From Xico

Follow up to Elizabeth Morales García article: article on Fabulas Vegetales in Clarinveracruzano.com

can be found at this link.  Here is my translation.  It is written by EIizabeth Ortega.

Xalapa, Veracruz, 23rd of January 2012

On Friday night, the 20th of January, the municipal president of Xalapa, Elizabeth Morales García supervised the work in the viaduct of Parque Juarez where artists Lucía Purdencio Nuñe and Carlos Daniel Berman Loya were working on the mural called "Fabulous Vegetables".

"I am surprised by the effort and artistic talent of these young graduates of the Universidad Veracruzana. I recognize the effort required to paint this viaduct* since they have to do it late at night in the company of a support team from the municipality which has also commited itself to this grand effort," said the mayor.

She urged citiens not to despair because of the closing of the street during the night.

For his part, Daniel Berman Loya expressed his excitement that he had been the winner with his proposal to paint the "Fabulous Vegetables" on the walls of the viaduct. The medium isa vinyl paint in black, over which, as the final phase, color will be applied.

The interesting thing about this project was, without doubt, to be able to paint something with these dimensions. We are tired but happy and proud that we can see our own work in this part of the city. It generates a number of sensations," he said.

The Municipal President said that with the conclusion of this mural, the cultural patrimony of the city will be increased since it will add to the more than 50 murals which already exist in the city not only enriching the cultural patrimony, but adding to sites of interest to tourists.

"[This is] a city which recognizes in its youth a thriving artistic sensibility to participate in projects of this type. It adds to the attractions we are bringing to fruition for the development of tourism as part of our economic development. The mural from now on will be an obligatory stop for visitors who want to know more about Xalapa," added the mayor.

The mayor urged the citizens not to despair over the closing of the street during the night and furthermore invited families to show their solidarity with the young people who night after night continue with the development of this artistic project of grand dimensions in the city.

*Actually in English I think it would be called a small tunnel or very long underpass since it runs under the park.

"

 

 

 

 

 

Orquesta de Xalapa concert -- All Beethoven and a bit boring

A couple of months ago we attended a mostly delightful concert by the Orquesta de Xalapa at the Teatro del Estado.  We watched a guest conductor from Coatepec bring to life some Mexican compositions. While the guest soloists (from Xalapa) were perhaps a bit lacking in energy, theexperience in general gave much pleasure.

Last night, we went with friends to here the same orquesta, this time for an all-Beethoven program led by the resident conductor, Fernando Lozano. This orchestra is filled with technically excellent, often inspired musicians.  But last night they were merely competent.  That wasn't their fault.  As far as I could tell (and I'm certainly no musical expert and the audience did respond with some enthusiasm) the conducting ummmm was lacking.  As I understand it, it is the conductor's job to interpret the piece, set tempos and moods and contrasts and shades;  coordinate entrances of different instruments: give life to the whole.  Last night it sounded as if the conductor was only used to conducting a high school orchestra.  The first piece slipped by in a few minutes and was perhaps the best.  The second piece, Concert for Violin and Orchestra in E major (I think), opus 41, dragged badly.  It lacked, if my memory serves me, variation in tempo and tone, and the soloist, Adrián Justus, started out wanly.  He warmed up a bit by the end, but there was really, for me, no stirring of the soul.  Justus gave two encores in which he showed off his skills a bit more successfully when he was unaccompanied by orchestra or led by the conductor.  I don't like trick violin pieces, but he pulled them off pretty well.

The final piece, Beethoven's Seventh Symphony was, I thought numbingly dull.  The last movement, Alegre con brio, was anything but.  It sounded more like an oompah band than much of anything else. Now that's harsh.  And maybe I was in a bad mood.  Who knows?  What a tragedy to watch these musicians, many the same ones who provided such great pleasure under the previous conductor, Carlos Miguel Prieto, reduced to mediocrity.

It was no worse than mediocrity.  Knowing that the conductor is not beloved or at least able to draw out the best in his musicians, knowing that there are many disgruntled souls, it is amazing to realize that they can set aside their distress and perform together if not as a great orchestra, at least as a basically competent one.  It could be a truly great orchestra, and under the previous conductor it certainly seemed to be moving in that direction.

