The Tastoanes of Tonalá

Masked dancers called Tastoanes gather in front of Tonalá's Palacio Municipal. On July 25 of this year, Carole and I visited the Guadalajara suburb called Tonalá to participate in the the annual Fiesta de los Tastoanes. During our five years in Mexico, we have seen a number of indigenous dance troupes, many of them wearing hand-crafted masks. However, the Tastoanes are in a league of their own. The fantastic masks portray grotesque monsters and the dancers are vigorous and acrobatic. The whole affair is conducted in a spirit of great fun. For anyone who is intrigued with Mexico's indigenous culture, and who plans a July visit to the Guadalajara area, this fiesta is a must. As a bonus, Tonalá is the source of many of the wonderful crafts showcased in Tlaquepaque and other parts of Gualalajara. Every Thursday and Sunday, the local craftspeople display their wares at massive street fairs in Tonalá where prices are generally much lower than at the boutiques of Tlaquepaque or elsewhere.

The Prelude

A statue of a Tonalateca warrior kneels in a dramatic pose in the center of Tonalá's plaza. Tonalá (Nahuatl for "The Place Where the Sun Rises") is located on the eastern side of the Guadalajara metropolitan area. The city was originally founded by Zapotecs, an ethnic group concentrated mainly in faraway Oaxaca, but with widely scattered outliers. The Zapotecs intermarried with other groups and were eventually conquered by the Toltecs, who imposed their own religious and military practices. Tonalá figured in the famous Salt War of 1480-1510 AD, when the Purépecha (also known as Tarascans) invaded on their way to seize the valuable salt beds near Colima. Tonalá's king raised an army and fiercely resisted the invaders, eventually defeating them. The warrior shown above exemplifies this fighting spirit. For a map of Tonalá showing its relationship to Guadalajara, click here.

The dance area was laid out in front of the Palacio Municipal. When we arrived, the area was packed 6 or 8 people deep and photography seemed problematic. I have learned over time that an elevated position is often best for an event like this, and I noticed the 2nd floor balconies of the Palacio, seen above. Other expats we met were sure the local authorities wouldn't let is up there, but I've long since learned to ask for what I want. The worst that can happen is that they say "no". Sure enough, an official gave me a welcoming smile and graciously conducted us up to a balcony with a great view of the action. Tonalá gave a rather different welcome to the Spanish, when they arrived on the scene in 1530. Queen Cihualpilli then ruled the area and, no doubt, had already heard about the ferocious temperament of Conquistador Nuño de Guzmán. She bowed to the inevitable and provided him with supplies. However, when de Guzmán demanded that the native people show obeisance to the Spanish King, they were outraged and showered the Spanish with arrows. This was the same warrior spirit that had overcome the Purépecha only 20 years before.

Tastoan masks decorate the staircase leading to our 2nd floor balcony. The 6 masks in the middle are connected to a fountain. The subjects of Queen Cihualpilli formed their battle lines on a hill near the present-day Centro Historico and fought the Spanish with everything they had. De Guzmán's soldiers, covered with steel armor and possessing firearms and horses, eventually won the battle. However, the Tonaltecans were no pushovers and the Spanish suffered severe casualties. De Guzmán subsequently chose Tonalá as one of several successive sites for Guadalajara and it held that distinction during the 18 months between August 8 1533 and February 1535. By 1621, Tonalá had become one of several key sites used by the Augustinian friars for propagating the faith. In 1873, Tonalá was recognized as the chief city of its own municipalidad (equivalent to a US county). In the 20th Century, Metropolitan Guadalajara expanded to swallow up surrounding towns like Tonalá. Presently the overall municipal population of is 408,000, with the population of Tonalá itself (374,000) making up most of that total..

Members of the large crowd chat as they await the beginning of the dance. The city government had set up bleachers that ran the whole length of the Palacio and they were packed. Everywhere we've visited, Mexicans love fiestas and spectacles.


