Morning Comrades and welcome back to another instalment in this series, where we once again head back to Mexico, but specifically, a personal favourite of mine, Oaxaca.
Tucked into a curve on Mexico's southern coastline, the state of Oaxaca is known for its rugged mountainous landscapes, the Spanish colonial architecture of its capital city and its vibrant art scene. Along with neighbouring Chiapas, a high proportion of its inhabitants are of indigenous origin. Indigenous peoples such as the Mixtec, Zapotec and Mazatec make up around a third of the population, which also experiences some of the most severe poverty in the country.
Over the past 2 decades, Oaxaca has also become known for political upheaval and experiments in local democracy. In 20061, a massive popular uprising shook the region in response to the violent repression of a teachers' strike in the state capital. APPO (the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca) formed the same year, a non-hierarchical social movement agitating for justice in the region. In particular, it called for the expulsion of governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, who was accused of corruption, sanctioning human rights violations, and even the use of death squads.
All so often we here in the imperial core think of revolutions as something antiquated and historical - feel free to figure out why that is - whereas they are a daily reality in the rest of the world. Same story goes for Oaxaca. Again, similar to Chiapas2, Oxaca’s neighbouring state that has been in open revolt against the Mexican state at large since 1994, this most wonderful part of the world has been in open revolt against the Mexican state for as long as I can remember. Oaxaca has always had a brilliant art heritage that dates well back before the Spanish colonized the area. It was only, however, after my first visit to both Chiapas and Oaxaca that I realized how interwoven the artistic history of the region was with the revolutionary actions of the then present day revolutions, hence this excursion into this subject.
In order to fight against violence and bureaucratic corruption the local artists gathered in 2006 and one subsequently formed a street art collective Asaro (Assembly of Revolutionary Artists of Oaxaca) and particularly a prominent Oaxacan street artist and a member of the collective -Yescka. Many of Asaro founding members were college students at the time of the uprising, but formed a collective in order to pool their resources and lend their creative talents to the political struggle happening on their doorstep.
Since then, the collective has become known for its stunning works of street art, most of which are produced from wood-cut prints and stencils. Maestro Shinzaburo Takeda, a Japanese master printmaker and the Dean of the School of Fine Arts at the University of Benito Juarez in Oaxaca, was a founding member of ASARO. Takeda taught many ASARO members to make woodblock prints. These have helped create a visual commentary on the country's political situation — such as the disappearance of 43 students from the town of Ayotzinapa in 2014 — that is in-keeping with a long tradition of murals and popular art in Mexico. But there is also a utilitarian aspect to their design: they are easy to reproduce and reuse, meaning they can be used to cover a lot of walls in a short space of time. These collectives made use of traditional figures like the Mexican revolutionary hero Emiliano Zapata along with images from popular and religious culture such as Day of the Dead calaveras and the Virgin of Guadalupe, using familiar icons to create a new vocabulary of dissent to critically address contemporary events.
The social movement that began in June of 2006 continues today, as does the work of the ASARO collective. Many believe that the Oaxacan movement, like the Zapatista movement in Chiapas to which it has close ties, is a continuation of the Mexican Revolution and the promised reforms that have yet to be realized.
Espacio Zapata functions as the group's studio. Much of their work is produced there, and some of it is sold to put back into the running of the collective. The space also hosts education workshops: artistic and printing techniques are taught to young people from the colonias around Oaxaca, to make sure the area's creative talent is nurtured. Asaro's work has a higher social purpose that is rooted in, and reflects the reality around them.
Lapiztola is another art collective famous for its resistance art in Oaxaca. Shortly, Lapiztola is an art collective in Oaxaca created by Roberto Arturo, Rosario MartÃnez and Yankel Balderas in 2006 during the Oaxacan uprising. At the beginning, Roberto Arturo and Rosario MartÃnez were creating designs for t-shirts, banners and posters in support of the protests. Even after the uprising had officially been quelled, the duo continued designing and printing t-shirts for the movement. In 2007, they formed the collective Lapiztola, a play on the Spanish words lápiz (pencil) and pistola (gun), with Yankel, an architect and graffiti artist who had also been active during the 2006 protests.
A personal favourite of mine is the artist Gran Om. Gran Om is famous for his political prints, contemporary gig posters and social political theme murals. Together with his friend illustration artist Kloer they design prints and paint murals that affect the life of people in the communities leaving a rich commentary on today's social and political issues: the fight of the indigenous people for their land, women rights, the collapse of the political system.
I could go on for days about this vibrant and brilliant part of the world but I hope this offers an introduction to those that are interested.
Yours, warmly and in desperate need to return to Mexico,
V.
If you want to know more about these uprisings, click here
I highly recommend getting acquainted with this revolution, I consider it one of the most important ones in our lifetimes. Read this for starters.