"Papel Amate" - 1980s Nahua painting from Mexico on handmade paper

Value = $125     Starting Bid = $80

Framed Mexican "papel amate" painting ca. 1980-85 (15"h x 10"w)

Donated by:  Caroline Cargo and the Robert Cargo Folk Art Gallery

Nahua people have inhabited the region of the Balsas River in the Mexican state of Guerrero since pre-Columbian times.  In the 1960s, Nahua artists in several remote villages began creating "papeles amates" -- paintings on paper made from the bark of fig and mulberry trees by traditional methods.  Typically amate paintings depict colorful scenes of village life -- family celebrations, farming, hunting, pottery-making, weddings, funerals, religious and community fiestas.   In the 1990s, traditional Nahua artists used this conventional artistic medium of papel amate to transmit an unconventional message of political protest when a proposed hydroelectric dam project on the Balsas River threatened to dislocated tens of thousands of Nahua people living in 22 villages.   In the midst of the community struggle, papel amate artists began painting scenes protesting the dam, and those images were reproduced and passed out at meetings and roadblocks to raise funds and educate people who would not otherwise learn about indigenous resistance.  The Mexican government failed to obtain World Bank financing for the proposed dam and the project was canceled in 1993.

This framed, traditional papel amate painting from the early 1980s combines several glimpses at everyday village and family activities. Let it be a reminder of the strength of the indigenous Nahua community to launch successful creative opposition through multiple channels -- prayer, political protest, and progressive art.