Act Locally
Art Historian Selma Holo examines the activism of the artists and museums of Oaxaca
By Katherine Yungmee Kim
March 2005
The state of Oaxaca always had an identity separate from the rest of
Mexico’s. Even though it was considered the heart of
mexicanidad—“Mexicanness”—Oaxaca and its strong cultural life of
museums, cultural centers, archaeological sites and artisanry thrived
no matter what political forces were shaping the nation, says USC
College art history professor Selma Holo.
Holo’s latest book, Oaxaca at the Crossroads, Managing Memory,
Negotiating Change, examines how the southern state conscientiously
shaped its cultural memory in the arts, from the contemporary and the
colonial, to the urban and archaeological.
“The private activism of the artists, artisans and private businesses
came together and made a change in Oaxaca which, on the scale that it
energized the community, hadn’t been seen before,” Holo explains. “I
thought it was really worth memorializing and critiquing.”
In 1994, Holo spent a year as a Fulbright senior researcher in Spain,
intending to spend more time on her area of expertise, the Spanish
artists Goya, Picasso and Ribera. Instead, she found herself interested
in the nation’s transition from a dictatorship to a democracy and its
effect on museums. Her book, Beyond the Prado, was an examination of
how museums colored the nation’s sense of self.
It also reflected Holo’s shift from her study of art history towards
the study of museology—the study of museums themselves and their impact
on our cultures. In 2000, she was in Oaxaca when Vicente Fox defeated
the long-entrenched Institutionalized Revolutionary Party (PRI).
“I was curious to see if it was going to be the same thing as Spain,” she says. “But it wasn’t.”
The Mexican government already understood that it could strengthen its
position in the world and its political position at home through
supporting arts and culture. “They put a lot of money into the arts,”
Holo explains. “I was knocked out by the museums there and I wanted to
know what was happening to them as things were changing.”
Oaxaca, in particular, seemed to be able to express itself through the
arts. Holo attributes this to the resoluteness of the Oaxacan people.
“You had individual artists like Francisco Toledo,” Holo cites. The
Zapotec Mestizo-Indian artist was a leader and political activist in
his home state, where he created museums, libraries, gardens and a
cinemathéque. In 2000, McDonald’s tried to open a restaurant in the
Zócalo, the historical central plaza in Oaxaca City, a place
traditionally full of locals and tourists enjoying oaxaqueno and basque
cuisines.
A group of artists, led by Toledo, arranged for a tamaliza in the
plaza, a tamale supper with homemade tortillas and fresh fruit juices,
to remind people of what they had to preserve. “Many artists were
determined to keep the new arches out of view of the venerable old
arches that mark the sacredness of the space,” Holo writes.
The artists prevailed in their small triumph over globalization.
“Oaxaca’s efforts in the realm of culture are an inspiration,” Holo
concludes. “Its efforts have touched on many of the issues that concern
any contemporary region wrestling with the power of the arts to
positively influence and enhance its increasingly globalized
communities as they struggle to participate in the world at large while
preserving intact their local souls.”
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