On a non-musical note, the Orchestra looked disheveled, sloppy, depressed even.  Many members were slouched in their chairs when not playing, many seemed to have shirts coming out of pants. Women had blouses and tops which were very informal to say the least.  If beautiful music emanated from the group, it wouldn't matter at all.  But the orchestra's appearance seemed a reflection of their spirit.  Lozano himself had a shirt that was too tight and hair which certainly could have been combed.  If he wants long, flowing white locks, he should maintain them.  He  doesn't have the gravitas to get away with slobbishness.

Anyway, after the performance and aware that there has been great hostility to Lozano,and wanting to get some perhaps less biased information, I decided to Google him.  I found a very informative article from 1 february 2010 in the Veracruz version of La Jornada as it appeared in the Xalapa blog Uno A Uno.  It was written by Victor Manuel Robello.  I translate below some selections from it.

"A group of musicians who are members of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Xalapa (OSX)talked to La Jornada Veracruz and explained their discontent which was due to the 'pessimism and mediocre work' of the musical director, Fernando Lozano Rordigúez, arguing that since his arrival as director on the 20th of November, 2007, the musical level of the orchestra has diminished to such a degree that numerous people devoted to the concerts had stopped coming .... The problems increased and on the 4th and 11th of December [of that year] seconds before the concert was to begin, as Fernando Lozano made his way toward the podium, some members of the public booed him; likewise, the musicians said that there hadn't been a single concert that they themselves hadn't saved.

....

"On the 25th of October in 2007, six members of the Orchestra sent a letter to the governor of the state, Fidel Herrera Beltran, with a copy going to the rector of UV, Raúl Arias Lovillo, in which they expressed their disagreement with and annoyance at the possible imposition of Fernando Lozano [as head of the Orchestra].  One part of the letter said, 'the artistic growth of a symphony orchestra depends in great measure on the musical quality of its director.  In spite of the documentation which he may be able to flaunt at present as director of the Orchestra, it does not correspond to  the level of our orchestra, since he lacks energy and dynamism, rehearsal technique, vitality and inspiration for the musicians.  In the last ten years, he has not established permanence with any first rate orchestra, whether it be national or international.  Because of this, the musicians left open the possibility that it was and is a 'great risk for the OSX to have a director with a musical profile such as that of Lozano Rodríguez.'  They said that the OSX sought continuous institutional and personal improvement within an environment at the forefront and artistic professionalism at all levels.

"Later, the Technical Council of the OSX met to present a proposal to the authorities of UV on the 29th of October, 2007.  The group proposed was made up of nine musicians, the first four places correspoonding to Enrique Diemecke, director of the National Symphonic Orchestra from 1990 to 2007 who received 31 votes; second was Fernando Lozano with fifteen votes, and then Sergio Cárdenas and Guido María with 11 votes each.  A few days later, the rumors began that Lozano would be the director.

"This would break two regulations in the Ley Orgánica of UV ....which stated that 'to be a director of a department or institute it was required that the appointee be over 30 and younger than 65 years at the time of his appointment."  Lozano was already 67.  This seemed a flagrant violation of the Ley Orgánica of UV.  

"A member of the Orchestra who preferred to remain anonymous mentioned that '[Lozano] has had a very bad relationship with the musicians; administratively it has been pointed out that he has managed money in a murky fashion, has been accused of corruption, does not have a broad repertory and has invited his friends to be soloists and guest directors.'

"[Orchestra members] said that at the end of his first year as administrator of the OSX, Lozano informed them that he already had no money for touring nor to invite first rate conductors and soloists since he argued UV had cut the budget.

"Another source of concern for the musicians is the  personnel chief, Ricardo Martínez Salazar, since the internal rules of the OSX mention...that in order to undertake this role one has to "come from the OSX as an musician with a minimum of five years of experience with personnel.' ....Martínez Salazar is not a member of the orchestra much less knowing how to play an instrument.

