal welcome, something that I've never experienced before.

♪ As a filmmaker and a painter, I'm always of course on the hunt for imagery.

Now, when Don Chaza mounted his horse and sat there in all his glory, that was it for me.

Everything was going, and I'm like, "This may be the painting.

This is what I came to Argentina for."

♪ ♪ -A gaucho would be a cowboy in Argentina.

Initially, the gaucho was the sons of mixed parents, so Indian and immigrants.

So obviously not being really accepted neither by one community nor the other, and so having a very lonely life but a very free life.

♪ The gaucho is someone that has a horse, a knife, and you might have seen a belt with some coins on it, because that was his purse, if you want.

He would move from one estancia to another and offer his services.

The gaucho would be the one that would have helped in moving the cows from one field to another.

Nowadays, gauchos are the ones that are actually working in the countryside.

They are more settled than they were before, and it's true that they still have really a lot of knowledge on how to behave with those animals and what is the best way to get the most of them.

♪ -The gauchos are serious horsemen.

All the way from Don Chaza to his grandchild, these guys know how to ride.

They play this game where they have two soccer posts, and there's a ring that they charge at full gallop, and they have a little, tiny stick, and they have to get the ring on the stick at full speed.

♪ It's a test of basically horsemanship and skill.

♪ -The gaucho, to a certain extent, it defines the Argentinean macho culture that we know nowadays a little bit, because it's all about the strength that they show by working with the animals.

♪ -Both got it.

They both got it.

There's a secondary part to this which is a little bit more romantic, so the gaucho that gets the ring can present that to maybe one of the lady spectators as a token of affection.

♪ What's that game called?

-We call corrida de sortija.

It's like a ring running, a competition between gauchos.

It's just like a party.

It's a celebration.

-The Americans have a cowboy culture that, you know, about 100 years ago, 150 years ago, and that cowboy culture is dying.

Is the gaucho culture -- Is it evaporating like the American cowboy?

-Years ago, it was dying, the culture, but now it's growing, you know, because Argentinean child, Argentinean boys are looking the culture in gauchos, and they like this, and they practice the gaucho culture.

♪ -It was all very impressive.

And with heavy horsemanship comes heavy appetites, and these guys know how to cook.

[ Man speaks Spanish ] One of my favorite days was the day of the barbecue, or asado.

They grilled everything under the sun.

So, we got chicken?

-Chicken.

-Chicken, and we've got ribs.

We've got the chicken necks.

It was amazing, and it was all about tradition.

They wanted to celebrate what they were, their heritage.

Oh, whoa, yeah.

-Oh, bravo.

-The grandkids were there playing.

It was a nice family moment, and they were so kind to welcome us into it.

[ Man speaking Spanish ] This is how you barbecue.

♪ ♪ -[ Singing in Spanish ] ♪ -Salud.

-Salud.

-[ Singing in Spanish ] ♪ -In the last three hours of our stay there, we all gathered together in the kitchen.

My producer cut together a little short of all our experiences for that week, and they got to watch themselves.

-[ Singing in Spanish ] [ Laughter ] ♪ -Rumor has that she makes all the food here, and it's fantastic, but she doesn't eat it.

[ Laughter ] Some of these people have never been on camera.

It was very cool to watch their reaction to themselves.

[ Laughter ] -[ Laughs ] -They would nudge each other, and, you know, the guys were saying, "I'm riding a little bit better than you."

You know, we take for granted we have our cellphones and shooting ourselves all the time, but that was kind of a special experience for them.

-[ Shouting in Spanish ] ♪ ♪ ♪ -I fell in love with Argentina 14 years ago.

On the first step I made in Salta, I just felt that I belonged to this place.

[ Man singing in Spanish ] I really wanted to live in a place where people would dance, sing, laugh, interact with people, living the life as it come, minute by minute.

♪ -Sarah was kind enough to take us to where she lived.

She said that we would see something that most visitors don't see.

And so we pull up in the cab, and, you know, from 5 blocks away, we hear this intense drumbeat.

The whole community is alive with rhythm and dance, and it's a party.

It's a party.

♪ -In my neighborhood, we have a very special murga.

A murga is a group of people that do some dancing and some music with some big drums, and they are getting ready for the Carnival that is in February every year, and so they rehearse during the whole year.

And it's a great way for people to get together, the younger ones, the older.

It gives a purpose to teenagers to be part of a group and maybe avoids them doing some other stuff that would be maybe less productive.

-If this is your neighborhood, why weren't you dancing?

-Because I'm actually doing some other type of dances.

This one is definitely too hard for me.

I cannot jump in the air as they do.

[ Laughs ] ♪ [ All singing in Spanish ] ♪ ♪ [ Whistle blows ] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -Outside of the famed Recoleta Cemetery, I came across a young immigrant from Nicaragua who found refuge in Buenos Aires, following her dream of becoming a filmmaker.

♪ -It's not secure anymore, living in my country, so I have to immigrate to Argentina.

And that's a thing that is difficult for me, because I always thinking in my future and about my country, what is going on there.

That makes me feel so anxious, and sometimes I feel like I'm not going to return to my country, and that make me scared.

I want to see my dad again and my sister.

