Orgullo Mixteco Por Salvador Rojas



This year, Mexico is celebrating its bicentennial of its Independence and 100th anniversary of its bloody Revolution. These are recent mile stones. Mexico’s history goes back thousands of years before Jesus Christ. One has to travel Mexico to appreciate what our ancestors accomplished, from the creation of Xocolatl (chocolate) to the Mayan Pyramids of the Yucatán.

In 2009, I traveled two weeks through the southern states of Guerrero and Oaxaca, Mexico along with my friend Renzo Devia. He was filming a documentary series titled “Afro Latinos”.

It was fascinating to the see the Indigenous cultures of Oaxaca from the Afro-Mestizos, Mixtecos, and the Trique. To hear them speak their native tongues takes you back to the time before Hernán Cortés landed on the coast of Veracruz. I discovered that Mexico has 62 Indigenous languages that are still spoken today, making it one of the most linguistically diverse countries in the world.

While spending a day in the small town of San Andres Huaxpaltepec, Oaxaca I came upon a mural near a Catholic church.

This panoramic photograph consists of four of my photographs stitched together to complete the full Oaxacan mural.

The theme of the mural is “Tradiciones / Traditions ” and was painted by a small collective of artists: Angel Carrasco, Leonides Rendon, Mataki and Jeronimo Lopez Ramirez aka Dr. Lakra. Dr. Lakra is a well known Mexican tattooist and is the son of one of Mexico’s most famous living artists Francisco Toledo.

The Oaxacan mural is dedicated to the rich traditions and customs of the local Mixteca culture. “Los Mixtecos” call the town of San Andres Huaxpaltepec “Xini Titi” and means “Cabeza de Iguana / Head of the Iguana”. The mural starts with an Indigenous Woman, and then the mural features a black carnival mask (La Máscara Negra), an iguana head representing the town, and the head of a bull. Followed by the local Iglesia Catolica where Santo Patrón Tata Chú is worshipped. The solo dancer painted in dark hues represents the night dance of “Dia de Todos los Santos” that happens every November 1st, to honor all the saints of the Catholic faith. The dancer is followed by an Indigenous Mixteca woman making yarn out of algodón by hand. The mural continues with a group of four male dancers called “Los Tejorones”, they perform their dance rituals during Easter Carnival. The dancers are wearing tailored European style suits, conical feathered headdresses, and small wooden masks painted pink with small moustaches, as a caricature of the Frenchmen who invaded the area in the 19th Century but retreated. The mural ends with two masks, the Jaguar mask and “La Máscara Negra.” The different masks painted on the mural are used in various dances though out Mexico, where the “Máscara Negra” represents the Afro-Mexican population of the Costa Chica area of Oaxaca.

El Sol Sale Igual Para Todos!
Fotografia Y Escritos Por Salvador Rojas



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