# Mexico of the Mexicans/Chapter VI

CHAPTER VI
ART, MUSIC, AND THE DRAMA
It would have been strange if Mexico had not plunged with some ardour into the pursuit of the fine arts, considering that in the veins of her people Indian blood is commingled with Spanish. The Nahua and Maya of old were among the world's greatest masters of sculpture, possibly greater masters in that field than ever were the Spaniards themselves. Irrespective of this priceless legacy, there exist in Mexico to-day abundant elements likely to favour artistic creation, elements tending to keep alive the flame which was lit so early as the days of Cortés, who, himself showing a deep interest in Aztec art, urged his pious countrymen to send or bring fine devotional pictures and statues to New Spain, telling them repeatedly that this act was a veritable duty. They responded munificently to this appeal, with the consequence that Mexican churches, and religious edifices in general, are still singularly rich in grand old Spanish works; while the incitement which these objects awaken is assisted by the presence, throughout the land, of a wealth of good pictures by native Mexican artists, of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. No country has a more romantic and thrilling history to look back upon than Mexico; and the stirring affairs enacted there in the past, the deeds of the conquerors, are even now proving a mine of inspiration to Mexican painters.
The efforts which Porfirio Diaz made to suppress bullfighting tended rather to quicken than quench the Mexican devotion to that sport, which erstwhile evoked from Goya, in Madrid, some of his most typical works: and, apart from the superb display of glittering colour and seething action which the bull-ring presents, there are countless picturesque sights to be seen from day to day in Mexico, more so than ​in most countries at the present time, Spain herself not excepted. The elderly women of the peasant class, for example, have not yet renounced the use of their tasteful headgear: a big white bonnet, rather like a nun's, which usually forms a beautiful contrast with the wearer's some-what swarthy face; while be he peon or not, the vaquero still rides abroad with all his old brave display, his sombrero, his vast jingling spurs, his elaborately tinselled clothing. How grand, too, is Mexican scenery! The perpetually snow-capped mountains around Cuernavaca rival Fuji-no-Yama, the falls of Juanacatlan easily surpass Niagara, the Inferniello Canon transcends the Yosemite Valley, the Great Plateau has all the wizardry of the Sahara, while the tropical parts of the land abound in magnificently glowing colours.
But granting these things, says someone—allowing that Mexico embodies such a plentitude of intrinsic incentive to Official Encouragement.art—what has the country done officially to aid this almost unique incentive? What help and encouragement are afforded by the State to the painter or sculptor? What opportunities are vouchsafed him from year to year of exhibiting his handiwork?
These are interesting and important questions, and it is, therefore, imperative that they should be handled cautiously, in justice to the Mexican Government. It is only very seldom that an official and greatly influential position is held by a man of genuine aesthetic taste, and Mexico has not really been more fortunate in this relation than most other countries, although both Hidalgo and Maximilian appear to have had a personal affection for the arts. Nevertheless, there is alive, and in effective action in Mexico city, what is styled variously El Museo Nacional de Pintura y Escultura, La Escuela Nacional de Belles Artes, and the Academia Nacional de San Carlos—which, as the two latter names indicate, coincide in aim with the Royal Academy in England—striving to set up a definite criterion in art, and offering instruction and guidance to young artists. The ​last-named establishment may well be called a very old one, the fact being that it evolved by degrees from a school of engraving, founded in 1778 by Charles IV of Spain, while its first director was a noted Mexican expert of the burin, Geronimo Antonio Gil. In 1783 the king made a handsome pecuniary present to this school, almost simultaneously sending it a valuable gift of casts from the antique; and shortly afterwards he sent overseas, to assume the directorship of affairs, one Rafael Jimeno, a painter, and an architect named Manuel Tolsa. Up till then the Academy's activities had been conducted in a section of the old Mint, but in 1791 it moved into its present spacious quarters, a house previously the Hospital de Amor de Dios, and situate hard by the Palacio Nacional. Just as in all other countries, in Mexico the Academy is fervently disliked by the majority of young artists who are in real earnest about their work, these contending that, by its whole nature, the institution is the sworn foe to that individual note which is essential in vital paintings and sculpture, the enemy, too, of that development or evolution, as regards technique, so indispensable to art's welfare, if not to her life. But waiving this point, it can hardly be gainsaid that, considering the comparatively limited extent of the Mexican national treasury, in the matter of subsidies the country acts munificently towards its Academy, which is thus able to offer numerous scholarships to young men and women. The most valuable of these scholarships admit of their holders going abroad to study; and, quite recently, the incalculable advantages of working for a while in Italy have been granted by the Academy to three of its most promising pupils. Leandro Izaguirre, best known as a gifted copyist of old masters; Ramos Martinez, a successful painter of pastels and a notable colourist; and Alberto Fuster, who has since painted "Sappho" and "The Greek Artist," each of the three receiving a comfortable little pension during his foreign sojourn. What European countries, it is worth pausing to ask, give money sufficient to convey their budding ​artists a distance equal to that from the Gulf of Mexico to the Adriatic? In 1909 Mexico sent no fewer than three young painters to Madrid; one to Barcelona and one to Paris, to which city were sent, at the same time, a student of engraving, Emilliano Valadez, and a student of sculpture, Eduardo Solares. According to the constitution of La Escuela Nacional, the winners of its travelling scholarships are expected, during a period of four years after returning home, to give their services by preference to the Government; but such services are, of course, remunerated, they are not often called for, and the rule is not rigorously imposed.
