The church at Aracataca, the birthplace of Colombian Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez, will be restored by the government as part of a renovation plan for places that inspired “magical realism,” officials said.
The government plans to spend 250 million pesos (about $130,000) on restoration studies and designs for the San Jose parish church on the Plaza Bolivar in Aracataca, a city in the Caribbean province of Magdalena.
The Trade, Industry and Tourism Ministry and the National Tourism Fund, or Fontur, are carrying out the project, Fontur said.
Improvements to the building make up part of the government project to save iconic places related to the life and works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1982.
Also included among those places are Pueblo Viejo, Sitio Nuevo and Cienaga, municipalities near Aracataca.
The purpose is to promote “literary tourism” along the “Macondo Route: Magical Realism,” which will guide visitors to places that influenced Garcia Marquez and are described in his books.
The Nobel laureate was hospitalized last week in Mexico City for respiratory and urinary-tract infections, but is expected to be released this week.
In January, Housing Minister Luis Felipe Henao said in Aracataca that starting in March, the town would have potable water for the first time in its history.
Published in Latino Daily News