San
Cristóbal de las Christmas (part 2)
“The
Revenge of Don Juan”
The time ticked slowly on as I sat
alone silently sipping my mezcal and munching my borderline burnt
baguette. Now that all the work was done, I felt slightly lost. Was
I happy, relieved, nervous? I remembered the exact same feelings
from our first show at the Undercurrents – was it enough
promotion?, there´s loads of things on this weekend, are the bands
gonna show up? (classic one). I looked around the room for the
hundredth time to make sure the images hadn´t fallen down and the
dodgy double sided tape (no blu-tak in Mexico) was doing it
double-sided mission of both sticking to the wall and my highly
valued - but still pretty cheap in Stoke Newington if you supply
your own watercolour paper - portfolio prints that were definitely
NOT for sale. What was for sale however was more crazy hats (which I
managed to sell four of as I was waiting for 200 pesos each). I also
had my drawing cards I use in London for donation or exchange.
The exhibition itself was a varied
show. I had my favourite drawing and photos of murals completed in
the years before at festivals etc, featuring also the body art work I
do with Happy slap Boutique at Boomtown Fair Festival. As well as
this was some of the works from Tulum and the solitary months in the
Caribbean to try and expose a contrast between the London inspired
themes and works before I knew of places as beautiful as Mexico,
crossed with the work done here away from that world. The difference
I could now see was that clear in the older pieces yet not from new
stuff was I focussed more on subject matter and trying to prove a
point with the work, less attention to graphic detail but more on
impact and surrealism. The topics, which always carried some weight
back home when hung here heralded the tone of a deathbed repenter,
trying to scream at the world rather than exhibit inside it. The work
completed here I noticed for the first time carried a more
inquisitive nature, more attention the construct of the piece and
playful, seemingly made by someone humbled and in awe of life rather
than trying to mess with it. After some serious chin-stroking I
suddenly had no time to ponder this as suddenly, magically, crowds
started rolling in to the venue, scarfs pulled over red noses and
peering into the gallery space
Relief is my favourite human
emotion. Love is pretty good of course, and hope etc, but pure, raw,
un-cut, RELIEF really hits the spot for me. Probably because I am
such a stress-head. I felt this miraculous emotion in all its
soothing sexiness as I saw the jolly groups of people who´d chosen
to come down and check out the weird güerro´s art show and
adjoining live music which turned out to be one of the most popular
acts in San Cristóbal de las Casas – phew…
I got to work on the Live Art and
socially explaining the pieces as best as I could as my Spanish was
still pretty bad. My translated explanation of the Minesweeper
project however was gaining attention and was causing those who read
it to look closer at the work and pull friends over to see also.
Everything was rolling. For a bit or variety I wanted to do a
free-style live art piece, without much subject matter but more as
some fun for the crowds around me. Anyone who spoke to me I asked to
give me something to draw into the piece and with ideas ranging from
an old tree to a superhero who does not know why he is a superhero
with no superpowers, the piece had the desired effect and created
many nice talking points. A beaming smile was hanging from ear to ear
as I knew already it was a turning out to be a success. My first
foreign solo show. Good vibes, and it still had more days to run!
Another collective was invited for
the night and was running a stall at the front of the venue with
stickers, screen-printed books and posters all on donation. I liked
them immediately, really nice crew called Tapatista from Guadalajara
in the middle of the country. Their work was political and shared the
same DIY dynamic as Minesweeper – they ran a self organized social
centre in their city where they lived, worked and printed as well as
organizing local events for the community. After chatting a bit I
learnt that they have an event coming up, the second installment of
ZINFUTURO a DIY , auto-prodiction festival in the same vein as Crack!
Festival in Rome. They invited me to come and show my work and print
at one of the studios nearby . I accepted.
The music had started and the party
was going full on in the other room, live dubstep and reggae-hophop
styles from Macka B da local Mc with da dreads down to his knee.
Turntablism too and a really great female vocalist but I can remember
her name… The crowd were cool to full of boozed-up Christmas cheer
and I was happy to see lots of locals there too not only travelers.