La Danza de los Tastoanes

The dance finally began, led off by 3 young men dressed as clownish kings. Mexican events rarely begin at the time advertised, so we found the best vantage points on the balcony and made ourselves comfortable. Finally, things seemed to be under way at one end of the long rectangle making up the dance area. The dancers began to file in, and I could see the long blonde manes of the mask wearers approach through the press of the crowd. I was very glad that I had pushed for a better angle. The ring of people surrounding the dance area was at this point so thick that photography would have been impossible at ground level.

A Tastoan strides about in his full barbaric regalia. In addition to a mask with a huge blonde mane, he wore an animal skin, as did many of the other dancers. So what is this all about? The explanation is a bit complicated because it involves the melding of two different traditions. The point of connection between the traditions is St. James, one of the original 12 Apostles. He is known in Spain as Santiago Matamoros and his Feast Day is July 25.

Dancers gather around a fallen Tastoan. The Tastoanes began to fill the dance area below my balcony perch. Above, a group of them dance around one who lies face down, having been "killed" in a ritual sword fight. St. James the Apostle had evangelized in Spain during Roman times and his body was returned there and buried in the town of Compostela after he was martyred in Palestine in the middle of the 1st Century AD. In the following centuries, his tomb became a pilgrimage site and Compostela was designated a Holy City. At the beginning of the 8th Century AD, the Muslim Moors from North Africa invaded Spain and established their first Caliphate. For the next 700 years, in a struggle known as  La Reconquista, Spanish Christians fought to defeat and expel them. The final campaign of this long holy war was waged by King Ferdinand of Aragon and his wife Queen Isabella of Castille, the same two who funded Columbus' explorations. The Spanish Christians adopted James, or Santiago, as their patron saint for the crusade against the Moors. This is how one of the chief apostles of the so-called Prince of Peace was dubbed Matamoros (The Moor Slayer), and why he is often portrayed brandishing a sword. About this time, Spanish Christians began to celebrate Santiago's Feast Day using costumed dancers who reenacted the defeat of the Moors by the Christians.

A prematurely graying Tastoan pauses to catch his breath. On his extravagantly curving yellow nose perches a dragonfly. His lips and teeth form a magnificent snarl. The creators of the masks go to great lengths to make them uniquely--and hilariously--hideous. The long struggle against the Moors had two effects on Spain. First, it produced the most experienced and best organized, equipped, and trained soldiers in Europe. Second, the ideological nature of the war produced a fanatical brand of Catholicism that viewed dark-skinned heathens as souls to be saved, by force if necessary. With Columbus' discovery of the New World, both of these powerful forces were unleashed on the inhabitants of the Americas and Santiago Matamoros became the patron saint of the Conquest.

A statue of Santiago Matamoros, brandishing his usual sword, is carried on a palanquin. Santiago wears a somewhat anachronistic cowboy hat, as do other dancers who represent the Spanish, like the man in the foreground. The saint is carried by Tastoanes, symbolizing his dominance after the defeat of the indigenous warriors of Tonalá in 1530. According to legend, the slain warriors were transformed into hideous monsters, perhaps as punishment for opposing Conquistador Nuño de Guzman. The Danza de los Tastoanes thus originated as a morality play where "good" triumphed over "evil" similar to the dances held in Spain on the Feast Day of Santiago. This, of course, overlooked de Guzman's brutal role as the Heinrich Himmler of the Conquest. In the end, his depredations were so atrocious that even the colonial Spanish couldn't stomach them and de Guzman was sent back to Spain in chains and died in prison.

This fellow looks a bit like the alien warrior of the sci-fi movie "Predator". Many of the dancers, in addition to their masks, wore traditional clothes such as this serape over a tunic and pants made of rough cotton. On his feet he wore leather sandals. As with many Catholic rituals imported by the Spanish conquerors, local people have gradually transformed the dance into something quite different from the original. While Santiago is still respected, many people now feel that the Tastoanes represent indigenous pride in the heroic, if unsuccessful, defense of Tonalá against the Spanish. Mexico is filled with rituals. street names, and monuments dedicated to such heroic but failed efforts against various invaders.

