"Cover Me With Your Rebozo" - Museum of Popular Culture

A funny thing happened to this post on its way to publication. I thought I knew what I was writing about. A year ago, I published a post about rebozos. For months, Rebozos in Michoacán and Elsewhere has been among Jenny's Top Five All-Time Most-Viewed Posts.

So when the Museum of Popular Cultures in Coyoacán announced a rebozo exhibit titled "Cover Me With Your Rebozo", I was one of the first in line.

Rebozo from Exhibit "Cover Me With Your Rebozo" at the
National Museum of Popular Culture, Coyoacán (Mexico City)
Photo: Reed (Click to Enlarge)

The rebozo is a typical Mexican garment worn like a shawl. It is described poetically as the cradle that lulls, the jacket that covers, the shade that refreshes, the garment that crowns, the elegance that distinguishes. As an ongoing tradition in all parts of the country, it is regarded as a national symbol.

Gregorio de Gante's poem titled,"Ode to the Rebozo" makes explicit the symbolic value of the rebozo. The introduction to the exhibit quoted two stanzas from the poem. Curiosity piqued, I found the poem on the Internet. And that's where the post fell off the rails of this blogger's best intentions and editorial control. (See my translation, Poem: "Ode to the Rebozo")

Poem's Historical Context

The poem is beautiful; its imagery vivid. References to the rebozo's role in the life cycle of rural Mexicans resonated so strongly with my experiences in Pátzcuaro that I decided to translate the poem into English. But translation brought me up against references so distinctly Mexican that I considered omitting some stanzas. Fortunately, my inner self cautioned, "Not so fast, Jenny." I turned to my good friend and teacher of Spanish for help (CELEP).

The more I learned, the more I came to understand the poem's complexity and relevance. Not for the first time, my attempt to understand a seemingly isolated piece of the complex fabric called "the culture" of Mexico, seems to lead straight into the complexity that is Mexico's multi-layered cultural whole.

A light bulb went on as I read a biography of the poet Gregorio de Gante. Why was I not surprised to learn that Gante was born in 1890, which means he was twenty years old in 1910 when the Mexican Revolution broke out?

The poem's references are not only to the Mexican Revolution, which Gante and his brothers joined, fighting in the Revolutionary Forces under General Antonio Medina, but also to the War for Independence from Spain, which had taken place a hundred years earlier.

Brief History of Mexico | Setting the stage

I recall that Mexico's War for Independence (1810-1821) was begun by criollos (Spanish born in Mexico) rebelling against their lack of political rights and hence their exclusion from political power. Intent on maintaining control, the Spanish Crown permitted only peninsulares (Spanish born in Spain) to hold office. Once gained, however, Independence simply set off a hundred years of civil strife inside Mexico.

Conservatives favored establishment of a monarchy; Liberals favored populist, representative government. These forces struggled to gain control over the fledgling country that lacked practical experience in self-governance, including basic notions of compromise and rule of law.

The election of Porfirio Díaz in 1876 brought some stability to the country, but at a steep price. Once in office, Díaz held onto the presidency for thirty-four years (1876-1911), a period of dictatorship known as the Porfiriato. Primarily by encouraging foreign investment, Díaz not only achieved internal stability, but fostered modernization and economic growth. Economic progress, however, was achieved through violent repression and exclusion of most Mexicans from economic opportunity and power—injustices that triggered the Mexican Revolution, which broke out in 1910.

The Mexican Revolution (1910-1917) was not a coherent political movement under a unified leadership. Rather, it was another bitter fight between the landed elites and the masses in an ongoing political dynamic that continued to pit Conservatives (landed elites in favor of strong central government) against Liberals (populists in favor of representative government).

Nurturing Mexican Nationalism | Enter the rebozo

When the fighting wound down in 1917 and the dust finally settled in 1920 with the election of Álvaro Obregón as president, the landed elites had more or less prevailed over the populist forces. But if the government was intentional about subduing popular revolutionary leaders like Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa, it was equally intentional about fostering a sense of Mexican nationalism to support the nation's newly approved Constitution (1917).

To support its nationalist goal, the government drew on the traditional values of Mexico's indigenous peoples and actively supported the arts and artists. Literature, poetry, music, dance, photography and painting—all received government support. The common denominator in the theme of this cultural work was the Mexican Revolution, whose anniversary is celebrated annually on November 20.

