Guadalajara was founded by the Spanish in the 1540's. At its core, Guadalajara is a colonial city. At the center is a cathedral surrounded by four plazas, one on each side. The whole is a grand space, created by a self-confident, world-conquering, world-creating Spanish empire. Some colonial buildings remain along the sides of the plaza squares.
Today, however, modern Guadalajara and surrounding municipalities make up Mexico's second largest urban center, inhabited by over four million people. The modern city has almost overwhelmed the colonial core, creating a conflicting experience. The spaciousness, solidity and balance of the colonial structures communicate security, calm, a sense of serenity. Some of the modern buildings try to reflect this solidity, but seem unimaginative and sterile. The rest are a hodge-podge of utilitarian commercial structures -- stores, offices, hotels. Many look tired and worn. Apparently, as with many US cities, life in Guadalajara has moved to the "suburbs."
Today, however, modern Guadalajara and surrounding municipalities make up Mexico's second largest urban center, inhabited by over four million people. The modern city has almost overwhelmed the colonial core, creating a conflicting experience. The spaciousness, solidity and balance of the colonial structures communicate security, calm, a sense of serenity. Some of the modern buildings try to reflect this solidity, but seem unimaginative and sterile. The rest are a hodge-podge of utilitarian commercial structures -- stores, offices, hotels. Many look tired and worn. Apparently, as with many US cities, life in Guadalajara has moved to the "suburbs."
Nevertheless, Jane and I found within this center, in some of the suburbs and in the countryside beyond, a series of wonderful manifestations of the eternal human creative dynamic. This dynamic always involves a tension between energy and order, structure and movement, permanence and change.
Classic Dance and Traditional Music in a Classic Setting
Our first experience of the dynamic of energy and order took place on our first night, at the Teatro Degollado (Dey-go-YAH-tho), a neo-classic temple to the arts, built in the 1860's, that faces the Cathedral across the largest of the plazas.
Our first experience of the dynamic of energy and order took place on our first night, at the Teatro Degollado (Dey-go-YAH-tho), a neo-classic temple to the arts, built in the 1860's, that faces the Cathedral across the largest of the plazas.
Entering through the grand portico of Greek columns, we walked into an equally Grand Lobby, then on into a classically European theater that is all sumptuous red and gold. Four balconies rise up to a mural-covered ceiling.
In this wonderful, traditional but lively space, we experienced an equally wonderful, enthusiastic performance of the very traditional ballet, Coppelia, performed by the energetic and traditionally well-trained students of the Ballet School of the Instituto de Cultura de Jalisco. Principal parts and major variations were danced by members of the Companía de Danza Classica de Jalisco, the professional company of Guadaljara. So ballet, in all its traditionally shaped and maintained vitality, is alive and well in Guadalajara...in a beautiful setting.
On our second night, we returned to the Teatro to hear a concert by the Jalisco Phiharmonic. Billed as a 'fusion concert', it featured the professional orchestra playing with a norteño ('northern') group, a Mexican musical style that combines guitars, a harp, an accordian and singing. The program was all traditional popular Mexican music, kind of a Boston Pops concert played, sung and enjoyed with alegría, soul-satisfying joy by performers and audience.
When the concert ended, the Mexican family sitting in front of us, in the first balcony, turned and asked us if we enjoyed it. We replied, "¡Nos encanta¡" "It enchants us." The father of the family then told us that his son was one of the performers--he was the chiflado, who whistled an entire song.
But it was not whistling. It sounded like a bird singing, almost like a flute. He produced the sound somewhere deep in his throat. At one point, the orchestra and guitarists who had been accompanying him fell silent. Putting aside the microphone, he filled the theater with his birdsong. The entire theater fell absolutely silent, we held our collective breath as we listened to this miraculous sound. When he finished his song, the audience, us included, went absolutely wild.
