The magic of the first carpet had our attention. And the second. Brilliant colors, traditional patterns passed from wrinkled hands to nimble young fingers generation after generation in villages in the interior of Mexico.
Santiago Borja’s carpet appears traditional at its heart but melts into modernism at its edges. Weavers from the workshop of Jeronimo Hernandez in Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, completed its execution.
But then something happened on the next wall. The scarf escaping from the flat surface, its fringe fluttering free as though a butterfly freed from its cocoon…
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…a phrase too obviously transitioning to the title of the exhibition at the Museo Textil de Oaxaca – Cocoon Me from My Feet Up: Traditional and Contemporary Carpets. Curator OlgaMargarita Davila assembled work by 18 artists from four countries “to connect ourselves with the meaning of the fabric we inhabit: our body.”
Bodies resembling dancing Guatemalan worry dolls bob along the top and bottom of a linear weaving by Susan Martin Maffei whose website explains:
Crocheted 3 dimensional trims, quipus and found objects enhance the narrative visuals of many works, influenced by textile forms and embellishments of the many ancient cultures I have explored.
An “unwrapped” piece caught my eye, but then the artist almost cheated to make me a fan – a postcard. He created a postcard to the curator to accompany one of his pieces.
….there is such a contribution to be made by adapting examples from the history of our chosen medium and quietly exploring a simple form or image through line, grid-form or in separate units, repeating and developing it again and again.
When completed the Mission Drive‐in Theatre will serve as an icon for preservation and neighborhood re‐development….
The project goal is to complete the approved mural components of the Historic Mission Drive‐In Marquee in a way that follows recommendations of the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for the Treatment of Historic Buildings, and stays consistent with the historic period….
…all viable methods of re‐creating the mural, sign lettering and lighting feature will be considered, provided that the completed work re‐creates the style, color and graphic quality of the original mural and components as closely as possible.
The resulting illumination of the marquee mural instantly makes the old Mission Drive-In Theatre a striking night-time landmark on the south side.
Public Art San Antonio
But there is something missing.
KENS-5 TV
The new mural is soul-less, devoid of the human presence that characterized the original.
Instead of a re-creation, the design was sanitized following public protests in several contentious meetings.
A sombrero-porting Latino leading a donkey, a beast of burden sparing many a worker from debilitating back injuries, and one napping under a sombrero are both regarded as racial stereotyping.
I concede there was a time when many Anglos viewed such images and uttered the racial slur “lazy Mexicans.” Call me naïve, but I like to think we have moved beyond that point.
Sombrerería in Mexico City, late 1800s, Underwood & Underwood stereoview card: “The ordinary sombreros are made of palm-leaves and straw, but those of the wealthier classes are of expensive felt, and may be white, gray, or maroon in color. They are often very ornate, being embroidered with the wearer’s monogram, or designs of flowers, and faced with gold or silver lace. In Mexico, only the men wear hats, and they are a very valued possession. Sometimes a man will invest his entire fortune of thirty or forty dollars in his sombrero. They are frequently of vast dimensions. The larger the sombrero, in fact, the greater its aesthetic value in the eye of the average Mexican. The flourish with which he doffs it in salute is something never to be forgotten by the unaccustomed foreigner.”
My hope is, rather than erase the existence of sombreros from our collective memory, we honorably embrace them as part of our heritage in San Antonio.
Here is why:
San Antonio was part of Mexico for longer than it has been part of the United States.
Mexicans who worked outside in the hot sun wore sombreros. They were smart.
The crown of a sombrero can be angled to follow the sun like a sunflower, shading both the face and the neck.
Hardworking people who rose long before the sun and worked until after it went down could use their sombreros for shelter while taking well-deserved naps.
People who sport gimme caps get red necks. No additional comment necessary.
mi sombrero guapo
I’m all for a sombrero resurgence. I’m doing my part.
Yes, I know this aging gringa looks foolish wearing her broad-brimmed caballera hat, complete with a horsetail-hair stampede string to hold it in place when the wind threatens to send it swirling.
But time has taught me a few things. I grew up on a beach trying to keep up with tan people. I merely burned and freckled. A slow learner, I repeated the process over and over, summer after summer.
I’m part of a freckled race that old Dr. Pipkin said had no business south of Ireland. But I hate cold and love hot sauce.