The Tastoanes in action. It was hard to know just where to focus, because there was so much happening all at once. Individual dancers whirled and leaped, and groups of various sizes spun about one another. Rather than being centrally directed, the dance seemed to be a collection of spontaneous outbursts, exciting but a bit confusing. Notice the dancer on the left. He holds a "sword" in his right hand made from a stick with a leather hilt. Many dancers carried similar swords and used them to stage mock battles among themselves.

I thought this was quite a handsome fellow. He wears a cowhide tunic, and his mask is topped by what appear to be two cow ears. What I at first thought were his eyebrows appear to be the legs of a large spider perched on the top of his long, red nose. The magnificent locks of hair worn by the dancers are usually made either from hemp or horse tails. The dancers' masks are sometimes made from ceramics, but more usually from a combination of leather and paper maché, to reduce weight. They are painted with acrylics which give them their vivid colors. Snakes and insects are often incorporated into the designs, as are the horns, hide, and other parts of actual animals.

A dancer whirls and lashes out with his wooden sword. One of the most dramatic aspects of the costumes was the mane. The dancers took full advantage of this by ducking and turning their heads so that the long hair would swirl and fly about.

Two Tastoanes face off in a mock battle. Sometimes these battles would result in the "death" of one of the dancers. It seemed symbolic to me that the Tastoanes so often fought each other rather than a Spaniard. The Spanish Conquest would never have succeeded without its deliberate "divide and conquer" strategy, implemented by Conquistador Hernán Cortéz from the moment of his landing on the mainland of Mexico in 1519.

When not dancing themselves, Tastoanes stood about and watched the show. When we visited Tonalá, the day was warm and a bit sticky. I can only imagine how hot it must have been for dancers such as these two. The masks are heavy and the costumes had to be stifling, even when standing still. Jumping and twirling about while conducting mock battles must have left them panting and sweating torrents. This might explain why the action of individual dancers seemed to go in bursts rather than continuously, although collectively the action was fairly continuous.


The Aftermath

Centerpiece on the grille at a Birreria. Immediately next to the dance area were numerous small booths selling a wide variety of traditional Mexican food. A birrieria is a place that sells birria, or goat stew. The proprietors of small sidewalk restaurants like this seem to use every part of the goat but the bleat. The meat is cut up and placed in a pot with a spicy, tomato-based sauce and other ingredients. Despite the rather disturbing appearance of the head, the dish is really quite good. Even though the Tastoanes were still performing, by this time it was mid-day and Carole and I went looking for lunch. We had recently dined on birria, so we kept looking .

Great aromas and a the owner's friendly smile drew us to this place. The proprietress stands next to several pots filled with interesting choices. Her young son munches while shyly peeping at us from the back of the booth.We settled on sopes, which can be roughly described as tiny Mexican pizzas. You have several meat or vegetable choices, which are then placed on top of doughy disks about the size of a tea saucer. Three or four of these will fill almost anyone right up to the eyebrows.

Carole and friend at Tonalá's Museum of Tastoan Masks. This was one of a variety of beautifully crafted masks on display, including some from other countries. Try as I might, I couldn't persuade Carole to wear it for a photo. I would strongly recommend a visit to the mask museum for anyone who can't attend the actual dance. Although there were many wonderful masks in the museum, I chose to show only this one because I had so many good shots of masks worn by live dancers. To show museum masks seemed like "gilding the lily". The museum is located on Ramon Corona between Constitución and Cuauhtémoc streets, only a couple of blocks north of the main plaza.

This completes my posting on the Tastonanes of Tonalá. I hope you have enjoyed it. If you have any feedback, I would be delighted to hear it. You can leave any messages in the Comments section below, or email me directly.

If you leave a question in the Comments section, PLEASE leave your email address so I can respond.

Hasta luego, Jim

Tonala folk art Part 3: The Master Potter

Ferocious cat seems ready to spring off this damaged pot.  The pot, created by master potter Salvador Vazquez Carmona of Tonala, sat in a corner of his rustic workshop waiting for repair of a crack. In spite of the flaw, the work shows the liveliness and originality which mark his work.

