Museo Soumaya

Some basic facts about Museo Soumaya: It's a private museum owned by the Carlos Slim Foundation and houses the numerous art, religious items, historical documents and coin collection of Carlos Slim and his late wife Soumaya, whom the museum is named after. In 2011, it opened a new location, which is the one I went to. The building was designed by Mexican architect Fernando Romero, his son in law. There is a large amount of European artwork including pieces from Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet, Henri Matisse,Vincent van Gogh, August Rodin and many others. There is also a nice collection from famous Mexican artists such as Diego Rivera, Rufino Tamayo and David Alfaro Siqueiros.

The art collection itself is impressive and was a pleasure viewing the work from these great artists. The building was quite interesting as well. The shape of it, the material it was made from, it really stands out. I wasn't overly thrilled with how the art was arranged on each floor. I'm sure it was difficult doing that with rounded rooms and the amount of art that was available. Inside the building is a big spiral that goes up. Each floor is leveled off and grouped into a specific genre: the coin collection, European art, Mexican art, religious relics and art, sculpture. When you reached the rooms, you didn't really know which way to start. Since the rooms were round, they had to put wall separaters everywhere to hang the work. It just felt a little choatic, especially with the amount of people that were there (admission is free.) Also, there were fire extinguishers everywhere. They really distracted from the art. I'm sure they had to follow a strict fire code because of the oddly shaped building. (No windows anywhere) A little disappointing but the art was great, the building was fun to photograph and it was free.

Looking at the front

The entrance

Close-up of Soumaya

Entering the museum

There are a couple of sculptures on this floor including Rodin's "The Thinker".

This was how the building was going to look initially. There were some changes made.

Looking down on main floor from the second floor. You can see a small crowd around the Rodin sculpture.

Looking at the second floor gallery before heading up the ramp.

Painting by Claude Monet

Manuscript for Kahlil Gibran's "The Prophet"

The top floor, gallery 6, all sculpture

Salvador Dali sculptures

Another view of the sculpture floor from the back. There's a big skylight in the middle of the ceiling.

A close-up of the outside of the building. Aluminum hexagons cover it.

Different angle

In its entirety



Día de los Muertos is coming up and I'm super excited. People have already started building altars and getting prepared for the holiday. I built an altar myself. Some people celebrate Halloween here too. I'm not exactly sure how they do Halloween for the kiddos but I guess I will find out. Be looking for a blog or two about Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) in the next couple of weeks. Lots of photos!

In the meantime...

Next blog: Basilica de Guadalupe

Xochimilco and the Island of the Dolls

Xochimilco is located in Mexico City south east of the city center. It is known for its water canals that flow throughout this neighborhood. People can rent a gondola like boat, trajineras, and enjoy the beautiful scenery. The boats have long tables on them with chairs. A lot of people will bring food and beverages and have lunch on them.

The trajineras are decorated in bright colors and have different names.

I was with Ariana, her brother Steve, our friend Taryn and Olivia. We rented a boat to go visit the Island of the Dolls. It's more expensive then taking the typical route most people go on but between the four of us it wasn't that bad. It took quite a while to get there, about an hour and a half.

More boats

Ducks

Another boat that was being serenaded by a mariachi band.

Olivia having a blast.

A broken down trajinera.

A pretty flowering water plant.

More photos

At last, we arrive to our destination. It's a pretty creepy place. Nothing like seeing a bunch of rotting dolls strung up in trees and along fences. Some history behind Isla de las Munecas. This small island, chinampa, was inhabited by a man named Don Julian Santana. One day he discovered a young girl who had drowned by the island. He was haunted by her death so when he saw a small doll floating by shortly after discovering the girl he fished it out of the water and hung it up in a tree to please the girl. He had hoped to appease her tortured soul and protect the island from further evil. One doll wasn't enough though. Don Julian continue to fish out doll parts whenever he saw them. When he couldn't find any in the water, he would scour trash piles whenever he made a rare trip to town. Later in his life he would trade his farm raised vegetables and fruit in exchange for dolls. In 2001, Don Julian dropped dead from a heart attack where the young girl was buried. People speculate different reasons why and even how Don Julian died but the people at this place, which is ran by family members, told us he died of a heart attack. The island didn't get much attention while he was living but it has become a popular tourist attraction since then. Visitors will still bring dolls to be strung up.