"On this past September 8 [2010], the Technical Council of the OSX sent a document to Fernando Lozano in which it was brought to his attention his estrangement from the orchestra because of the present situation.  A fragment of the document is reproduced below addressing 'our concern about the artistic level at which our Orquestra finds itself two years after you took over.

"' In this period of time, we have observed a deterioration in the quaility of rehearsals and deficient interpretation in our concerts, adding to a growing improvisation in the programming which affects artistically our daily work.

"'We call for respect for the music, for the public, for the soloists and all the members of the orchestra.  These last have maintained, until now, a professional attitude which has saved numerous concerts.'

"Another member with twenty five yers inside the OSX explained that the orchestra saves a concert when the director doesn't know the work that he is directing, loses direction, loses the rhythm or doesn't mark the tempos which are written in the score, but the orchestra doesn't stop: the musicians continue playing because they know the piece well.

"All the limits of tempo, tuning, entrances, stops, variations in tempo, changes in tempo, balances, timbre, [have parameters set by the composer.] The director can't, on a whim, say that if the Allegro is marked for 120 beats per minute, he will marke it at 8o. There's a limit in the parameters, and Lozano ignores them and then, in doing this, destroys the composition of the author.'

[Here there is criticism of his final performance as director of the International Festival of Music in Morelia]

"Further, the musicians complain that when they dare to say anything, they have been sanctioned with administrative [deficiencies].  'It doesn't have to do with whether or not Lozano does or doesn't do what we want, rather that there should be an equilibrium between director and orchestra, but Lozana won't accept any type of criticism. We agree that there should be discipline when someone arrives at an inconvenient time or shows a lack of respect to any member of the orchestra, but we don't agree that there should be discipline to silence our complaints.

"In 1990, Abel Eisenberg who was a student of maestro Silvestre Revueltos....published a criticism entitled 'Between Violas and Violins' in which he mentioned the following about Fernando Lozano: 'It is my responsibility to signal the negative elements in the world of good music in Mexico.  On this occasion I am referring to Fernando Lozano who acted like the absolute czar in our musical panorama during the presidency [of Mexico] of López Portillo.  Lozano attended my lecture and audition course in the National Conservatory without showing any talent for music.'

"´Unexpectedly, he surged ahead, always conducting with the clumsiness of an amusing bear, but with the talent of relocating politically like [other slick politician types],' commented Eisenberg.

....

The article continues with  criticisms and complaints about Lozano's musicianship, leadership, politics, treatment of music, etc., from various sources as well as some of his responses.  Very depressing. It wearies me too much to keep translating it.

I only hope that very soon the orchestra will have the conductor it deserves and a brighter future.  I for one won't be eager to go back if Lozano is conducting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Joyful Noises

It was totally unnecessary to worry about about returning to el Teatro del Estado to hear La Orquesta Sinfónica de Xalapa after my inglorious exit last year, but I did.  It was definitely inglorious.  I had imagined all the people who customarily sat on the same side would still remember.  We did have other excuses. There's been continuing gossip about hostility to the new conductor, Fernando Lozano, who supposedly gained his position because of his friendship with the wife of Mexico's president so that the musicians weren't playing all that well for him. And Jim and I are a bit pokey at night, slow to want to go out, slow to want to trek to Xalapa, all of eleven miles from our house, mainly because it's hard to see to drive the last bit in the dark.

But last night, gracias a Dios as they say here, in a spur of the moment kind of way, we did go.  What a joyful and exuberant concert, a muy mexicana kind of evening, and even more, a very local kind of evening.  The soloist Claraliz Mora, a lyric soprano with a coloratura's range, is from Xalapa.  As  you can see, she is gorgeous.  And she sings beautifully, too. Absolutely no resemblance to the lard-padded sopranos I remember from my childhood.

 The baritone-tenor, Armando Mora, who our friend Britta said was her father, is also from Xalapa.

Corny shot, I agree. But he is handsome and courtly. Courtly sounds like an old-fashioned world to USAers, but it is still very appropriate here.  Many men have gestures that are elegant and gracious that they use without thinking.  Mora has the greater range of a baritone tenor and hardly sang like a tenor at all. 

