উন্নত করার কিছু দেখছেন? একটি পরিবর্তন প্রস্তাব করুন।
এই পাতাটি সর্বজনীন।
এই পৃষ্ঠাটি বাংলা ভাষাতেও আছে: মেক্সিকান আর্টেসানিয়া
Taxco is Mexico's most famous center for fine silver, yet the town had no real tradition of silversmithing before an American architect, William Spratling, arrived in the 1920s to lecture in Mexico City and fell in love with it. Mexico is the world's leading producer of silver, but only a fraction of its output is crafted by Mexican artisans. The story is a good way into artesanías, the commonly used term for handmade crafts and folk art, which range from fanciful wall sculpture to hand-woven tablecloths. This guide tells travelers what is sold, how it is made and how to tell high-end, gallery-quality pieces from mass-market schlock.
Calavera Catrina figures for sale at the tianguis in Tonalá, Jalisco (Photo: Gzzz, CC BY-SA 4.0).
What makes something artesanía
Artesanías includes purely decorative items and practical ones for everyday use. The term artes populares is sometimes used too, but it seems to apply mostly to decorative items on public display, as in a museum, whereas artesanías implies articles with a practical purpose that are for sale. The crafts reflect popular culture but are taken very seriously in Mexico. The federal government's FONART agency, part of the Ministry of Culture, researches, preserves and promotes traditional artesanías and pays fair prices to skilled indigenous artists for their best work, then exports it to international galleries or sells it in its stores in Mexico City, which are essentially high-end galleries. Buying from FONART assures a high-quality piece truly made by Mexican craftspeople. The guide warns that cheap plastic knockoffs from China make it hard for traditional craftspeople to survive, so travelers should beware the junk in markets and roadside souvenir stores.
The crafts both reflect and define mexicanidad, "Mexican identity": the traditions, themes and values of the Mesoamerican societies that existed before the Spanish conquest, joined with the European values the Spanish brought. The idea of a blended identity, neither purely European nor purely indigenous, began in the late 19th century and was embraced after the Mexican Revolution (roughly 1910 and later).
Many pieces share visual elements. Colors can be bold and bright, especially on carvings such as alebrijes and on home furnishings, and the deep ochre red and bright blues and yellows of Aztec and Mayan temples are common. Typical motifs include skulls and skeletons, around Day of the Dead; geometric patterns copying those of Mesoamerican sites; plants such as maguey and animals such as the jaguar and quetzal; and spiritual symbols from Maya, Purhepecha and Aztec cultures, alongside Christian ones such as the Virgin of Guadalupe. The more intricate the patterns and the finer the workmanship, the higher the value.
Clay, wood and paper
| Craft | What to know |
|---|---|
| Talavera | A blend of Chinese, Arabic and Mexican patterns on everything from vases and dinnerware to wall and floor tiles. UNESCO lists it as intangible heritage of humanity, with the inscription naming Tlaxcala. Cheap talavera is sold in every market, but the best pieces are intricate, unique and expensive, and come from workshops in Puebla or Tlaxcala |
| Mata Ortiz pottery | A modern recreation of the ceramics of the pre-Columbian Mimbres and Casas Grandes cultures at Paquimé, Chihuahua. Juan Quezada Celado is credited with researching the methods and black-on-white zoomorphic designs from excavations and replicating them with the same local clay |
| Barro negro | Black pottery from Oaxaca, made since the days of Monte Albán, about 100 BC. Newer pieces have a metallic sheen from a process Doña Rosa rediscovered in 1950 |
| Tonalá ceramics | Made for more than 1,000 years, known for aromatic barro canelo clay, which smells of cinnamon and flavors stored water faintly, and for burnishing that predates the Spanish |
| Alebrijes | Fantastical, brilliantly colored creatures. Pedro Linares, ill and hallucinating in Mexico City, made paper-mâché figures of what he saw; sculptor Manuel Jimenez took the idea to Oaxaca, where they are carved in copal wood and painted in acrylics |
| Calaveras catrinas | José Guadalupe Posada published the first calavera catrina graphic in 1910, criticizing both Mexico's elite and ordinary Mexicans who thought they must follow European models of sophistication. The elegant skeleton has since taken on many meanings |
| Trees of life | Pottery sculptures created by missionaries who destroyed images of Mesoamerican gods and encouraged biblical ones: God at the top, Adam and Eve at the base, branches with angels and animals. The best come from Metepec, Acatlán and Izúcar de Matamoros |
| Amate paper | Made since at least the first century AD and used by the Maya and Aztecs for their codices; the oldest existing codex, the Grolier, is on amate. Only a few Otomi and Nahua villages make it, San Pablito in Puebla best known |
Tiger masks from Guerrero, in the National Mask Museum, San Luis Potosí (Photo: AlejandroLinaresGarcia, CC BY-SA 3.0).
