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Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2007 09:16:55 -0700 (PDT)
From: Victor Martinez <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: Topicos de interes general sobre Mexico
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Subject: [MexicoXXI] Vivid Mayan textiles a study in cultural evolution
Vivid Mayan textiles a study in cultural evolution
POSTED: 11:05 a.m. EDT, March 29, 2007
CHICAGO, Illinois (AP) -- As lingering winter gave way
to the gray of early spring, some of the most vivid
colors in Chicago were on museum walls: textiles from
the Mayan peoples of Guatemala and southern Mexico.
For searing the eyes with bright, sometimes jarring
hues, the exhibition "Arte Textil Maya" at the
National Museum of Mexican Art wouldn't lose a trick
to the fauvism of the early 20th century, or even the
op art of the 1960s. But the items on display aren't
the signed creations of internationally known artists;
they're the work of anonymous women, often woven with
primitive back-strap looms.
There are skirts, ceremonial headbands and poncholike
women's blouses called "huipiles." Multi-use cloths,
called "tzutes," which can serve purposes as humble as
covering food baskets or as exalted as altar hangings
for religious rites, grace the exhibit.
The textiles, created from the early decades of the
20th century to present day, come from the mosaic of
related, but linguistically distinct, groups that make
up the Mayan world.
That world has made news recently, both through its
royal past and its impoverished but activist present.
Mel Gibson's violent film "Apocalypto" brought a
version of the Mayan past to moviegoers, but drew the
wrath of many archaeologists, including Mayan expert
David Freidel of Southern Methodist University, who
condemned it as a "big lie." And the modern Maya,
after decades of repression, are making their voices
heard -- even to the point of purifying the Guatemalan
ruins of Iximche after what they called a "polluting"
visit by President Bush.
In the centuries that elapsed between that storied
past and present-day Mayan empowerment, generations of
women patiently spun cotton, wool and rabbit fur into
yarn. Then they dyed the yarn and wove it into complex
patterns, which they further embellished with
embroidery, brocade and applique.
"This exhibition gives us a way to link the modern era
into the ancient civilization," said Cesareo Moreno,
visual arts director of the Mexican Fine Arts Museum.
The works are from a collection assembled by Banamex,
the parent company of Mexico's largest bank, and were
curated by Maria Teresa Pomar and Juan Rafael Coronel
Rivera, who stressed the ideas of cultural continuity
and evolution.
To show the classic origins of the textile patterns,
Pomar and Rivera created an eerie audiovisual display,
in which images of ancient Mayan statues, frescoes and
bas reliefs appear on facing screens. Through digital
enhancement, the limbs and heads of the images move
slightly, as if the ancient kings, consorts and nobles
were coming to life.
One of the images is among the most famous in Mayan
art. It shows Lady Xoc, a wife of the eighth-century
King Shield-Jaguar of Yaxchilan, pulling a
thorn-studded cord through her newly pierced tongue in
a bloodletting ritual. And as the visitor watches, red
suddenly appears on Lady Xoc's stone body. The red is
evocative of the spilled blood, but it also highlights
the intricate geometric pattern so painstakingly
carved into her garments.
"Most of the classic designs appear to have been
geometric like that," Moreno said. "The patterns with
figures of people and animals and birds seem to have
come much later -- centuries later, even. It was a
sort of evolution."
And because the Mayan world is so fragmented -- with
more than 20 Mayan languages spoken in Guatemala alone
-- the designs that evolved were specific to a
particular population.
A tzute woven in 1940 for a religious confraternity
among Guatemala's Cakchiquel Mayans, for example,
shows small multicolored birds and deer marching
across a blazing red background. One also woven in
Guatemala in 1940 for a confraternity -- but of the
Quiche people -- has large, ghostly men, deer and
birds crossing a field of black, dark green and yellow
stripes.
And the designs do not remain fixed in time, either.
One display consists of a series of women's huipiles
from Chichicastenango, Guatemala, woven at various
times from 1930 to 1985. The changes over the decades
are immediately noticeable, even to the casual
visitor. In the later huipiles, European influences
are obvious, especially in the floral designs.
"The transition has been gradual, and it came first in
the materials ... synthetic dyes and yarns, that sort
of thing," Moreno said. "And the flower motifs that
came later on were definitely inspired by European
decorative arts.
"But this is not a bad thing," he said. "To keep their
weaving traditions alive, the weavers need to change.
If a culture does not adapt -- if it ceases to meet
the people's needs -- it dies."
The exhibition, which runs through May 27,
occasionally features demonstrations by some of those
weavers. Now nearing the end of its tour, which has
included stops in Mexico City, New York, Dallas and
San Francisco, the collection is destined for a
permanent home in a former convent in San Cristobal de
las Casas in the Mexican state of Chiapas.
--
Victor M. Martinez
In the end only three things matter:
how fully you have lived, how deeply you have loved and how well you have
learned to let go
Buddhist saying
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