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Sculpture Tatewarí Memuuya
Artist: Uxayucauye
Uxayucauye (The principal elder of Tuapuri community)
Photo and movie by Paco Link
View this Quicktime sculpture movie
In a long term project initially funded by Cultural Survival of Harvard in 1979, Juan Negrín engaged a trio of shamans in a project to create sacred representations of their ancestors. They reproduced the ones they had seen in the shrines, in the caves and the sacred peaks to which their pilgrimages were guiding him. The standing pieces are called memuú or memuute (plural), and frequently some of their features are anthropomorphic. They are usually accompanied by a round spherical stone, sculpted on all sides, called a tepari, (teparite plural). The project is a vast array of iconographic detail that involves over 100 pieces, most of which were sculpted by the shamans Yauxali and Matsuwa Taisán de la Cruz, brothers from the community of San Sebastián Teponohuastlán, Wautüa. Only partial explanations of the motifs will be posted at this time. They do not include the accompanying paraphernalia of corresponding arrows, urute, gourd-bowls, xucurite and the round yarn paintings that correspond to their cheeks, eyes or faces, called nierikate.
Sculpture Tatewarí Memuuya
Artist: Uxayucauye
Uxayucauye (The principal elder of Tuapuri community)
Photo and movie by Paco Link
View this Quicktime sculpture movie
In a long term project initially funded by Cultural Survival of Harvard in 1979, Juan Negrín engaged a trio of shamans in a project to create sacred representations of their ancestors. They reproduced the ones they had seen in the shrines, in the caves and the sacred peaks to which their pilgrimages were guiding him. The standing pieces are called memuú or memuute (plural), and frequently some of their features are anthropomorphic. They are usually accompanied by a round spherical stone, sculpted on all sides, called a tepari, (teparite plural). The project is a vast array of iconographic detail that involves over 100 pieces, most of which were sculpted by the shamans Yauxali and Matsuwa Taisán de la Cruz, brothers from the community of San Sebastián Teponohuastlán, Wautüa. Only partial explanations of the motifs will be posted at this time. They do not include the accompanying paraphernalia of corresponding arrows, urute, gourd-bowls, xucurite and the round yarn paintings that correspond to their cheeks, eyes or faces, called nierikate.
