Volver, cats and retablos

Volver

Our cat Volver and friends

A Gemini like my son, on June 6, our cat Volver will be 2 years old. A stray, when he was just a tiny little kitten, Volver would come to our veranda every day and, maybe because we fed him, decided to adopt us.  His name, Volver, comes from the song VOLVER VOLVER.– he just had to come back.

Unlike Mr. Wolf, I’d never had a cat before (although I’ve had 2 important dogs in my life: Hero and Nala). That’s why I couldn’t understand Catmania. But now, because of Volver, I can.

gatos-amigos

“Thanks to the Virgin of Guadalupe the two cats stopped fighting and became friends once again”

I found the above retablo on a Russian site FULL of cat related retablos: Демоны, Святые и коты.  If you like cats, you will love this.

I know that cats were well respected in Ancient Egypt but thought it was because the cats ate the rats that ate the food. However, it seems their popularity was due to the goddess Bastet cult.  That’s why so many cat amulets were made.

Louvre_egyptologie

a mummified cat via

Cat cemetaries with mummified cats were abundant in Ancient Egypt.  But  not because they were loved house pets.  Cats were bred specifically  to be buried: these practices seem to have been encouraged by Egyptian rulers for economic reasons. The ‘sacred animal industry’, supplied considerable employment and also provided tax income to the Pharaohs.

foto of Volver by Chiara Pilar

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Infinitas Gracias …more retablos

Today I just can’t get enough RETABLOS!

And, in edition to the article reblogged (below), here are a couple of other iteresting article:  Art and the Spiritual Realm – Background Part 1 + Votive Offerings +

cliffdean's avatarBirding Walks in RXland

Just up the road from the British Museum. there’s a moving exhibition at the Wellcome Institute of Mexican ex-votos. These are mostly hand-painted tin panels given in thanks for the intercession of saints when called upon in cases of extreme jeopardy from accident, sickness or crime.

In mid-fall from a building, a workman would cry out to S Anthony and would survive with minor injuries. A wife would pray fervently from her sick-bed to the Virgin, a family from their drowning car, a mill-hand as his arm was caught in pre H&S machinery.

The retablos are naive, sincere images expressing the gratitude of ordinary people for the blessings bestowed upon them, but their quaint simplicity distances them from our cosy, secure lives.

In an adjoining room is a wall reconstructed from more recent ex-votos harvested from the walls of a church. These are letters – hand-written or typed – drawings…

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Ex Voto Retablos

Back to Frida via back to RETABLOS:

see also this related post:  The term “ex voto” is translated as “my vow.”  The form represents a vow of acknowledgment and testimony for the granting of a miracle of divine intervention.  Typically these tributes were created and gifted to the community church after a turning-point episode in the life of a community member – whether it be recovering from typhoid fever (as is the case in the first ex voto below) or surviving a robbery at gunpoint as is depicted in another of the images below.    + Mexican Retablos + Retablos: ex-votos y santos + La Guadalupana + retablos, Museo de la basilica de Guadalupe, Mexico + another retablo related post

CARDBOARD RETABLOS

 

Michelle Molyneux's avatarCONTENT

In modern philosophical theory, an acknowledgment of power beyond human understanding is largely absent. Ex Votos however are votive offerings of gratitude for a vow or prayer fulfilled. Votive offerings are given before prayer fulfillment as appeasement or veneration. Depicted are life-threatening or catastrophic experiences and a subject(s). Votive offerings are ubiquitous, these examples are from Mexico and Spain. For more information see: Everyday Miracles.


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Ancient weavings and Chancay dolls

Chancay dolls! Chancay dolls are named after the Chancay culture of Peru AD 1000 – 1476

 

 

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Hillary Steel on the Endangered Mexican Rebozo

REBOZOS REBOZOS REBOZOS REBOZOS

hillarysteel's avatarR. John Howe: Textiles and Text

On February 9, 2013,

HillaryHerOwnImage

Hillary Steel presented a Rug and Textile Appreciation Morning program on the Mexican Rebozo, a traditional Mexican shawl, woven in warp faced,  resist-dye ikat, that is in danger of disappearing. 

Hillary Steel is a handweaver. Her work has been featured locally in solo exhibitions at Glenview Mansion Art Gallery, Rockville, Maryland (2011, 2002, 1999) and in numerous group exhibitions in such venues as the Blackrock Center for the Arts ( 2013),  Artists’ Museum, Washington, D.C. (2003), and Snyderman/Works Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania since 2000. Her work is also held by several public collections including that of the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C. and in our embassies abroad through the US State Departments “Art in Embassies Program”. 

Hillary is involved with cultural preservation efforts with regard to Mexican rebozo weaving, the subject of her presentation here. More of Hillary’s work can be seen on her…

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