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Ritmo de Fuego/ Rhythm of Fire
The Coppersmithing Art & Artisans of Santa Clara del Cobre, Michoacán, Mexico

JUST PUBLISHED!

A project of the heart, Ritmo de Fuego/ Rhythm of Fire is a book which documents and augments a traveling exhibition of the same name. The book forms a historical and human portrait of the unique coppersmithing community, el pueblo of Santa Clara del Cobre. Addressing essential questions about the transformation and endurance of culture this book is homage to the Santa Clara community, the countless project contributors and collaborators, and all Michoacános living in Mexico and in the USA.
Ritmo de Fuego Book Cover

597 pages, 500+ full-color photographs
hard cover book
ISBN: 0-9741171-0-2
Text is in Spanish and English
price: $80.00

[ To purchase using check or money order please email a request: support@cuentosfoundation.org ]

Marion Oettinger, Director of the San Antonio Museum of Art writes that Ritmo del Fuego "..is a true tour d'force and should become the standard to which future research on Mexican craft must refer..."

BOOK SUMMARY:

This book has grown from seven years of collaborative work devoted to the Ritmo del Fuego project—essentially a project del corazón (of the heart). An interdisciplinary team of artisans, community members, and scholars has created an ongoing bi-national exchange to explore and document Santa Clara today, the relationship of its past to its present and to its future. In an effort to see the whole picture, a necklace of distinct perspectives has been strung together to examine its coppersmithing history, regional connections, calendar of festivals, and the stories, aspirations, and traditions of its artisans.

Santa Clara del Cobre, (also named Villa Escalante) is a mestizo, Spanish-speaking community of artisans located in the western central highlands of Michoacán, a region renowned for its metal-smithing mastery originating with its indigenous peoples as far back as 600 A.D. The material (copper) and process mark and record the complicated navigation of this region’s culture as it resiliently transforms through time.

Today the artisans of Santa Clara del Cobre synthesize pre-Columbian, Colonial, and modern-day methods to create hammered copper vessels whose physicality is transformed into symmetrically balanced forms of expressive tension and a poised sensuality. The community’s struggle, their history, their challenges, and their accomplishments speak about a process (of cultural transformation, migration, and exchange) taking place all over the world.

FROM THE BOOK JACKET :

Ritmo del Fuego / Rhythm of Fire is a unique achievement, telling the story of the deep-seated copperworking tradition of Santa Clara del Cobre, an ancient community in the forested mountains of Michoacán, Mexico. What is often seen as “folk art” is shown to stem from early workshops established in Michoacán during the 8th-9th centuries AD, by coastal traders and artisans from the Andean Region of South America. Since then, the manufactures have included utilitarian and ornamental objects. Many have been recovered at archaeological sites, most notably from the 15th century Tarascan Kingdom. Others embrace forms of Spanish origin after the 16th century conquest. Today in the expanding international market, Santa Clara copperwares include a wide range of sophisticated decorative vases, pitchers, trays, dinner wares and related forms. A vital community has evolved with this ongoing tradition, portrayed with affection and care by the project organizer Michele Feder-Nadoff, and the many other authors in this remarkable, well written contribution to the cultural history of the Americas.

Richard F. Townsend
Curator
Department of African and Amerindian Art
The Art Institute of Chicago


ART is memory . ART builds bridges . ART is meaning . ART makes sense
 
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