Visiting Local Artists in Oaxaca

A big high point of the tour for lots of people was visiting with expat artist Jean Foss and her husband Chucho at their bright and beautiful home in the village of Huayapam. 

Any tour that starts with a beautiful garden and snacks and mezcal at 11 in the morning promises to be a good visit.

Jean's devotion to her work is inspiring and her love for all things Oaxacan shines through in her style which I might describe as a painterly, folk art version of magical realism.

She has a great website which gives you some of idea of the sheer output of her work. I was even more surprised to learn that she describes herself as someone who works very slowly. 

See more of her work by clicking here 

 
Definitely one of the high points of the 2017 Art Retreat was the visit to the home and studio of Hungarian expat via way of Chile and Canada, surrealist artist Susana Wald who has lived in Oaxaca for the last 20 or so years.

My pal Wren Davidson, who had gone on the 2014 Tour with us has, since then,  been going down to Oaxaca a few months of the year to study drawing and painting and had encountered Susana and began drawing lessons with her at her home studio. "Hmmmmm", I thought, "maybe she can make the introductions for us." She could and she did and little did I know how wonderful it would all turn out to be.

 After a private visit to the village church, we went to Susana's home. We had refreshments. We sat in her big curved exhibition space. Susana talked about her life and then took questions.  Everyone had thoughtful and considered queries and Susana responded in kind. We  learned about the three tenents of surrealism: We must have freedom, We must have love, We must have poetry (creativity). Her helper Quinto brought out her work in chronological order one by one. We talked about spirals, eggs, black stones, anarchy, Mexico, Neruda, freedom, and women as furniture.  I don't think it's an exaggeration to say we were soon all sitting on the edge of our surreal seats.

We were all of us deeply inspired by this dedicated octogenarian artist who has more than one twinkle in her eye. It was a beautiful encuentro and a real sharing of energy. She fed us & we fed her.(And then later we all ate together).

Susana lives with her husband, Ludwig Zeller, a surrealist poet, in a house they designed themselves on the outskirts of Huayapam. 

While we were there, they were having a show of their letters and correspondence at the Stamp Museum  and Susana had a painting show at Santa Domingo. I feel lucky to have had this encounter - with a huge thank you to Rogene Manas, Pablo Gonzales, Quinto Euceda, & Susana Wald for making it all happen.

The Essential Culinary Tool in the Central Valley of Oaxaca

They call them molcajetes, the stone grinders, you see them everywhere. I love the shot above from a home kitchen in San Miguel de Valle.

And these ones all lined up nice and tidy and remember to write your name on the bottom of them so you don't lose them.

They're used for grinding herbs, spices, salsa, and chocolate, and here indigo and cochineal for natural dyes.

  A private collection spotted in the home of a rugweaver in Teotitlan

And spotted at the Rodolfo Morales home.

A Very Fine Collection of Ex Voto Paintings in Oaxaca

I was writing Susana Wald about visiting with her at her home in Huayapam about 20 minutes outside the city and she mentioned she could arrange for the village  church to be open for us.  Yes please. It's an early and old church and Susana says on a clear day you can see Mt Alban from the atrium. I'd only been there once before and remembered, among other things, their fabulous collection of ex voto paintings.  Really folk art at it's finest, up close and personal - some dating back as late as the early 1800's. There were paintings on metal,canvas,and wood all in various states of disrepair lined on both sides of the wall in the side chapel. ( Pro tip - most of the action in the churches happens in the side chapels.) Here are just a few of them.