Friday 19 December 2014

Prints from Oaxaca

Tanya and I went down to Oaxaca to collect more prints, to add to the YayBig Southwest collection, chasing much of what we read in the Oaxacan Printeresting post by Kevin McCloskey.  I also recently absorbed the Oaxacan ASARO exhibit at the Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico.


We bought a lot of prints from Espacio Zapata:

Espacio Zapata
with pictures of the missing 43 students from Ayotzinapa


Front room of Espacio Zapata studio


Mario Guzman with the large press
(we bought the large print in the background
on amate paper
by Irving Herrera)


We bought a set of 6 prints at Espacio Zapata:


Mario Guzman


Beta










We also bought other prints from Espacio Zapata:


Mario Guzman












We bought prints and t-shirts from Taller-Galeria Siqueiros as well:

Taller-Galeria Siqueiros






We stayed  at the Ishuakara Casa Estudio, which is both a studio that gives classes, and a hotel rooms in the back:

Tanya made a print at
in one class
using a homemade press


Tanya Rich and Armando Ruiz Freger
(Armando runs the Ishuakara Taller)


We met  maestro Abraham Torres at the Taller Tamayo school, and he then gave us a nice tour of the other printmaking studios in the area:


Abraham Torres' studio


Abraham Torres
holding the YayBig Southwest catalog --
Christina Cardenas' catalog print
was done in his studio


Abraham Torres


Abraham Torres




Everyone has a large press in Oaxaca, 
like this at La Curtiduria


Another Lithography studio


Tanya Rich and I,
with Abraham Torres
and some of the students 
of the Taller Tamayo for printmaking --
we bought the student "carpeta"
of 18 prints




The student "carpeta"


Student "carpeta" prints on the table


Later on
we noticed an exhibit in the Mexico City metro
of the Taller Tamayo school
in Oaxaca

We bought more works from Taller de Grafica"La Chicharra":


Taller de Grafica
"La Chicharra"






Venancio Velasco


Marcos Lucero


We bought these prints from Eric at Kuchaku:







I bought a print from Tatonka (Mojo) from his street stall.  He said it was leftover from the protests in 2006 (which accelerated the printmaking movement in the city of Oaxaca):


Tatonka


I also bought a print from Michael Roman at La Mano Mágica.  Michael Roman taught me how to silk screen back in the 90s, at the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, in San Francisco:


 

Oaxaca definitely is a vibrant printmaking Mecca.  We certainly did not visit all the graphic studios -- I believe maestro Takeda, who "jokes that Oaxaca is sinking like Venice under the weight of its printing presses."  

We missed the 2nd Annual Oaxaca Print Fair by a few days, unfortunately.

Besides collecting prints, we enjoyed the paintings, Toledo, crafts, restaurants, mezcalerias,  Dr Lacra, many openings, Monte Alban, and the whole festive atmosphere downtown.  Something was happening during every moment. There was both a mezcal fair and a chocolate fair on the same day, with free samples.  How can it get any better than that?

Maestro Abraham Torres told us about the lithography studio in Xalapa -- La Ceiba Grafica.  They are drawing on marble, rather than traditional lithography stones.  

We also followed some of the tourist advice from Top Ten Things to do in Oaxaca.

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