Because I was not wise enough to learn from experience, I had, what I told the Mister was in his honor, an upside-down, backwards “L” carved in my chest. But that “L” actually represents the third letter of melanoma.
I’m only telling you this so, when you see me wearing my caballera hat walking along the Mission Reach, you won’t make fun of me in front of me. My sombrero represents a self-preservation technique I learned from old postcards, from photos of men like those who used to grace the Mission Drive-In marquee.
And, yes, some of the postcards were condescending in tone. But the photos were of real people, real people living in San Antonio who wore sensible hats when going about their daily business.
At this latitude, the sombrero-toting figure appears the smart one. Having a red neck is no sign of intelligence; it’s just asking to be branded with one of those “L’s.”
If only I had one of those back-saving burros to port that case of two-buck Chuck up to the kitchen….
The sidewalks and plazas in the historic center of Santiago de Queretaro were overflowing with pedestrians on a recent Sunday night, evidently a typical Sunday evening. Our host, Clyde Ellis, and his neighbor led us past a plaza where families were lined up to see an exhibition of National Geographic photographs, through the plaza with the dancing waters and past the one where a younger set was gathering for contemporary pop.
Although stopping frequently to greet other neighbors encountered along the way, they were intent on the goal – Destination Danzón. And, having lingered at great length over a late lunch, we were late.
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Banda de Musica de Gobierno del Estado already was swinging into the first set of the Tradicional Serenata Dominical, and dancers were sashaying around the plaza. Selections included “New York” and Glenn Miller’s “De Buen Humor,” or “In the Mood.”
Cha-cha-cha transported me instantly back to the days of Sunday tea dances in Virginia Beach. The tea dances, inappropriately named as brown bags clothed bottles of bourbon and gin on virtually every table, were held outdoors across Atlantic Avenue from the old Cavalier Hotel. The huge round dance floor was roofless and surrounded by a double-decked gallery perched directly above the beach, so close to the ocean her hurricane-driven waves periodically would drag almost the entire structure out to sea.
I would watch my parents and their friends cha-cha-cha-ing around the polished wood dance floor to the big band sound of bands such as the Lester Lanin Orchestra. Cuban music was king, as the island was a popular vacation destination for ships cruising out of Norfolk.
One Sunday in particular came to my mind. I must have had new clothes, never before worn by my older sisters – a rarity. A starchy crinoline belled out the skirt of my smocked, puffed-sleeve dress, and lacy white anklets emerged from the top of shiny black patent leather Mary Jane shoes.
Longing to join the glamorous adults twirling on the dance floor, I remember dancing with one of the columns supporting the upper deck of the gallery. The mother of an older man – probably 8 years old and the only other child there – persuaded her son to ask me to dance.
The boy commanded a rather spirited lead at a pace restrained only marginally by the beat of the music. For a grand finale, he spun me around under his arm so fast I twirled out of control like a top, the slick soles of my Mary Janes flying out from under me as I landed plop on my bottom amidst raucous laughter from onlookers.
The dancers of Queretaro were well beyond my league as well. They greeted each number enthusiastically, although the band held out playing the even first danzón until the second set.
The danzón originated in Cuba but was exported to Vera Cruz, where it flourished and spread. Dancers pair off on the floor but refrain from taking the first steps until an orchestral cue on the fourth beat of bar four of the paseo, a cue much too subtle for me to catch until after the banda had played several. Tunes on the programa in Queretaro included “Siboney” and Gonzalo Bravo’s “La Negra,” and the evening closed with a spirited marcha, “Queretaro.”
Did we join the dancing Queretanos?
I am positive I could have danced with a lamppost on the plaza all night without the mister even being tempted to cut in to salvage my reputation.
But just as well. Despite awkwardly suffering through a season of Mrs. Sadler’s cotillion, my dancing skills have improved little through the years.
A six-year-old piled up in a crinoline pouf on the floor might be cute, but the woman she evolved into a half century or so later would not.
Note Added on March 24, 2012: Just noticed that the Instituto Cultural de Mexico in HemisFair Park is exhibiting photographs by Cristina Kahlo, “Tiempo de Danzón,” through the end of April.
Note Added on March 31, 2012: And a friend just emailed me that Salon Mexico if offering a danzón lesson from 7 to 10:30 p.m. on Friday, May 11, at the University of Incarnate Word.
Postcards from Barton Springs 