Like most bodies of kindred nature, and as one of its titles shows, the Mexican Académia Nacional is itself an art gallery. Its principal rooms, however, are inadequately lit, so that proper justice is not done to the exhibits there, and this is much to be regretted, for the pictures include many fine old works, numerous good ones, too, by artists still living or deceased within the present decade. Salient among these contemporaneous paintings is Manuel Ocaranza's "Travesuras del Amor" (Love's Wiles), a fine little study of a cupid, seemingly occupied in the appropriate act of preparing a love philtre, the subject treated in a fashion which would have delighted François Boucher himself. Ocaranza's notable gifts are further represented by a picture called "La Flor Marchita" (The Faded Flower), a curious contrast to which is formed by the many neighbouring works on Biblical themes, notably "Abraham é Isaac" by Salomé Pina, "Dejad á los Ninos que Vengan a Mí" (Suffer little children to come unto Me) by Juan Urruchi, and "El Bueno Samaritano" by Juan Manchola. Events in the lives of the early Christian martyrs and saints also figure prominently in this gallery, remarkable items in this field being Uarráran's "El Sueño del Mártir Cristiano" (The Christian Martyr's Dream) and "La Carida en los Primeros Tiempos de la Iglesia" (Charity during the ​first years of the Church); while there are various works on classic topics; for instance, Luis Monroy's "Ultimos Momentos de Atala." Episodes from the history of Spain are likewise set forth in divers canvases, chief among those artists evincing signal talent in the handling of such matter being Pelegin Clavé, a powerful colourist. But best of all are the paintings of a class already referred to—those inspired by Mexico's own history. One of the finest of these is that in which Juan Ortega has depicted the visit of Cortes to Motecuhzoma; further good works in this same category being a pair by Felix Parra: "Episodio de la Conquista" and "Fray Bartolome de las Casas, Protector de los Indios." One by Rodrigo Entiérrez, "El Senado de Tlaxcala," must also be cited; while as fine as this, if not finer, is a famous picture by José Obregon, "La Reina Xochitl." The heroine and her father are here delineated presenting a rich goblet to the Toltec prince, Tecpancaltzin; and the painter has in rather an adroit fashion signified the precise contents of this goblet, there being, at the extreme left of the canvas, a servant bearing a maguey plant, the plant from which Mexico's national drink of pulque is concocted. The doughty Indian is evidently somewhat surprised, and withal greatly delighted, by the imminent prospect of quenching his thirst; while it is clear that his first taste of pulque is not to be his last one, for in the background are more servants, carrying large pitchers, the wherewithal for a carousal. The whole picture reflects sound archaeological knowledge on the part of the artist; and this complete correctness of his details, from an antiquarian point of view, certainly adds materially to the interest of Obregon's masterpiece.
