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| TEPOSCOLULA, OAXACA (10/94) |
High up in the Oaxaca mountains, the church of Saints Peter and Paul at Teposcolula was built circa 1541 by the Dominican Order to serve the evangelization of the region's Mixtec indians.
Outdoor altars are ubiquitous throughout central and southern Mexico because the Indians thought it absurd to worship dieties anywhere but under the celestial dome of the cosmos.
At the time this capilla abierta was built, the devastating plagues of 1576 had not yet hit the region and the size of the precinct points to the throngs that must have there assembled.
In 1541, the repressions of the Counter Reformation had also not reached Mexico and the evangelizing Dominicans and Franciscans were much more open to synchretic accommodations. One is left to imagine the melange of rennaisance ritual and Mixtec celbratory practices that must have resonated in the space.
The attached Youtube clip is from the much ruder, present day south in Chiapas, but it provides a spring board for historical imagination.
These pictures were taken in 1994 when the precincts were in a state of pronounced decay. My cousin Armando was instrumental in securing a grant for the preservation of the outdoor chapel which has since been restored with a full cupola. The stunning and guilded rennaisance gothic interior has also been refurbished. Although one can hardly complain of restoration, to my eyes the delapidation had its own poetic grandeur some part of which I hope my doggie lenses have captured.
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