The guest conductor,Alfredo Hernández Reyes is from even closer to home, hailing as he does from Coatepec.

The home crowd loved them.  They all have impressive international resumes, including the two Mexican composers whose works were for me the best parts of the concert, the most impressive, the most filled with life.

The first composition was Huapangos by Sergio Cardenas who was born in Tamaulipas. He didn't compose it in Mexico, but in Germany.  There is a smaller version for cellos. This grand version for full orchestra he dedicated to Tamaulipas and to its governor in 2007. It is, as he says, an homage to the music of huapangos, popular Mexican folk dances, and threads of familiar themes run through it.  I wish I could make music like this.

Sergio Cardenas

The second piece,  Danzón Numero 2 by Arturo Márquez.  Although he is from Sonora, he has been especially taken with the music of Veracruz, the popular music.  Danzón is performed in the Port of Veracruz weekly in the main public square, as well, I'm sure as elsewhere.  It is a formal sort of dance, elegant and intricate and popular.  We have seen it here in Xalapa.

Some stretches of Márquez's piece were a bit more, what shall I say, urban, jangly than those of Cardenas's piece, and then suddenly, one of these jangly pieces stopped and immediately the most beautiful, lush, sensuous passage began and it was as if all of us -- orchestra and audience -- had become an ocean, just for a minute, an ecstatic, floating whole.

When we went to the symphony in San Antonio, the tickets were expensive and the audience tended towards well-heeled and older.  Sometimes people -- lots of them -- fell asleep during the concert.  I sometimes imagined some of the patrons were surrounded by light clouds of delicate dust.  In Xalapa, many members of the symphony are young, and many members of the audience are, too. Certainlly not all.  But also there are all kinds of people from all walks of life.  Students and old folks pay a grand total of 50 pesos a seat, maybe $4.85 in dollars so lots of people can afford it. You can get a non-discounted seat for 100 pesos. Every time I go to the symphony here, I think of the days in San Antonio when I interviewed old folks (people in the third age, like me) from Mexico who lived in San Antonio.  They were not by any stretch rich, but many loved good music and popular music and folk music and it poured forth from their apartments.  But they simply couldn't afford to go to the symphony.

Below, some pictures taken en aire libre of some women in the orchestra:

 

Carlos Slim's Art Museum in Mexico City

in process.  Photo from ArtDaily.org on Friday, January 28, 2011.  (Scroll down to find it.)

MEXICO CITY - Mexican Alfonso Miranda, directorof the Soumaya Musuem poses in front of the Soumaya Museum which belongs to Carlos Slim,  It was designed by Fernando Romero whom I think is his son-in.law.  It is supposed to open in April.

From Carlos Slim's website: (my translation)

The mission of the Museo Soumaya of the Carlos Slim Foundation is to share the arts with the Mexican public as well as with foreigners for their education and esthetic enjoyment. at the same time that it guarantees conservation of art and research.

It is a space for an encounter with the arts. Especially outstanding is the collection of sculpture by Auguste Rodin, the most important outside of France, as is also the work of ancient European masters, of impressionism, and of the moderns.  Tours of the museum connect visitors with the sensibility of El Greco, Murillo, Rubens, Cranach, Brueghel, Tiziano and Tintoretto as well as Van Gogh, Toulouse. Lautrec, Rouault, Matisse, Picasso, Miró, Dalí and others.

Mexican epochs are given expression in mesoamerican and colonial works, as well as works from independent Mexico from nationalism and The Rupture.  The religious canvases of José de Páez, Miguel Cabrera, and Juan Carrea, the portraits of José Agustín Arrieta, Hermenogildo Bustos, Jossé María Estrada, the landscapes of European artists such as Rugendas, Löhr, Egerton, Chapman, the universality of the painters of the the 20th scentury such as Rivera, Siquieros, Orozco and Tamayo, and those who undertook different roads such as Soriano, Cuevas and Toledo enrich the  diversity of this region.