The father described this as his son's don, his god-given talent. The father and the family thanked us profusely for enjoying their Mexican music. They shook our hands vigorously several times. Our thought was that Mexicans so often expect estadounidenses (USer's) to look down on their culture, that this family was expressing their gratitude that we valued what they had to give and had shared in it with alegría . We seemed to be the only gueritos, "pale-skins" in the audience.
Sanctuary for a Meditation on Violence
Our next experience of the dynamic tension of order and energy, structure and movement, permanence and change came with our visit to Las Cabañas. Built in 1810, just before the Mexican War of Independence, Las Cabañas was thus constructed at the tail end of the Spanish colonial era.
Constructed as a hogar or home for orphans and widows, today Las Cabañas is a state cultural center and musuem. It is in neo-classical, i.e., Romanesque revival, style, looking on the outside like a Roman temple. It is huge, with 106 rooms and 23 patios!
Colonial architecture creates an experience of serenity. It does so through a quiet, ordered rhythm of balanced proportions, repetition of simple elements and movement through alternating closed and open spaces. In its interior, Las Cabañas embodies the essence of this architectural style with neo-classical refinement. It is serene.
At the core of Las Cabañas is a chapel, a Romanesque sanctuary. In the 1930's, José Orozco, one of Mexico's leading muralists, was commissioned to paint murals on the walls and ceiling of this chapel to depict Mexico's turbulent history.
Framed in the stone vaulting of the chapel, the murals are stark and explosive in their energy, all in shades of gray, punctuated by blood red. It is difficult to imagine a more arresting contrast of serene order and violent chaos.
Finding the Center of the World: Guachimontones
On Saturday, the Fourth of July, we traveled by taxi west of Guadalajara to a Mesoamerican archeological site known as Guachimontones, 'the homeless mounds' as they have been dubbed by the locals. Excavated only in the last decade, the mounds are the remains of a society dating from between 300 B.C. to 300 A.D. They sit on a hill overlooking a huge valley.
In Mesoamerican civilization, as in Chinese and other primary civilizations, locating the center of one's world in relation to the four cardinal directions was crucial. This "axis mundi" established one's spiritual, psychological and physical orientation and, hence, sense of order and place in the world.
At this center one met one's gods and, thus, one's own identity. The center grounds the human world in the midst of the forces of the natural world and the cosmos. This is a theme that recurs time and again in the Mesoamerican Cosmovision.
At this center one met one's gods and, thus, one's own identity. The center grounds the human world in the midst of the forces of the natural world and the cosmos. This is a theme that recurs time and again in the Mesoamerican Cosmovision.
Guachimontones' organization is unique in the Americas and in the world. Centered around circular 'pyramids' that marked and maintained the center of the world for this culture, the site is relatively small and simple. But as one walks around and within its circles, the very size and simplicity of the space enables one to experience the fundamental dynamic of creating a centered, bounded and thus coherent communal space very much at rest in the midst of a vast natural one.
The Creation of Miniature Worlds: Artesanias of Tlaquepaque
Tlaquepaque (Tlah-kay-PAH-kay) is a city contiguous with Guadalajara known for its artesanías, i.e., crafts, especially pottery. We traveled there on Sunday. The many grand colonial houses of Tlaquepaque originally belonged to the Spanish ruling class. Now they are occupied by stores selling fine artesanias, upscale restaurants and museums.
We visited the Museo Regional de la Cerámica featuring displays of many styles of pottery. What struck us was how images of nature dominated the decoration. Here the energy of nature was transformed into miniature worlds of art by the creative organization of the artist.
¡Gracias, Guadalajara!
So, in three days we found in this huge, fragmented, worn but renewing city wonderful experiences of the creative tension in human life between energy and order, stability and movement, permanence and change. ¡Gracias, Guadalajara!
Still Curious?
Here's the link to Reed's Photo Album of Las Cabañas: http://jreedbrun.xanga.com/
Still Curious?
Here's the link to Reed's Photo Album of Las Cabañas: http://jreedbrun.xanga.com/
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