♪ The main thing that I like here, you see a lot of artists.

I feel I have more opportunity to grow like a photographer and a good filmmaker.

[ Laughing, conversing indistinctly ] [ Laughs ] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [ Camera shutter clicking ] -As I'm walking the streets of Buenos Aires, one of the unique visuals that you get here are the dogs and their walkers.

And it's not uncommon to see someone walking 7, 10, 15 dogs.

And more often than not, if they're walking 15 dogs, the dogs are actually walking them.

[ Dog barking ] ♪ ♪ -This society was created by immigrants.

Our culture, musical culture, it's very eclectic and full of songs from other countries.

Tango was born here.

Many people said that it was in France, but no.

♪ It's a mix between African music, habaneras from Spain, and music from gauchos here.

-How did you come to discover dance?

-It's a funny story.

A boyfriend left me when I was around 25 years old.

And I was completely, you know, sad, and some friends pick me up and said, "Go to tango, to a tango class."

And suddenly, I went with them, and I discover a world, and this change my life.

♪ ♪ I travel around the world teaching.

I have fantastic friends through tango.

The most great people that I meet in my life was through tango.

We feel an identification with the music, and tango lyrics are very special.

They are very sad.

-Why?

-Because I guess Argentineans are -- inside are sad, melancholic, you know?

They always cried about a woman who left them or the mother who died, or, you know, always seems a little bit depressed, the lyrics.

But we love it.

[ Laughs ] ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ [ Cheers and applause ] -Bravo!

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -[ Singing in Spanish ] ♪ ♪ [ Cheers and applause ] -Bravo!

-Being here in Argentina, you really learn that dance is a form of communication.

Everyone does it down here.

It builds a sense of community.

-The dance that be known from Argentina is tango.

♪ The connection is key.

You're actually not looking at the other one, because you are in what we call the close embrace.

You're not supposed to talk, obviously, within the dance, but you want to transmit something to the other one dancing with you.

Every dance is a moment of life, you know?

They forget about the world around, and it's all about you and me sharing that three minutes together on the dance floor.

-Tango changed my life, open many, many doors for me.

I travel around the world teaching.

I have fantastic friends around the world through tango.

♪ ♪ -A lot of people were very hesitant to let me film them dancing or take pictures.

Why is that?

-Well, you know, they go, but they supposed to be working or with the family, so they ran away and just for dance for one hour or two hours, so they don't want to be discovered.

-Ah.

-That is why.

-So it's like a guilty pleasure, perhaps?

-Maybe.

For some people, yes.

-It's not so important whether you are the best dancer or not, whether you know the steps or not.

What is key is whether you want and how much do you open to connect with that person that you're going to be dancing with during those three minutes.

♪ And that is the magic of the dancing.

-If I want to dance with her, and she is at another table, what I do is to make eye contact, and slyly, I do this.

She answer me, "Yes."

I get up.

I go to her table, and we start dancing.

If she doesn't want to dance with me, she goes away with her face, and that's it.

-What happen if I want to dance with him?

If I want to dance with somebody, and I start to look at him and continue look at him, and he's looking away, that mean he don't want to dance with me.

But he's invited me, that mean we have the agreement to share that time, that tango together.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -"Canvasing the World" fine-art reproductions printed on pearl linen and museum-quality cotton rag are now available.

♪ To order your own fine-art reproduction of "Tango" or any editions from the "Canvasing the World" television series, please visit CTWgallery.com.

♪ If you'd like more information on the series or a peek at what's currently on Sean's canvas, you can follow "Canvasing the World" on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter... or visit us at CanvasingTheWorld.TV.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -Muy bien.

-Thank you.

Gracias, gracias.

♪ Mr. McQuerrey, my sixth grade teacher, used to have a little art study class after lunch.

One day, he says, "I think you guys are mature enough to see an image of a nude woman."

And we look at each other in class, we're like, "Yeah, yeah, we can take it," and, you know, secretly, we're [Imitates chuckling] And so after lunch, we gather round, and Mr. McQuerrey brings out this picture of a nude woman, and it's Duchamp's "Nude Descending the Staircase," which is very much an abstract study in motion.

You know, we were a little disappointed as sixth graders.

But in the long run, that painting directly influenced my "Tango" painting for Argentina.

When I was in Argentina and watching these tango dancers, I feel like I channeled Duchamp a little bit, at least with the study of motion, because this is what this dance was.

It was a study in motion.

And so visually, as I'm taking photos and they're a little blurry, and you see little trails of light and movement, I'm like, "Wow, maybe this is how Duchamp felt as he was creating his compositions."

And so I applied that experience to the motion tango painting of Argentina.

-When we arrived at La Fortuna, we pull up, and Don Chaza and his son are on their horses.

They have an Argentine flag and an American flag, and they're in their gaucho outfits, and they're just greeting us with the flags as we pulled up.

They put on all sorts of different spectacles for us.

♪ -[ Speaking Spanish ] -After six days of filming on location, we took a bus back to Buenos Aires, to the city.

And there's about 18 million people in Buenos Aires.

It's an amazing city, but it's a massive city.

So going from the country, La Fortuna, to 18-million-person city, that was quite substantial, a very different shift.

But both were fantastic.

♪