Oaxacan Woodcarving

Popularized by Manuel Jiménez in the Oaxaca Valley, which is located in southern Mexico, artists skillfully carve and paint native animals of Mexico. In this region, the artform has become a major production and desired form of sculpture.

According to the Hearst Museun of Art, many of the carvers are descendants of the Zapotec Indians, which are natives to the Oaxacan area. The soft wood of the copal tree is used to carve these amazing creatures and are carved, sanded and then painted by hand using bright colors. Men often carve the figures, when they are not farming, in order to earn extra money to support their families. Sometimes an entire family may help create these fantastic and amusing figures.

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One of my favorite Selena songs! Enjoy!

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Doña Isaura Alcántara Díaz – Traditional Mexican Folk Art

Set of wake (velorio) figures. Made by Timoteo Aguilar; Ocotlán de Morelos,Oaxaca. This set of 19 hand-painted ceramic figures depicts a wake scene, which is an important ritual of traditional Mexican culture. These figures were made for sale to tourists, and became popular in the 1950s. This style was created by Doña Isaura Alcántara Díaz. She taught the style to her five daughters, along with their husbands and three brothers.

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Art of the revolution

This Mexican print represents a soldier fighting for the rights of peasants during the revolution of 1910. Image courtesy of Dover Publications, Inc.

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The art of dressing fleas?

Practiced in Mexico for well over a century, the art of dressing fleas in tiny costumes has now almost entirely disappeared. This image shows a pair of fleas dressed in tiny male and female costumes; other examples are grouped into scenes like weddings. This form of Mexican artwork is a traditional artform that is entirely unique to Mexico. If you have any additional information regarding dressing fleas please leave a comment, I would love to hear your incite.

(Dressed fleas. Guanajuato). Learn more about Mexican folk art.

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“Crosswinds: Visual Narratives from Guadalajara” opens in San Antonio

“Mexico City has a very definite sense of aesthetic. What trends in Mexico City is a little more avant-garde. . . . Consequently, Guadalajara has always had a much more colorful pictorial narrative tradition of art, and because of the climate of Guadalajara and because of its proximity to Puerto Vallarta, a lot of people have gravitated to Guadalajara to work and live.”

Learn more about this exhibit displaying beautiful works of up-and-coming contemporary artists from Mexico.

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Franciscan missionaries help develop traditional Mexican artwork

Franciscan missionaries arrived in Mexico with Cortés in 1519. After the Spanish Conquest, the Franciscans set up schools to instruct the children on indigenous art in efforts to sway them from Aztec idolatry and toward Christian rites. One of the native arts that most impressed the Fransiscans was “feather mosaic” (arte plumario in Spanish) practiced by gifted Aztec nobles. Utilizing Hummingbird feathers, images were created by laying down these infinitesimally small feathers to produce a spectacular effect. Only a very few examples of the earliest Christian feather mosaics survive, as the medium is so inherently fragile; only a fraction retain a semblance of their original radiant colors.

The Franciscans also taught the indigenous people of Mexico the art of carving nearly microscopic scenes on rosary beads. Typically, scenes from these Mexican carvings depicted the Passion of Jesus Christ and were set in gold and enamel mounts.

Source: Arts of the Mission Schools in Mexico | Thematic Essay | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

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Tribute held for famous mexican sculptor, Arturo Macias

Arturo Macias is a distinguished Mexican sculptor and architect who draws deeply upon the riches of his cultural heritage. Macias figures, which are often life-size, are steeped in the folkloric tradition yet thoroughly contemporary in their aesthetic appeal. Read more about this event that was held online at the Zihrena Gallery, which is a virtual gallery of Mexican art and culture.

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Learn more about traditional mexican folk masks

According to USATODAY, mexican artists originally created masks in celebration of holidays such as Carnival and the Dia de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead. Now, masks appear in almost all Mexican celebrations, in addition to their value as artwork. Check out some of these amazing pieces of history and art.

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The photography of Manuel Álvarez Bravo (1902-2002)

Álvarez Bravo was a photographer born in Mexico City on February 4, 1902. Bravo began studying painting and music at the Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes in 1918, but did not begin professional photography until 1925. Though he was never formally a member of the movement, some argue his work displays many characteristics of surrealism. Bravo’s images often suggests dreams or fantasies, and he frequently photographed inanimate objects in ways that gave them humanistic qualities.

Álvarez Bravo’s work was often political. One of his most famous photographs entitled, “Obrero en huelga, asesinado” or (Striking Worker, Assassinated) depicts the face of a bloodied man lying in the mexican sun. Some speculate this image is influenced by Alvarez Bravo’s involvement in LEAR (League of Revolutionary Writers and Artists) during the 1930s. Fellow photographer Paul Strand described Bravo’s work as “rooted firmly in his love and compassionate understanding of his own country, its people, their problems and their needs…He is a man who has mastered a medium which he respects meticulously and uses to speak with warmth about Mexico.”

Manuel Alvarez Bravo has been an influence on Mexican and Latin American photography. His rejection of facile picturesqueness, his insistently ambiguous irony, and his redemption of common folk and their daily subsistence have marked out a path of high standards for photographers from his area.

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