Buenos Aires Province (Argentina)

Buenos Aires is the biggest and most populous province of Argentina. Since the 1880s Buenos Aires is an autonomous city, and the capital of the province is La Plata.

After a request by reader Bruno Rodolfo, I decided to make a new flag for the province, with more references to provincial history.

This is the current flag:


It was adopted in the 1990s. I think the design has some merits, but the color clash is problematic.

My humble take on this thread is the following:


The diagonal layout remembers the map of the province. The medium blue fields represent the sky — "buenos aires" means "good airs" in Spanish —  and the sea, respectively. The white stripe is not only a nod to Argentinean flag, but a reference to Plata river — "plata" is Spanish for "silver —, fundamental for the development of the province and the whole Argentina. The golden color represents province's wealth, and the red demi-sun is a symbol of federalism and appeared in earlier Buenos Aires flags.

Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Many thanks for reader Bruno Rodolfo, for his valuable theme suggestion.

Mercosur [car plates]

The Mercosur, a regional bloc comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela, intends to adopt uniform vehicle registration plates, like European Union already did. Trucks and buses must adopt it from 2016, other vehicles from 2018. On recent news, it's possible to see prototypes for the model, that can be seen here. I think the model rather ugly, so I decided for my own attempt.

The plates on the linked image follow the color scheme of respective countries. I'll, at first, design an unified color scheme, totally inspired in Mercosur's flag. They contain the blocs's flag (in Portuguese for Brazil, otherwise in Spanish), the national flags, the countries names in native language and the local identification (already used in Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela).


I particularly like the layout, and I think it's more similar to the current plates on the countries. I don't think a QR code is needed.

As I early wrote, the basic layout can be adapted to current colors and customs. Below, for example, there are vehicle plates inspired in current Brazilian ones.


I'm particularly happy with the results, because I achieved a clever color scheme with contrasting colors (fundamental to every type of plates).

Comments are welcome.
You can see my post about Mercosur flag here.

Mercosur

The Mercosur (Mercado Común del Sur in Spanish, "Southern Common Market" in English) is a South American political and economical organization, originally comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay; Venezuela joined in 2012, and Bolivia is in admission process. A blog reader called Gonzalez proposed a post about a Mercosur flag that "does not need to be translated".

Gonzalez's worry is based with the fact that the flag that flies on Brazil is this, with "Mercosul" (the name of the organization in Portuguese) inscription. In Brazil, flag law states that this flag should be flown near national flag in many kinds of public bodies.


And, on the rest of the member countries, that speak Spanish, the inscription is "Mercosur":


The symbolism of the flag is interesting: the Southern Cross emerging from horizon is a clear reference to the south, and represents the motto "our north is the south" (a reference to compass' north, used as guide). The fours starts also stand for the four founding members.

An easy solution for the issue is just removing any inscription from the flag and, catching the opportunity, making the stars bigger.


As it would be too easy, I'll propose a more original design, too, presented below:


This flag doesn't have the logo aspect anymore. The white stars on blue seems more natural (it's similar to a Mercosur's unofficial flag variant), and the triangle points to the south, as stated on the motto.

Comments are welcome.
Once more, I'd like to thank the suggestions, and invite you to send me one.

South Atlantic Islands (Argentina)

I've recently saw a Polandball comics containing a Malvinasball, a character representing Argentine claim over Falkland Islands (the islands are commonly known as Malvinas in Spanish). In effect, the claimed region corresponds to Argentine department of Islas del Atlántico Sur (South Atlantic Islands). The character used a novel flag, that I reconstructed on the image below:


Well, it's not a great flag, for many reasons: too similar to Argentine flag, yellow on white isn't a contrasting color scheme, the map is too difficult to be reproduced.

This flag, if used elsewhere, is totally unofficial, as the Argentine department doesn't have a flag. The flag flown by British territory of Falkland Islands is the following (Argentine claim also include parts of South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands and British Antarctic Territory):


Some proposed flags to the department can be found here, but flags are too generic, plagiarist or badly designed.

My flag proposal is inspired by a coat of arms that gained a competition in 1966 to a new coat of arms for Argentine. The coat of arms below, as well as many others related to the islands, can be seen here.


My flag proposal is the following:


The blue-white color scheme is predominant in most Argentine provincial flags, and I decided to follow the pattern to this department. The Sun of May is a symbol of claimed sovereignty over the islands. The symbolism of the waves is very obvious. In a arrangement inspired by coat of arms above, four stars are put on cross, each one representing a island or an archipelago: top (special place) for Falkland, left for South Orkney, right for South Georgia and south for South Sandwich.

Your comments are welcome.
I'd like to remember it's a creative exercise and no way has intentions to show political statements.

Catamarca (Argentina)

Until 2011, the last Argentine province to not have an own flag was Catamarca. But later I knew in August 2011 that region finally adopted one. This flag is this:

But it's just the first Catamarca flag, and they're still forming their visual identity. An aspect I don't like in the flag is the May Sun. This symbol is among the most meaningful and remarkable of the world. But currently it is in Argentine national flag, Uruguayan national flag, and aproximately five Argentinean provincial flags and three Uruguayan departmental flags.

The core of my proposal comes from the Artigas' Flag, early used by the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata, a confederation of Argentina and Uruguay. Historians indicate that this was the first flag ever to be flown in Catamarca — a version of this flag is currently used by Entre Ríos province in Uruguay, and as Uruguayan narional banner.

As I said before, this flag has current use, so I needed to made some adaptations (however, I never thought to use this flag as it was concepted). I continued using the colors, but made it a true triband. To identify it as local flag, I put the sol de Catamarca (Catamarca sun) in a bend. The result was curious, because the most voluminous size is the right, and not the left. I was lucky because the sun comes from East to West, making it one more symbology. My final proposal is this:

As always, I hope you liked my post. Comment and follow my blog, please.

P.S. As Brazilian, I meet everyday a lot of other Brazilian people that don't like Argentina (some of them actually hate), but I don't think like that. Our resemblances are very bigger than our differences. Obviously, I prefer Brazil, but I don't think Argentina is in the bandit size.