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Great Masters of Mexican Folk Art
from the Collection of Fomento Cultural Banamex, A.C.

    Anyone who has traveled to Mexico cannot help but to have been exposed to at least some of the immensely appealing handcrafts created there. It's nearly impossible to resist bringing home an example or two of these works; it's like bringing a bit of Mexico back with you.
    The crafts tradition in Mexico is largely home-based, carried from generation to generation. There is a wide diversity of Mexican peoples and cultures, from the dozens of indigenous peoples (Zapotecs, Mixtecs, Olmecs, many others) to the Spanish colonials, who brought the Moorish influence as well, even to Chinese elements that grew out of trade with the East. (It is startling to visit a humble church in Oaxaca state and find elaborate designs on the walls, created from local dyes using stenciled patterns of distinctly Chinese origin.) Of course, generations of mixing among people has created a majority of mestizos, people of mixed blood. The crafts are as varied as the cultural backgrounds and are executed in every imaginable medium: clay, metals, wood, stone, fiber, paper, leather, even wax.
    Banamex, a major Mexican bank now owned by Citicorp, has created a program to support handcrafts production and the continuity of its traditions. Over a two year period, visits were made to communities all over Mexico and a group of master artisans were selected representing all parts of the country. Cash grants were made to these artisans and many of their pieces were purchased for Banamex's collection. Through the display of these works and a program of publications, as well as programs of technical assistance, the intent is to preserve the traditions by making them commercially viable.
    Great Masters of Mexican Folk Art showcases a large group of these artists, organized by medium. Whether items of everyday use, or for ritual purposes, or "art for art's sake," the overall quality of the works is superb in terms of technical mastery of the materials, aesthetic sensibility, and a sheer joy of creativity that emanates from item after item. 
    A large wash basin by Ángel Santos Juárez, for example, appears to be eminently practical, but its appearance transcends any ordinary use, enhanced as it is by figures of animals and birds, with fish wittily painted on the bottom of the interior. Birds and gazelles provide small highlights in white against the darker colors and reddish earth-toned background, all combining in a composition of balance and harmony. There is an element of the primitive is this, and in other works here, but it is accompanied by a sophistication of design and technique that belies its humble origins.
    Also in clay is a four feet high blossoming of a traditional "Tree of Life," by Óscar Soteno Elías. It tells a complete love story, running from bottom to top--courtship, wedding banquet, baptism of the child, all reflecting both the powerful central position of family in Mexican life as well as the importance of the church. In metal work there is gold and silver filigree of the most delicate designs of leaves, spirals, and lines. Antonio Castillo Terán's silver pitcher with a black parrot perched on the edge is a perfect composition of arcs and curves, contrasting the gleam of the silver with the matte black of the bird.
    In a society that still, in many areas, is not subject to the homogenizing influence of television, storytelling and drama are often expressed in craftwork. A model of a fair in carved and painted wood by Pablo Dolores Regino includes multiple figures on a ferris wheel, a merry-go-round, even a mariachi band. (It immediately evokes thoughts of Calder's circus.) In black clay, Carlomagno Pedro Martínez' "Torito III" is also a multi-figure composition.  All the figures are skeletons, an approach in the mood of the Day of the Dead, reflecting both a profound Mexican fatalism about life and death as well as recognizing and accepting the cycle of life and death without morbidity. Humor is almost always an ingredient, too. Here, four figures carry off the remains of a bull, while a band plays and spectators watch the spectacle.
    Ramon Ramírez works in wax. His pair of elaborate candles, some three feet high, are a virtual explosion of reds and pinks in lacy and filigreed floral patterns. The candles are intended for church use; in view of their ultimate fate to be burned and melted down, there is an exquisite tension in the knowledge of the temporary nature of the art and the effort and skill that went it to its creation. Another medium that seems transitory in its fragility is work in elaborately cut paper (papel picado) used for holidays and festivals as well as the paper alebrijes, imaginary dragon-like creatures. These figures are perhaps better known in North America through their painted wooden versions from the villages around Oaxaca, represented in this exhibit by the fanciful and masterful work of Manuel Jimenez Ramírez.
    The sense of theater comes into play, of course, in wooden masks, here the work of Herminio Candelario Dolores. The Mayans used masks for funerals; as with many of the indigenous religious customs and practices, they were adapted into Catholic practices as well. The mask allows its wearer to change identities--from young to old, from white to black, from native to Spanish, wherever the fantasy leads.
    There are works here in fiber, straw, and beading; there is textile weaving, dying, and embroidery. There is work using amber, obsidian, shells, and horn--in short, whatever materials found in the environment are transmuted into useful and beautiful objects.
    If one artist had to be selected as a personal favorite, it would have to be Francisco Coronel Navarro who works in lacquered wood. His town of Olinalá is a center of this activity and he is perhaps its most accomplished practitioner. Lacquers are layered onto carvings (especially wondrous apples), trays, cabinets, trunks. Each layer is polished after applied, then carved with picks and knives. The carved sections are then filled with lacquers of contrasting colors. Designs include everything from floral to abstract patterns, even complete landscapes. This work is achieved in fine detail, resulting in varied and imaginative pieces of transcendent beauty that capture a resplendent joyousness. To own one is to share in the spirit and beauty of Mexico and its people.