This  is the third and final posting in my series on Tonala, Guadalajara's folk art center. For information about Tonala and various free and paid tours you can take to the many folk art workshops and showrooms, check out Part 1 of this Tonala series.

Salvador Vazquez Carmona at work in his shop. An internationally known potter whose work appeared in the book Great Masters of Mexican Folk Art, Sr. Vazquez' work is also exhibited in Tonala's National Ceramic Museum. Even so, his shop and studio are humble.  As is the case with many Mexican artists, his shop is part of his home. The entire front of his property facing the street is a small sidewalk Mexican restaurant run by family members. To enter, we walked through the restaurant, into the small courtyard in his house, and upstairs to the workshop.  He was at work at the time.  Sr. Vazquez is a small man with a soft voice who exudes a deep, quiet dignity.  His family obviously reveres him, as do his fellow Tonala potters. The picture above is not entirely my own, but is my photo of an unknown photographer's work hanging on the wall of Sr. Vazquez' studio. My thanks to the unknown photographer. 

Working on the details.  As  we watched, Sr. Vazquez painted fine details on a large pot. Although a man in his 70s, his eye is keen and his hand steady.  He is teaching his craft to his sons and also has instructed numerous apprentices who later became significant ceramic artists in  their own right. One of these, Juan Antonio Mateos, showed up at 7:00 AM for his first day as instructed. After two hours Sr. Vazquez showed up and opened the shop. This same scenario went on for several days. Finally the apprentice asked why he was told to come at 7:00 when work didn't begin until 9:00.  Sr. Vazquez told him that it was a test of his seriousness. Sr. Mateos later became a gifted potter in his own right.  

 
Doing it the old fashioned way. Sr. Vazquez and his work are distinguished by techniques that pre-date the Spanish Conquest.  Tonala was a great center for religious ceramic art when the Conquistadors arrived in the 1500s. Above, Sr. Vazquez uses a stone to smooth and burnish the surface of a pot. This technique is called brunido (burnished style). By training his sons and other apprentices in these practices, he is attempting to keep alive a form of art that is truly ancient.  

Animals play a big role in Sr. Vazquez' designs. As you will see in the work shown throughout this posting, cats and birds are recurring figures. Such animals have deeply symbolic meanings in the pre-hispanic mythology of the indigenous people.  A nahual is a being who shape-shifts between human and animal form.  Sr. Vazquez often decorates his work with nahuals in the form of smiling cats. 

Story of an  angry wife?  When I first took this photo, I was mainly attracted by the warm earth tone colors not only on the plate, but on the wall in back of it. Later, as I looked at the photo in preparation for this posting, I began to see that the plate actually tells a story.  A man with glassy eyes drinks from a bottle while he lies by his agave field.  Agave was used by ancient indigenous people to make intoxicating mezcal. This was later refined into tequila by  the Spanish. A figure, perhaps his wife, stands over the drunken man with an angry expression while waving a small sickle. I regularly see campesinos carrying a similar tool while they climb into the mountains to tend their small agave fields. Meanwhile, the nahual overhead grins in amusement.  There is an old saying in Mexico: "Para todo mal, mezcal; para todo bien, tambien."  "For everything bad, drink mezcal; and for everything good, you also should."

  
Another nahual peers out from a palm jungle. The long-necked cat with the body of a snake is surrounded by vegetation in the form of spirals.  I have examined ancient Mexican petroglyphs carved into the rocks near sacred sites which exhibit these same spiral shapes. 

Almost ready to take flight. These doves sit in realistic postures as they peer toward the light. Birds are another symbolic animal appearing regularly in pre-hispanic mythology.

A shape-shifting owl takes wing.  Owls which become witches are called lechuzas. This one appeared on a large pot, perhaps four feet tall.

An eastern influence? This delicate portrayal of perching birds with long black tails reminded me of ancient Chinese ceramic patterns I have seen. 

