Pimping Your Ride Via Indigenous Traditions
Applying beads to the “Vochol” (Vocho + Huichol) Image from the Facebook page of Museo de Arte Popular.
Mexico’s Indigenous people have been making art from millenia. When the Spanish invaded and conquered what’s now modern Mexico in 1492 they found complex metropolis, their buildings decorated with intricately carved sculptures and brightly colored painting. The painful conquest didn’t annihilate their passion for art making and in modern times their new works of elaborate pieces of art are often displayed in museums’ collections.
For the opening, some of the artists appeared in traditional garb of The Huichol, an indigenous ethnic group of western central Mexico
For this piece eight members of two Huichol families took the task to create a piece of art, seven months in the making, by using more than two million glass beads and a vintage Volkswagen as a canvas. Inspired by the designs of Francisco Bautista, a patriarch of one of the families, they incorporated their traditional indigenous theologies and cultural symbols with modern vernacular.
The serpents on the the front design represent “rain”, while the the roof is decorated with the sun and four eagles. Birds were thought to be the intermediaries between gods and mortals. The rear part and sides are tributes or “ofrendas” of fruits of the earth to their gods.
The piece will be shown at Museo de Arte Popular for a period of time and then the four wheeled piece will be go on tour in Europe and the in the rest of the Americas. Finally the piece will be sold at auction with the proceeds of the sale to benefit the programs of the museum.
Other Articles You May Like from BSA:
The Ljubljana Street Art Festival 2022 edition has come to an end, with great flourish. We've been reporting on it here on BSA, and now we bid adieu to the uniquely creative organizers. They plan...
Rounding out our week of Italian street artists and muralists, we see the newest by Davide DPA at the Pulpa Festival 2022 in Montesilvano. A city of the province of Pescara in the Abruzzo region of I...
You could call it a mural, this new piece celebrating Saint Sophia’s Cathedral in Kiev. You may also simply refer to it as an outdoor painting of a majestic and Byzantine indoor view. Borondo for S...
There has been some talk recently (meaning, oh, the last 30 years) about the role of street art and graffiti as a form of protest or political speech and its relevance, irrelevance, plenty or paucity....
AL: "Just spent 12 days in prison in Tokyo" BSA: Fuck! Was the food as good as the art? AL: Nope. The exhibition went great. The street stuff not so great. The food was terrible and was served ...