Applied arts also are presented here to give a living context to other epochs.  Textiles, fashion, photography, ceramics, coins, medals, miniature portraits and reliquaries enrich the vision of ancient forms of life.

In the environment of this colleciton of collections, Museo Soumaya includes a broad offering of permanent, temporary and traveling exhibits, courses, conferences, workshops, activities, publications and suervices with the purpose of bringing art to a variety of publics.

******************

This link will take you to a much more extensive description of the very unusual building that is to house the museum.  It's worth looking at.  It is an extraordinary effort.

Soumaya was the name of Slim's late wife, and it was she who started collecting art and it is I would say for her that Slim has continued on such a grand scale.  It seems their marriage was truly a marriage of amores de sus vidas.  Slim has never remarried.

I for one am eagerly looking forward to visiting it when it opens.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Moctezuma's Head Dress

Who knew?Moctezuma's head dress still exists, is intact and is in, of all places, Austria.  Art Daily reports that relevant agencies in Austria and INAH in Mexico are in talks for a temporary return of the artifact to its home. I copied the picture below of the head dress from the Art Daily site.  

Art Daily(artdaily.org) has daily news about all kinds of art, often with vivid illustrations.  You can start your morning with it.  A vegetable soup of articles from all over the world, it has a healthy dose of archaeological stuff from Mexico as well as some coverage (I wish more)of modern art in Latin America among a multitude of places.  

Puro México -- Marking the Centennial of the Revolution: Insight and Irony and Anger and Art

Along the iron fence enclosing the grounds of the Museo de Antropología de Xalapa hang sixty posters in an exhibit called 30x30.  

Below is the curator's statement, my translation:

30x30: An Opportunity for Reflexion

[The statement opens with the following quote:]

"The circus is on fire and the owner, instead of rescuing the midgets sells tickets for the next performance."

  -- Jacobo Jabludovsky [Very little is simple or exactly as it appears in Mexico.  This incredible quote which seems to summarize perfectly both the events of the Bicentennial and the Centennial was made by a Mexican journalist who himself was long a mouthpiece for the PRI, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, and a corrupter of the news on the party's behalf. He is more than that, and not all of it bad, but a lot of it quite confusing to me as a foreigner.]

The statement:

This year of 2010 we Mexicans are witness to two historic events important in the life of the country: the Bicentennial of Independence and the Centennial of the Revolution.  For those who are lovers of opportunism, this will provide an excuse for vulgar extravaganzas rich in advertising but poor in ideas. For the rest of us, all the way to the farthest corner of the country, these events will provide a great opportunity to indulge in ardent and sincere patriotic fervor.  However, the economic crisis (more than fifty million Mexicans live in poverty), the millions of unemployed, the insecurity, the violence, the corruption, the impunity and the discrediting of authorities oblige and will continue to oblige our collective imagination to reflect and to reconsider what should be celebrated, what should be commemorated.

The poster, the thermometer of society historically has been a presence and a comrade -- an accomplice at times in social struggles and demands.[Mexico has a rich history of political art: posters, cartoons, paintings, music.]  For this reason, and to mark these days, the Instituto de Artes Plásticas de la Universidad Veracruzana brought together 60 graphic designers to express their ideas, their points of view, their feelings, through this medium.  Thirty of the posters are dedicated to the theme of Mexican independene and thirty to the theme of the Mexican Revolution.  This is how the exposition got its name, 30-30 which also alludes in passing to that short-barreled rifle better known as the carbine..... [Carbines and other guns made by Remington started arriving in Mexico in the second half of the nineteenth century.  I'm taking a wild guess here that carbines were the signature guns of Pancho Villa's crowd and maybe others during the Revolution.]

Jose Morelos, Curator

September, 2010

****

Jim and I had parked across the street from the museum and had no idea these posters were on the fence.  We'd come to see something else entirely. We realized later we missed all the posters addressing Independence and saw only those marking the Mexican Revolution.

Below is a sampling of those latter posters. They are wonderful and surprising.  And disturbing and moving and sometimes funny. As people like to say, there is no cause for optimism, but hope remains.

 

The poster above says: Revolution 1910, Regression 2010.