The Mexican national emblem came from Aztec mythology.  The design on this large pot shows an eagle, sitting on a nopal cactus, clutching a snake in its beak.  The ancient Aztecs believed that their ancestors, who came from the north, had been told by their god that their wanderings would end when they found a place with an eagle devouring a snake while sitting on a cactus plant. Aztec legend says that place was the Valley of Mexico, which became the heart of the Aztec Empire. The use of this symbol demonstrates the complex political and social relationship  between the decendents of the Spanish conquerors and the indigenous people. The emblem was adopted in the 19th Century in an attempt to achieve political unity.

This completes Part 3 of my series on Tonala.  If you ever visit Guadalajara, please make every effort to visit Tonala, one of the most fascinating places I have found during our Mexico Adventure. 

Hasta luego!  Jim

Tonala folk art Part 2, glass blowing

Glass sculpture or undersea monster? A cluster of decorative glass sculptures hangs from the ceiling of a glass blowing factory in Tonala, Guadalajara's center for folk art workshops. This is the second part of a three-part series on these workshops.  In my last posting, you saw one of the paper mache factories and got a little dose of Tonala history.  Please refer to that posting for information about paid and  free tours of Tonala's folk art workshops.

It all starts with intense heat. Glass melts at between 2600 to 2900 degrees (F.) or 1425 to 1600 degrees (C.) depending upon the composition of the glass.  Just looking at the picture, I can almost feel the intense heat blasting out of the furnace.  Glass was discovered by potters about 3000 B.C.E., and the technique of glass blowing was invented about 100 B.C.E.  Glass blowing was introduced to Mexico in 1535, shortly after the Conquest, and has been a staple of Mexican craftsmanship ever since. 

Recycling at its best.  Clear glass bottles form the raw material for the glass factory. The huge pile here has been broken into small chunks before being fed into the ovens.   Many are recycled tequila bottles, of which there appears to be a virtually unlimited supply in Mexico. From the original, rather pedestrian use, beautiful things can be made. The workers only use clear glass so that they can add material during the manufacturing process to create beautiful swirling colors. The poles extending into the furnace are used  to pick up globs of molten glass which is then molded and blown  into the desired shape.

Glass worker blows through tube to create a wine glass.  He sat beside a metal plate which protected his legs from spatterings of hot glass.  Occupational safety officials north of the border would have heart attacks at how things operate in this factory.  As we watched, workers performed a delicate ballet, quickly and smoothly moving hot glass on the ends of poles from one work position to another.  No one wore protective clothing or face shields.  Still, everyone seemed confident in the skill of coworkers to avoid  injuring themselves or others.

Shaping the glass was a  delicate process.  The workers seemed to have only a few tools for this, including the glass blowing tube, shears, and what looked like a large pair of tweezers.

Shears are used in a variety of ways.  Not just for cutting and trimming, the shears also functioned to steady a tube held by coworker (out of picture to the right) as  two pieces of molten glass are melded together.  The glass work is certainly not without injury, as you can see from the bandage on the wrist of the worker above.

Large metal "tweezers" are used to shape the stem of a glass. The heat has persuaded this worker to doff his shirt, revealing a pattern of interesting tattoos.

There are two sets of furnaces in this factory.  The one above is used late in the process, when the glass objects are shaped and need to cure slowly.  This furnace is heated by wood, which you can see piled at the base.  The wood produces a much lower heat than the melting furnace, but enough to prevent the glass from cooling too quickly and shattering or becoming distorted.

Wine glasses cure in the final furnace.  Here you can see how the burning log is placed among the stacks of glasses to help the curing process.

And the final result.  Finished glasses were displayed in a showroom near the front of the factory. Notice how color has been introduced to some of the glasses in beautiful swirling patterns.
Wild shapes and colors attract and intrigue.  I was impressed at how plastic a medium glass really is.  Here it is stretched and twisted into an amazing variety of shapes.

Colored vases wait for flowers, or wine, or...? These vases are probably not unlike those blown by the ancient Romans using a nearly identical process 2000 years ago.