That’s what I like about this venue, due to its political and
socially minded events it bridges the gap which was always quite
apparent to me between tourist/traveler/eurohobo and the local
communities who lived in these beautiful places. I was dancing my
arse off, was a wicked set and I could tell the venue were happy also
with how it all went. Was an interesting Boxing day! Was a great
feeling, basically everyone I knew and many of whom id given a flyer
too that I didn’t know before were there, and all the effort felt
100% worth it. After this point in the evening I can´t remember too
much more of what happened in any real detail as there was a lot of
mescal flying around but all went really nicely, I think we went to
an afterparty but I might be confusing that with new year… What´s
important however remains – the show was a triumph and the venue
were happy to continue. Yes mate.
The days after were very pleasant,
dipping in and out of the venue to say high and straighten things etc
and wander around in the post-Chirstmas-pre-New Year bubble of alpine
Chiapas. I felt like doing some new things. I had heard about a
shaman called Don Juan who lived in the surrounding mountains and had
Temazcal ceremonies (and others) on his land. Now I had heard a few
things about this man before, a friend of mine saying he had seen him
make rain stop by throwing his coat at the clouds and another telling
me he was also a black belt in Kung Fu. Intrigued, I decided to
mission up to the land on New Years eve with some guys I had met in
town who were from the notorious northern bordertown of Juarez (one
living in Juarez, studying in El Paso USA). The more experienced of
the two claimed that this shaman had changed his life and he was now
his disciple, the other had never done this before either so I
decided to stick with him as we approached the land. The idea of a
temazcal is this. You and many other people cram inside a hand-made
mayan sauna and through the intensity of the hot coals, really load
chanting and expression of inner feelings ( as well as some
un-described “medicine” that gets burnt on the coals) your
spirit, mind and body are completely cleansed – Just in time for
New Year! ¿Sounds great, No?
After an hour or so of walking we
arrived at the compound and a small group was already there chanting
and collecting firewood. The lad was beautiful looking over the town
and the rugged beauty of the mountains all around made me feel very
happy to be there. There were huge stones in the middle of the pit
and the well-crafted flames engulfed them turning them red hot. The
structure of a small hut was standing close to us and I helped
everyone cover it this with multiple layers of very thick fabric. A
truck approached down the hill and everyone around became hushed and
excited. It was him. I was imagining some kind of priest -like figure
with a pet eagle or something like that but he was actually just
quite normal looking. A small man with a big ranch hat and boots
climbed out and approached us. He definitely had a presence though
I´ll say that. He walked over, blessed the fire and started talking
about a large rock as if it was a large turtle - I suppose it did
kind of look like a turtle. I didn’t quite understand but everyone
else seemed to smiling, but after he blessed us all and the place in
general he went away to my disappointment. I asked myself why, but I
guess I just wanted to see some magic deep down but I was left with a
very clam and controlled feeling over me as we all stripped down to
our underpants and crawled inside the hut.
What followed was
really, really intense. I imagine most saunas have limits on how hot
they are are but even after about 5-10 minutes after introductions
were made this grew to be so stiflingly hot that I thought my skin
was melting and my finger nails curling and burning off my finger
tips. With the chanting, talking (which to be honest I could really
understand which didn’t help much) and whatever it was burning on
the coals the whole time (my diagnosis: salvia) my mind in the pitch
black started going into some very strange places to escape the heat.
