Taking Over Creation

For the past 14 years, every year in November there is an event that brings the top artisans from all over Mexico to Lake Chapala for a three-day show.  It is the Feria Maestros de Arte Mexican Folk and Indigenous Art Show.  This year it will be November 13-15 at the Yacht Club in Chapala.  Eighty artists will participate, along with music, dancers and other entertainment.  The unique feature of this show is that it costs artists/artisans nothing to participate.  The Feria Committee, comprised of both Mexican and Ex-pat inhabitants of the Lake Chapala area, pay for transportation, shipping, accommodation and meals for all of the participants and their families.  There are no booth fees or any other fees.  For many of the artisans, the sales they make during these three days comprise their entire year’s salary. Others count it as their top show of the year as it draws thousands of not only local art lovers but also collectors and gallery owners from the U.S. and other countries.

The Feria, which was the brainchild of Marianne Carlson, who last year handed over the reins but still acts as publicity director and board member and woman-of-all-jobs for the Feria, was conceived of in an attempt to allow artisans to continue to create their traditional homemade art: clothing, carpets, furniture, sculpture, toys, beadwork, paintings, pottery, paper making, jewelry, tapestries, rebozos, knives, glassware and photographs.  With the decrease of tourism at various times, without this show, many of these artisans would have been driven to abandon their skilled artistry to take other jobs, which in many cases would mean the demise of an art form that they are one of the few artisans still making.

If there is interest in the subject, I’ll write more about this subject and/or these artisans, but the reason I am talking about this in Cee’s Flower of the Day challenge can be better demonstrated by a few pictures:

Every year, volunteers get together to make decorations for the Feria.  This year they made 100 large paper flowers that will form part of the Feria decorations. For more information about the Feria, go here: http://www.mexicoartshow.com/

To Cee more flowers, go here: http://ceenphotography.com/2015/09/30/flower-of-the-day-september-30-2015-dahlia/