Shapes and colors again remind of undersea animals.  The glass objects in the background seemed like giant clam shells, while the corkscrew objects clustered like the tentacles of a jellyfish.

This ends part 2 of my series on Tonala.  The next part will focus on Tonala's master potter, Salvador Vasquez Carmona. He is revered among  Mexican potters not only for his beautiful work, but for the fact that he uses the old ways, developed centuries before the Spaniards arrived.

Hasta luego!  Jim

Tonala folk art Part 1: making paper mache

Paper mache toucan rests quietly as its paint dries. Carole and I recently took a tour of several folk art workshops of Tonala, the craft manufacturing center of Guadalajara. Charter Club Tours of Ajijic conducted the tour and, as usual, did a fine job. Their guide, Rosie, is outgoing and well-informed and the tour was worth every penny of the fee. For further information on Charter Club tours, click here.

The colorful toucan above was made in one of the paper mache workshops in Tonala. We also visited a glass-blowing factory and the workshop of the master potter of Tonala, a modest man whose expertise is held in reverence by potters far and wide. In this posting, I will show how the paper mache creations are made and some of the finished products. In two following postings, I will focus on glass-blowing and pottery. There are many more crafts than these, created at a mind boggling number of shops. For a map to Tonala and a walking tour guide of crafts workshops, click here.

Paper mache begins with creation of the basic shapes. The grey and rather ugly objects piled above are the forms which are used in various combinations to create the desired shapes. The Mexican art of paper mache manufacture goes far back into Mexican history, at least to the early days of Spanish colonization. Tonala itself has a long history and was the capital of a small kingdom which dominated the area. The name of the kingdom was Tonallan, which means "the place of the rising sun". It was populated by indigenous people of the Coca and Tecuexes tribes. Spanish priests called Tonallan "the factory of paganism" because of the strong tradition of craftsmanship in the representation of their gods, particularly the sun god. That tradition of craftsmanship continues unabated 500 years later.

Butterfly takes shape, not from a cocoon, but from a paper mache form. A worker here cuts away excess material from the shape which will eventually become a brilliant butterfly. The factory, in back of the storefront showroom, was simply a large open room with scattered tables where the workers, in stages, created an amazing menagerie of brilliantly colored animals.

The flaming face of the sun. Using recycled newspaper, a worker further cuts and shapes this representation of the sun with a human face. After 500 years, the sun is still a popular figure for paper mache makers as it was for their forebears at the time of the Conquest.

Parrot spreads his wings for the worker. Pasting additional layers of newspaper strips on this parrot's wings strengthens them.

Parrot gets his colorful feathers in this step of the process. With great patience and an extremely steady hand, this worker gives the parrot the finely detailed features and extravagant colors that are so striking in the artwork as well as in life.

A tiger dries while waiting for the painting process. This fellow appeared almost ready to pounce, but lacked his vivid stripes. The next step after application of the recycled newspaper strips and final shaping is a coating of grey material which becomes the base for the paint. The paint is applied in two steps, first the base of orange, then the stripes.

"Tiger, tiger, burning bright... in the forest of the night, what immortal hand or eye, could frame thy fearful symmetry?" The poem by William Blake could well apply to this ferocious-looking and nearly full-sized creature. Just what you'd want to encounter in your living room while stumbling around in the middle of the night investigating strange noises.

Parrots perch in foliage. Looking almost as they would in the southern jungles of Mexico, these parrots wait for a new home. The show room of the factory resembled a still-life zoo.

Toucans dry after their final coat of paint. The life-like expressions and postures of the animals represented in the showrooms are very striking and show fine craftsmanship.

Peacock seems to hear the call of its mate. The peacocks came in a variety of postures and were some of the most colorful and finely decorated animals displayed.

Gazelle meditates restfully on a dais in the showroom. The factory created and displayed animals from all over the Americas, Africa, and India. Interestingly, there were very few representations of human figures, except for a Christmas creche scene.

This completes my posting on the paper mache factory of Tonala. I hope you have enjoyed it and will also enjoy my next two on glass-blowing and traditional pottery making.

Hasta luego, Jim