I had the strange sensation I was switching dimentions in order to
get myself into a more powerful position to handle the environment I
was in, but in a fashion a bit like a pre-teen girl skateboarding for
the first time. When it came to my turn to speak I sweatily babbled
something along the lines of “thank you for accepting me inside
this mountain and I have no problems but some questions with the life
today” and started chanting, curling in a ball and kneeling upwards
to try and gain cool air that was not there – this lasted a VERY
long 2 hours, with the door occationally being opened so more coals
could be brought in, in case we ran out. By the last half an hour, I
had accepted in my delirium that I was probably about to die here in
this sweat lodge and that there is no way at all my foreign system
will ever recover from this ordeal and the burns inside my nostrils
and eyelids would ever heal back to the way they were. Everyone
around me, young and old were screaming, crying, shouting or praying
in the darkness – I was screaming too, tongue flailing toward the
roof, I couldn’t take anymore! This was it! The end of Joe´s weird
life in an even weirder situation: Sweating to death in a salvia trip
in my boxer shorts!!… But then, miraculously, the door opened and
it was over. I WAS TO LIVE! I crawled out, my eyeballs rolling in my
head still as I neared the fire to cool down. As I stood up felt
faint and nearly fell over. Everyone started hugging each other,
probably elated as I was that they had also survived and we all ate
fruit and dried off). I sniffed the foul liquid that had been sucked
out through every poor pore of my body. It smelled of London, cheap
alcohol, pavement, cigarettes, stress, free parties and boats. I was
a new man! I was high like snowtopped mountains are however so I
could not really figure out what the effects on my reeling mind were
in any kind of long term cleansing sense but I can say I felt really
good to be out of that odd hut… I shook hands and thanked the guys
who invited me there . “We´re going to another one tommorow, man,
4 hours this time! Wanna come?” . “Fuck that!” I replied
beaming and slowly, after saying my goodbyes, I edged slowly down the
mountain and made my way home.
I did learn something else about
temazcal effects first hand though that New Years Eve. It resets you
in a strange way. Also tolerances… Of course, being new year, I did
drink a hell of a lot of Mezcal and partied till the next day – but
strangely my normally resolute body rejected this totally and I was
sick like a dog the next day. Like a REALLY sick dog! My body could
not handle any liquid of any kind, I had a raging fever to the point
I was hallucinating in my bedsheets begging the stars for just one
drop of water to stay in my cursed body for more than 5 minutes!!
This continued for about 5 days, it was really cold too. I went to
see a healer in the town and she asked me about the days previous...
I explained about the temazcal and the heavy duty New Year also and
she looked at me as if I had just poured salt in my coffee. It turns
out that intoxication of any kind after that ordeal is a really bad
idea. She explained you are supposed to rebuild yourself again into a
stronger being than before slowly as you have been brought back to
square one in many senses, otherwise it can have a bad effect on you
(as I experienced…). I wonder if this was what Don Juan was saying
to the turtle rock…
After that wore off I went about my
business as usual, and arranged to have the exhibition extended for
another two weeks which the gallery were happy to do. With this bonus
I quickly jumped into Guatamala with Raf for a 5 days to renew our
Visas and came back safe and sound (bit of a brutal edit there but
yeah was mainly hiking and horse riding, some dickhead stole my coat
but to be fair I did leave it on a chair, Guatamala is really
beautiful though…)
There were other art related events
on too in San Cristóbal on our return and I went to check out what
was happening in a new project slightly apart from town called
´Arteria´. It was a beautiful piece of land with two large house
built onto it divided into two gallery spaces with workshops, live
music, dance and food downstairs served in the beautiful courtyard.
It was a foreign money place and amazingly well spent! The theme was
African dance and abstract artwork but what was really cool was the
carved jade skulls and sculptures on show around the venue. The
project had only been open a very short time and this was one of the
first events, but clearly years of effort had gone in to turning this
place into a real art palace, it had space for stone turning
specifically as well as a huge kitchen and workshops for young people
also. Really beautiful and I left wishing to be able to come down and
see what could be possible in this space another time. But we had
missions to continue: on to Guadalajara! Three days drive away in the
state of Jalisco. The proud home of tequila and the noble blue agave,
as well as the beginning of the barren deserts of the north of
Mexico. I did one last temazcal just to freshen up before I left
(seriously! and stayed sober afterwards for a week! much better) and
after saying our quick but heartfelt goodbyes to this beautiful town
which had been home for 2 very happy months we packed everything into
the trunk of ol´Jetta and got the funk out of there…
To be continued…