The entrance of the island.

There was a small museum set up in a shed. This was where we were told about the history of the place. It was creepy sitting there listening to the story while being surrounded by decrepit dolls and cobwebs.

Inside the museum

Close up of doll head

Don Julian Santana, he's holding broccoli in case you're wondering.

Dolls in trees

Part of an overview of the place.

Another overview, you can see Olivia in the bottom right corner. She was scared of this place at first, which was understandable. She warmed up to it though.

Dolls on a fence.

This was where the girl was buried. There is a gravemarker for Don Julian too but I'm not sure if he is actually buried here.

At this point, I tried taking a Polaroid but my camera would not work. Super weird since I hadn't had any problems with it. Click, click, click...nothing. I was so disappointed.

Everyone was pretty ready to leave. I really wasn't but didn't say anything. I could have stayed there all day but it was long boat ride back. I hear this place is even scarier at night.

Your boat is that way.

Ya'll come back now, ya hear?

We get back in the boat and start floating away. I decide to test out my Polaroid camera one last time. Ka-zhoooo...yeah it started working but no film came out. Apparently I had already shot the last of the film pack. The camera said I had more shots but I forgot with this newer Polaroid film (Impossible Film) you have two less shots then the original stuff. Crapola! I did have another pack of film with me and Ariana was saying we could go back but I said no. I felt like it just wasn't meant to be, fate. Plus, this other film I had brought, PX70 Color Shade PUSH!, requires extreme amounts of light. The brighter the better. It wouldn't have turned out anyway. This place was in the shade.

How do I know it wouldn't have worked? Well, just yesterday I visited Museo Estudio Diego Rivera and had taken a Polaroid of the entrance. It was pretty dang sunny but part of the building was slightly shaded, and I mean slightly, and it came out dark and almost indistinguishable. A disappointment to say the least but I went ahead and photographed it anyway. It has kind of an abstract feel to it. Sometimes you just have to roll with the punches. I will blog about that experience soon.

Next blog: Museo Soumaya - art museum

Making Cajeta de Membrillo

Cajeta is a candy that is made from a fruit. The cajeta that was made by Ariana's Abuelito, and help from others, is membrillo, or quince. A quince is related to apples and pears. They are a golden yellow and pear shaped. The process of making this took two days. During the first part of the day, Abuelito and Ariana's Uncle Francisco "Pancho" cut the membrillos in smaller parts and deseeded them. They had two huge bagfuls to do.
Towards the evening, Abuelito set up a tub full of water to boil. He had it sitting on top of a gas flame.
He placed some of the membrillos in a basket and then once the water was boiling, placed the basket in the water.

Here's the rest of the fruit waiting to be boiled. He used a long wooden paddle to stir the membrillos and take them out of the water.



Once the fruit is soft, it's ready to be taken out.

It took a while to boil the fruit, about 4 hours I'm guessing.

The fruit has to be soften so it can be grounded up. Early the next morning, they took the boiled fruit into town, Totatiche, where there was a special blender to do this.

So now it is the consistency of thick paste. Here's Ariana, her cousin and Aunt Chaya scooping it into a bowl so they can mix sugar into it.

Then it is poured into the tub over a flame and constantly stirred.

Once it gets a certain color and thickness it is then ready to be poured into buckets.

Here's Francisco "Pancho" stirring the cajeta. They let me try stirring it and it was super hard. I couldn't really do it. You have to constantly stir it or it will get scorched.

An overview of how everything was set up.

The cajeta sitting and cooling.

You have to let it thicken before you can eat it. It will end up having a thick texture, almost gelatin like. It is pretty sweet and very good. After witnessing how this confectionery is made, I have a deep appreciation for it. It is very good with milk. 

Next blog: Xochimilco and the Island of the Dolls