Vejigante Masks by Angel Sánchez Ortiz
Subject
Angel Sánchez Ortíz
(Puerto Rican)
Date2006
Mediumphotographic prints
ClassificationsGraphics
Credit LineConnecticut Cultural Heritage Arts Program collections
CopyrightIn Copyright
Object number2015.196.1016.1-.3
DescriptionPhotographs of examples of vejigante masks made by teens who were taught by artist Angel Sánchez Ortiz in a school program, and masks made by Ortiz displayed at a Puerto Rican festival. The photographs were submitted for his application to CCHAP's Southern New England Apprenticeship Program Year 9.
NotesBiographical Note: Angel Sánchez Ortiz, based in Holyoke, Massachusetts, is a maker of traditional Puerto Rican vejigante masks made of painted paper maché that are worn by costumed dancers representing demons and playfully scary figures at celebrations including Carnival and the St. James de Campostela Festival held in Ponce and Loiza, Puerto Rico. This festival has also been held in several cities around New England, including New Haven for some years in the 1990s. Today’s Puerto Rican masks are the result of a blend of the African, Spanish, and native Táíno cultures. Africans, who were forced to come to the island as slaves, brought with them a rich and ancient tradition of wearing masks during rituals. Angel taught the process of Puerto Rican vejigante-making to Lydia Perez in the Southern New England Traditional Arts Program in 2006-2007.Angel Sánchez Ortíz was born in Ponce and raised in Barrio San Antón in Puerto Rico. He grew up living the traditional Carnival festivities in February each year. During this time, family and friends were immersed in the celebration heralding the beginning of Lent. These festivities are more vibrant in the poorer areas of Ponce. He participated in the making of masks and costumes as they got ready for the Carnival in the Calle Cuatro, Bélgica, Cantera and Playa de Ponce. These masks are made out of papier-maché and depict animals with fantastic imagery. Angel Sánchez Ortíz made his own masks at the age of seven after observing artisans such as Mariano, Geño and others. By the time he was nine years old he had completed several other masks with vivid splashes of color and curved horns with the encouragement of his art teacher. Sánchez Ortíz continued his craft after immigrating to the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts in 1989, teaching children and adolescents this cultural tradition through workshops and other activities. He has exhibited his work at the Puerto Rican Cultural Center, the Spanish American Union, Worcester Art Museum, Wheeler Gallery at Umass, Holyoke Community College, at Hartford Public Library, at Lowell Folk Festival and many other events around southern New England. Angel is a strong advocate for transmission of Puerto Rican culture through mask-making and other paper crafts.
Subject Note: The Southern New England Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program is a CCHAP initiative since 1997 that fosters the sharing of community-based traditional (folk) artistic skills through the apprenticeship learning model of regular, intensive, one-on-one teaching by a skilled mentor artist to a student/apprentice. The program pairs master artists from Rhode Island, Massachusetts, or Connecticut with apprentices from one of the other states, as a way to knit together members of the same community or group across state lines. Teaching and learning traditional arts help to sustain cultural expressions that are central to a community, while also strengthening festivals, arts activities and events when master/apprentice artists perform or demonstrate results of their cooperative learning to public audiences. The Connecticut Cultural Heritage Arts Program at the Connecticut Historical Society manages the program in collaboration with the Folk Arts Program at the Massachusetts Cultural Council and independent folklorist Winifred Lambrecht who has a deep knowledge of the folk arts landscape of Rhode Island. Primary funding for the program comes from the National Endowment for the Arts, with support also from the Connecticut Commission on the Arts, the Institute for Community Research, and the Connecticut Historical Society.
Additional materials exist in the CCHAP archive for this artist.
Cataloging Note: This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services MA-245929-OMS-20.
Status
Not on view
2022 February 26