Government support fostered the internationally recognized Mexican Mural Movement. The "Great Three" Mexican Muralists—Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco and David Siqueiros—embraced the twin themes of indigenous values and the Mexican Revolution. In doing so, they created a mythology around the Mexican Revolution and Mexico's indigenous people. It is a mythology that remains strong in the imagination of Mexico's people to this day.

Silent films made from 1917-1920—years recognized as being a significant precursor to the famed Golden Age of Mexican Film (1935-1959)—provided valuable documentaries of key events in the Mexican Revolution. When 'talkies' arrived, the key themes were explored in various ways, often by means of tragic love stories pairing los de abajo (those from below, indigenous peoples) with los de arriba (those from above, the ruling elite).

Mariano Azuela, a physician during the Mexican Revolution, wrote a collection of short stories titled Los de abajo (Those from Below), that have become classics...as have the short stories of Juan Rulfo titled El llano en llamas (The Plains in Flames).

Regional bands playing traditional Mexican songs and traditional dances are an integral part of this national project; the world-famous Ballet Foklórico of Mexico, for example, was founded in 1952.

This, then, sets the stage for Gante's poem and for the rebozo exhibit. My translation and notes are available on Jenny's Page "Ode to the Rebozo".

"Cover Me With Your Rebozo"

The title of the exhibit at the Museum of Popular Cultures speaks to the rebozo as a transcendent national symbol that 'covers' all Mexicans: certainly, los de abajo (those from below) but los de arriba (those from above) as well.

The rebozos in the exhibit (shown below) are winners of a national competition.

Exhibit Photographs: Reed.
Click to Enlarge.

Regional Rebozos

Crafting a rebozo is a time-consuming, fifteen-step process that moves from spinning, winding, twisting and dyeing the thread, to weaving and pressing the finished product.

Given all these steps, each rebozo takes from 30-90 days to complete, depending on the complexity of the design. Both men and women weave rebozos, but the rapacejo or tejido en las puntas ['knitting on the stitches' to create the fringes], is an art practiced only by women who, with their fine finger dexterity and skill, create figures ranging from 'grecas' [traditional geometric patterns] to stars and legendary figures.

Rebozos may be of cotton, wool, silk, raw silk, or artisela. Artisela is a synthetic silk whose cellulose is made from wood fiber. Artisela, or Chardonnay silk, was invented in 1886 in France by Count Hilario of Chardonnay. Artisela was shown for the first time in Paris in 1889. Less expensive and easier to obtain than silk, artisela is often substituted for silk, which is an increasingly expensive raw material. Because of the cost, traditional silk rebozos are today generally made to order and affordable only by the wealthy few.

Rebozos are made in several states of Mexico. Each state's rebozos are identifiable by style, form and colors. The most highly recognizable rebozos come from:

• Tenancingo, State of Mexico;
• Silk rebozos, Santa María del Río, San Luis Potosí [see videos, below];
• Los palomos, Uriangato, Guanajuato [see video, below];
• Raw silk rebozos from the Cajonos region of Oaxaca [The opening 15-second segment of this UTube video is delivered in an indigenous language, but the excellent images of manual processes speak for themselves];
• Gasa (chiffon or crepe) rebozos from the Sierra Norte of Puebla; 
• Rebozos from Piedad and Aranza in Michoacán [see video, below].

Still Curious?

"Tápame con el rebozo": Recent Exhibit at Museo de Culturas Populares in Coyocán (Mexico City); also article from Milenio newspaper (in Spanish).

Piropos al Rebozo de Gregorio de Gante (Spanish original).

Casa de las Artesanías, Santa María del Río, San Luis Potosí:

• Rebozo Designs and Colors;
• Six Remarkable Ways to Wear a Rebozo.

Elsa Castillo Gallery, seda (silk) and artisela (synthetic silk made from wood fibers) rebozos from Santa María del Río, San Luis Potosí.

History of the Rebozo (Uriangato, Guanajuato): UTube video features old photographs and segments that show the spinning of thread and weavers at looms weaving rebozos.

Sociedad Cooperativa de Piedad, Michoacán (English); web site provides useful description of the process for making rebozos, including definition of key terms.

Related Jenny's posts:

• Poem: "Ode to the Rebozo" (my translation);
• Rebozos in Michoacán and Elsewhere;
• A Short History of Mexico;
• Diego Rivera: Artist for Mexico's People.