Masks are made and sold in markets across Mexico, many with techniques used over 1,000 years ago. Missionaries destroyed masks of gods, but the Spanish brought mask traditions of their own, especially for Carnaval dances that represent or lampoon Europeans. Devil masks, another Spanish introduction, are an example of mexicanidad: one may show both a horned European Satan and the Aztec god Tlaloc with serpents around the eyes.
Amate paper from San Pablito, Puebla (Photo: AlejandroLinaresGarcia, CC BY-SA 3.0).
Metal, cloth and more
In Taxco, silver is usually 92.5% pure, or "sterling," with copper making up the other 7.5%; the best silver is 99.9% pure. Workmanship matters most to a piece's value: fine detail, filigree and precious inlays count, and heavier pieces are often older, second-hand ones. In Taxco, the names Spratling or Margot de Taxco on a piece command a premium. Santa Clara del Cobre, near Lake Pátzcuaro, has made copper since the 16th century and is still worked the way it was 700 years ago, using a Purhepecha method more efficient than Europe's then. Copper jewelry from there began in the 1970s. In Mexico, pewter is usually an aluminum alloy.
Copper items for sale at the Tianguis Artesanal, Pátzcuaro (Photo: Thelmadatter, CC BY-SA 4.0).
Among traditional garments, the poncho is a blanket with a hole for the head and the rebozo a loose shawl, used by pregnant women for abdominal support and by new mothers to carry infants; the huipil is a loose, usually embroidered tunic, best when hand-made on a backstrap loom; the serape, now associated with Saltillo, has multiple thin stripes of vibrant color; and the quexquémitl is a pre-Hispanic shawl. In Huastec communities, a fringe on one means the wearer is married. Zapotec weavers in Oaxaca have made rugs for almost 500 years, since 1535, when Fray Juan Lopez de Zarate arrived with sheep and looms.
Mexico also has a long tradition of jade and turquoise jewelry. Olmec jade dates back as far as 1500 BC, green jade is common in Maya work and the Olmec favored a bluer jadeite; the Yucatán is the best area for jade shopping, and the turquoise used by Mexican artisans is generally sourced from Arizona. The Huichol (Wixarika) of Nayarit and Jalisco are known for bright colors and distinctive patterns, and for extensive use of modern beads on animal figures and masks.
Mayan jade on display in the Museo de la Ciudad, Mérida (Photo: Gary Todd, CC0).
Where to go
The guide lists well-known workshops for high-end work: Taxco for silver, Teotitlán del Valle for Zapotec rugs, San Martín Tilcajete for alebrijes, Santa Clara del Cobre for copper, Metepec for trees of life, Tonalá for ceramics, Puebla and Tlaxcala for talavera and Mata Ortiz for pottery. Wider selections are usually in galleries, markets and the craft fairs of the towns best known for each craft.
Sources
- Wikivoyage, "Mexican artesanias", by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Mexican_artesanias); changed here: rewritten and shortened, with listings, phone numbers, opening hours, prices, links and many photographs left out, and the photographs kept credited to their photographers with their licences in the captions; rewritten in hubnx's own words.
লাইসেন্স: CC BY-SA 4.0 · গৃহীত হয়েছে en.wikivoyage.org
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