Celebrating with the loot from their conquests

Energy resources - lands - public education - workers' rights

The structure in this poster is the enormous Monument to the Revolution.  I don't know the signifiance of BIBI in BIBICentenario, but under that it says suckling public funds.

The legend of the beginning of Mexico is that the people who were to become the Aztecs were poor wanderers making their way south.  They would know they had reached the place they were meant to settle when they saw an eagle on a cactus with a serpent in his beak.  This poster is a play on that legend and that image which is seen all over in a more benign form.  Here you can see the implication that modern Mexico has been built with weapons and blood.  The quote is from a poem by Ramón López Velarde, now considered one of Mexico's greatest and most characteristic poets.  Called "Suave Patria", or in the translation I use, Sweet Country, it is a poem celebrating Mexico's blessings and condemning its sins.

In the translation written in 1921 by Margaret Sayers Peden. the verse says:

Patria, I give the key to happiness:

be faithful forever to your likeness:

fifty repeats of the Ave are carved

on the beads of the rosary, and it is

more fortunate than you, Patria suave.

When I was taking my Diplomado en Estudios Mexicanos at the school for foreign students of UNAM, I wrote a paper about López Velarde.  He was from the state of Zacatecas and educated in the north of the country.  We visited his childhood home in Jerez, near the city of Zacatecas, where unfortunately in the past year or so narcos shot each other up in the streets.  Lopez Velarde was involved in the writing of the Plan of San Luis Potosí in which Madero, the leader of the revolutionaries in 1910 called for the government to be overthrown.  I just have to mention that some of that revolutionary work and writing was done in San Antonio, Texas.

López Velarde made his way to Mexico City to write and to involve himself with the very active circle of intellectuals there.  Although after he died, his talent and contributions to Mexican letters were recognized, while he was alive and trying to make it in Mexico City, he was sometimes looked down on and considered a provincial.  He also remained a strong practicing Catholic which the intellectuals who were involved in other philosophical movements derided.

Anyway, I don't entirely understand the verse above, either in Spanish or in English, except that along with much other literature and art in Mexico, it acknowledges that the beautiful and blessed land of Mexico is also cursed, at least at times, by the deeds and greed of its own leaders.

The Mexican Revolution overthrew Porfirio Diaz who started out a progressive leader and turned into a dictator.  The Revolution itself lasted for at least ten years and devolved into a civil war.  The victorious PRI -- Institutional Revolutionary Party -- became a group dictatorship that lasted seventy years, some of them better than others.

Below are two humorous posters with which I will close this post.

It has to be love, it has to be the Revolution.  It's the same story.

 

 

 

 

 

Flows and slices -- Barcelona artist Romero Campos Paints San Juan de Ulua

The rant I wrote before Hurricane Karl sprouted  from my experience at an exhibit at Las Galerías del Agora in Xalapa.   The paintings were made at San Juan de Ulua. I wrote about San Juan de Ulua here, but only briefly.  We've visited San Juan de Ulua more than once.  I had a bunch of photos but they disappeare with a hard disk crash. However, there are plenty available online. Below I give you an aerial view.  The rectangle at the center of the lower half with the elongated corners is San Juan de Ulua proper.  It is situated in the harbor of Veracruz.  Before the Spanish landed, it was an island used for religious purposes. While the Spanish ruled Mexico, it continued as a fort.  After independence, some Spanish resisters remaining in the fort continued to fend off attacks and maintain that Spain had not been defeated.  After Independence, it was used as a prison for political prisoners and as a presidential palace.  Today, it sits largely empty except for a small museum and some offices. Elton John gave a concert there recently. It is being renovated. I hope it isn't too extremely renovated, because the haunted quality woven into its walls and floors and doorways embody five hundred years of  history.  Walking in these buildings, knowing a bit of what happened there, we learn to feel and understand the past a bit, to understand who we are.     

It is this that the artist Alfredo Romero Campos seeks and captures in his exhibit and connects with the personal.  He says:

"It is the investigation through the recovery of these architectural spaces of the places I visited during my stay in Mexico, in which there is the presence of the abandoned, solitude and emptiness.  But at the same time, they are filled with atmospheres left by the passage of time, where the walls cry, breath and even hear the memories of the nostaligic and melancholy past.

