Juan Mata Ortíz is a small village of potters, farmers and cowboys in Northern Chihuahua. About 30 years ago, an unschooled artistic genius, Juan Quezada, taught himself how to make ollas, earthenware jars, by a method used hundreds of years ago by the prehistoric inhabitants. Now, his works are known worldwide and over 300 men, women and […]
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Juan Mata Ortíz is a small village of potters, farmers and cowboys in Northern Chihuahua. About 30 years ago, an unschooled artistic genius, Juan Quezada, taught himself how to make ollas, earthenware jars, by a method used hundreds of years ago by the prehistoric inhabitants. Now, his works are known worldwide and over 300 men, women and […]
Continue ReadingJuan Mata Ortíz is a small village of potters, farmers and cowboys in Northern Chihuahua. About 30 years ago, an unschooled artistic genius, Juan Quezada, taught himself how to make earthenware jars in a method used hundreds of years ago by the prehistoric inhabitants. Now, his works are known worldwide and over 300 men, women […]
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Juan Mata Ortíz is a small village of potters, farmers and cowboys in Northern Chihuahua. About 30 years ago, an unschooled artistic genius, Juan Quezada, taught himself how to make earthenware jars in a method used hundreds of years ago by the prehistoric inhabitants. Now, his works are known worldwide and over 300 men, women […]
Continue ReadingJuan Mata Ortíz is a small village of potters, farmers and cowboys in Northern Chihuahua. About 30 years ago, an unschooled artistic genius, Juan Quezada, taught himself how to make earthenware jars in a method used hundreds of years ago by the prehistoric inhabitants. Now, his works are known worldwide and over 300 men, women […]
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This article on the potters and pottery of Juan Mata Ortíz, Chihuahua will set the stage for a monthly series entitled, “Among the Artists and the Cowboys.” Visitors to the village describe the place as “magical.” Readers of future stories will discover the charisma of Mata Ortíz and its people-both the potters and the cowboys. […]
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Part 1: The America’s Oldest Urban Center Having reached Monte Alban and entered the site, on your right as you stand at the corner of the main plaza is the North Platform, the site of the Zapotec king’s residence and the temples of the nobility. Wandering around the hillside behind the North Platform, you will […]
Continue Reading The warm afternoon breeze wafts a gentle mist of dust across the floor of the Oaxaca valley and into Oaxaca city, softening the colonial patina of the richly carved, 300-year-old cathedral. The dust is two thousand years old, the dust of Monte Alban, the first major city in the Americas. Now a ghost city, Monte […]
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“Does your husband ever carve nudes,” I asked Enedina Castillo Castillo, only half jokingly. She grinned up at me with those wise eyes. “Once he carved a David that looked like the one by Miguel Angel,” she assured me. “You mean the one in Italy,” I asked incredulously. “Sí, the one with the hands. “And the….” […]
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Moctezuma ordered his special chair. Pedro Páramo, in Juan Rulfo’s award winning novel sat upon one. Both men enjoyed equipales, the rustic leather furniture found everywhere in Mexico. Equipales are still hand-manufactured in many parts of the country. However in Zacoalco de Torres, a small town south of Guadalajara, the tradition dates back to Pre-Hispanic times. By the […]
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