"These places which you see are also our laberynthine interior passageways, trapped darknesses in narrow walls, destroyed by the light of hope and our 'I'  immobilized by fear."

The curator of the exhibit, in his introduction which he calls "Infinite Perspective," put it this way:

"...[W]e discover an artist who..speaks to us about intimacy through desolate and silent rooms, who questions the existnce of emptiness, since they speak to us as containers of private histories which implore us to hear them."

I hesitated to put up photos here because the paintings are flattened so on a screen.  They are indeed pretty much two-dimensional although the paint has been applied in  layers, but of course paintings themselves have a depth that photos can't hope to reproduce, and in these paintings the depth is very important.  However, you can learn something from them I hope if you can imagine their subject: an old fortress on an island in a harbor, stone room upon stone room, often dim, connected by archways, through which the light filters, sometimes one color, sometimes another, depending on time and weather.

The paintings have no names, only numbers.  Wandering past them evokes wandering through thearched doorways from room to room in San Ulua.

 

 

 

 

 

Major Issue in Veracruz Elections -- It Should Be Everywhere

From the Diario de Xalapa, 5 May 2010

"Without art and culture, Veracruz is incomplete, the PRI candidate for governor, Javier Duarte de Ocho confirmed, recognizing that art and cultural production are indispensable for the construction of a better state and better citizens.  He said that culture is thought of as a right and opportunity for development.

While attending a private meeting with the representatives of the cultural sector, Duarte de Ochoa recognized artists, creators, cultural producers and cultural workers. The recently approve Law for the Cultural Development of Veracruz recognizes the work of everyone from producers to stagehand.

Interviewed at the end of the meeting, the PRI candidate for governor of Veracruz described the meeting as an exchange of ideas which will enrich the subject over the next six years [the term for the governor is six years-- a sexenio -- as it is for the President.] He reognized that the creation of more and better spaces for the development and diffusion of culture was a demand of Veracruzanoss and a necessity so that culture would be converted into a right and an opportunity for development.

He recognized the organization and solidarity of the cultural sector as a force for the defense of rights, freedom of thought and decision, including the rights to organize and protest  the cuts which were being attempted at the Federal level. Duarte de Ochoa said that art and culture had always been, from the beginning, and always would be fundamental elements in the cement of a society.

Almost a week after beginning his campaign and almost two months from the election, the standard bearer for the PRI recognized that art and culture are pillars of human development, since only through the creation, promotion and difusion of culture can there be a society committed to progress.

"Human beings are capable of expressing, demonstrating and transmitting the most beautiful, the most noble of their own being and in the case of Veracruzanos, we have creativity in our blood and we share with our rich culture and our distinct cultural manifestations daily.  In culture, as in art and in freedom of expression, their always must be respect and toleraance in order to recognize the richness of our differences."

Muy beautiful and interesting paintings of Veracruz by Teodoro Cano

Now that I've got your attention via my trip to the emergency room (remember how good care is here, please, and how cheap...people here regard health care as a right as stated in the Mexican Constitution and it makes them angry when it isn't always as available as it should be, definitely a problem for some.  The notion that it is a business and for profit and filled with bureaucracy and limited access and too many machines and not enough primary care physicians, etc etc a la the US is alien here) ... but I digress....

I wanted to tell you about the wonderful artista veracruzano Teodoro Cano.  

If you remember, we took a long walk down Calle Revolución a week or so ago.  Our walk didn't end at the bottom of the street, but continued on across Parque Benito Juarez, down the stairs and into La Pinacoteca Diego Rivera.

You can click on the pictures for a larger version.

Here is the entrance to the Parque Benito Juarez:

 

The Pinocateca is under the far end of the park.

This head is one of Cano's sculptures.  It stands watch in front of the entrance to the Pinocateca, as you can see.  You can also see the railing of the park above.

The head dress reads Papantla, and Cano is from Papantla.  It's in northern Veracruz, near The Gulf of Mexico, and it is a Totonac region, as is much of our area, including the rural areas around us.  Papantla is the home of the Voladores, the dancers you see swirling on ropes high above the ground in tourist pictures of the region. 

Teodoro Cano is Totonac and the region is called Totonocapan.

There are majestic Totonac ruins at El Tajín, near Papantla, and a bit further south you can find the smaller Cempoala, the city where Cortés was welcomed on his trip up to Tenochtitlán to meet Moctezuma. But that's just a tiny part of Totanaco history and heritage.  More to follow in a later post, since we visited Cempoala yesterday and I have a whole hoard of new photos.

Cano is a muralist, and like most muralists, he developed a stylized approach.  In his paintings, he brings tremendous warmth and love and empathy. Below you will see a sampling of what we found at La Pinocateca.  Imagine them, for the most part, large and richly colored. I took some at an angle to avoid reflection, which distorts them somewhat.  And the photos do not reflect the color and depth at all.

We start with a procession of La Virgen de Guadalupe who is a constant undercurrent in the life of all Mexico.

 Below is a painting called City of the Gods.  And of course prehispanic, indigenous religion is as much a current as is Christianity.  If not more, I'm beginning to think.  You know La Virgen herself is syncretic.  In the picture below, you see the vivid old spirits tumbling among the temples and walls of the Totonac city of Tajín.  Notice the reliefs on the walls, too.

 

This is a picture of a velaria, a wake. In our colonia, velarias are not much different. The original people who settled here in Ursulo Galván were Totonac, though not everyone is even part Totonaco (obviously).  
As you see in the picture, in the back people are gathered inside around the coffin. Outside, they are eating and talking.  When someone dies, people go among the neighbors for offerings of food, beans particularly, and money for the velario. Recently in our colonia, a woman in her early 60s died walking with her daughter near the soccer field.  Tere says she had been sick with cancer, and finally just gave out.  That night, a group of young men came to our house and everyone else's for the offerings for the velaria.  You see in the picture what looks like a floating piece of cloth towards the top.  Here, and I imagine in most places today, a plastic tarp is put out over part of the street for people to sit under. I'm always startled to see that the poles holding it up are just balanced on the concrete.

And now a wedding.  

As you can see, there are awnings here, too.  In our colonia, every celebration takes place in the street outside the houses of the people throwing the party.  The street is roofed with tarps especially if there's any chance of rain, the entrances blocked with rocks.  

 

The next two pictures show aspects of Día de los Muertos....or as we've learned here, Días de los Muertos since there are several days involved. See how comfortably death is mingled with life in the imagery. And look at the ofrendas, the offerings for the dead.

 

 
A mother making preparations for El Día.  I think she is making tamales.  In the foreground, I think are stuffed jalapeños. And a cat.

 

A Posada, the procession through the community looking for (and finally finding) a place for Mary and Joseph and Jesus.  In our community, these happen for maybe ten days before Navidad.

And Navidad:

 

Here, Christmas is celebrated late on Christmas Eve into very early morning Christmas Day, after the Mass celebrating the birth of Jesus.  

Below are some smaller paintings, mostly.  

This one is called Felicidad.

 

María descansando (María resting)

 

Lluvia de oro (Rain of Gold) 

Mujer en la playa (Woman on the beach)

  

And here again is one filled with people, called La Feria (The Fair). You can see people riding on the carousel.

 

A photo of Teodoro Cano repairing a mural:

 

And, to finish up, a portrait of the artist.

 

The two photos above are from an article in El Sol de San Luis which also appeared in El Diario de Xalapa, written by María Elena Ferral. I'm in the midst of translating the article and will try to finish it. Unfortunately, I have misplaced the link.  I will look for it.
 

 
 
 
 
 

Teotihuacan art in Paris exhibit

Via Mike Ruggeri, Aztlan Users Group, some glorious works:

http://www.lemonde.fr/a-la-une/portfolio/2009/09/11/mexique-les-tresors-de-teotihuacan-au-quai-branly_1237870_3208.html