This brief account of the modern pictures in the Académia de San Carlos will serve to give readers an idea as to who are the better known, if not really the most talented, of Mexico's painters to-day, at least so far as the realm of genre is concerned. More will be said, at a later stage, about contemporary Mexican painters; and it is worth pausing to note, ​meanwhile, that the old works possessed by the Academy include fine examples of Zurbaran, Murillo, Titian, and Rubens; while it should be added, in passing, that another important collection of old works, in Mexico city, is contained in the Museo Nacional de Arguéologia, Historia y Etnologia, which forms part of the Palacio Nacional, and faces the Calle de la Moneva. In this gallery, moreover, as also in the Palacio Municipal and the Biblioteca Nacional, visitors are afforded a good opportunity of appraising the modern Mexican school's prowess in portraiture; for there is domiciled, in each of the three said buildings, a large gathering of portraits of recent notables. Perhaps the Mexican portrait painter of to-day, who influences one most favourably, is Juan Tellas Toledo, a man who has won fame outside the border of his own country; while among his immediate predecessors, the best is probably Tiburcio Sanchez. It must be pointed out, however, that the Museo Nacional's two portraits of Maximilian, and one of the Empress Carlota, are not actually Mexican works; and the common inference that they belong to that category must be laid to the charge of numerous popular writers on Mexico, who, reproducing these paintings in books or magazines, have failed to state the artists' names.
Pottery is a branch of art for which the Mexicans have long shown a special aptitude—thus carrying on finely a grand Aztec tradition—and to this day, in Pottery. a great many of their towns, there is made some given type of faïence, quite peculiar to the particular place where it is created. Zacatecas, for example, is renowned for its lustred ware; Guanajuato for dark green ware highly glazed, and rather similar to the latter are those emanating from Oaxaca; while, on the other hand, a light grey is the favourite colour with the potters at Zacepu, and those working at Cuanhitlan evince a fondness for black. Another important centre of the art is Aguascalientes, and a still more famous one is Patzucars, the potters ​there mainly producing jars and bowls of an iridescent nature, in appearance somewhat akin to much of the faïence of old Persia, which they also resemble in being sadly fragile, alas! Nor must Puebla be forgotten, this town's artists in pottery having enjoyed a high reputation, throughout many centuries, for majolica, having a brilliance of colour like that associated with the Post-Impressionist painters. As fine as this ware are the Puebla tiles, also, in general, of glittering hue, and still used frequently in the decoration of churches in Latin-America. Nevertheless, the potters whom the Mexicans themselves regard as their cleverest are those of Guadalajara, who often ornament their handiwork with gold or silver, affixed after the piece is fired, the men of this school having likewise a taste for pictorial decorations. No account of Mexican pottery would be complete without what are known there as Afarénas: places where the Indians make earthenware for their own use, probably employing exactly the methods of their ancestors in Aztec days. A splendid artistry, a rare technical skill, are displayed in many of these primitive workshops; and even when looking at such of their creations as are intended merely for cooking utensils, seldom or never does the temptation arise to say with the poet—
What! did the hand, then, of the potter shake?
In the past, in many lands, pottery and sculpture were closely affiliated; and, as will be shown later, Mexico is one of these places where this affiliation is still Architecture. in evidence. Moreover, the bulk of her faïence is made anonymously; and the gentle art of self-effacement, singularly foreign as a rule to people of any aesthetic predilections, is also practised considerably among Mexican architects. In this matter they form a curious contrast to those of the United States, where egotism is so rife that, to a great many buildings, there are affixed prominently metal plates, bearing the designers' names. But, while this reticence on the part of the Mexican ​school may be a thing to be admired, it naturally makes very difficult the giving of an exact and adequate account of that school's activities. Few countries in Europe, and assuredly none in America, are richer in fine old edifices than Mexico, and they are of various types, the penitentiary of Puebla, for example, recalling some French châteaux, or Scottish castles of the Middle Ages, when building in both France and Scotland was largely carried on by Flemings. Needless to say, architecture of an inherently Spanish character is paramount in Mexico, not merely because of her inheritance, but because, in her early years, many of her great ecclesiastical structures were wrought from designs sent from Spain. Thus the veredos in the chapel of Los Reyes, in Puebla Cathedral, was designed by Juan Martinez Montanes, whose portrait, as the reader may recall, was painted by Velasquez. Before the seventeenth century was over, however, there were busy in Mexico many talented architects of native birth, among the best being Fray Diego de Valverde, who built the Palacio Nacional in Mexico city. And these early masters, far from betraying any inclination to depart from the architectural traditions of Spain, manifested in abundance their motherland's fondness for the quaint and the rococo, likewise giving their structures that bizarre glitter which is a striking characteristic of many Iberian churches, thanks to the Spaniard's large strain of Moorish blood. Nor have the Mexican architects of yesterday and of the present time disclosed any marked desire to forsake this course, hitherto accepted by those practising the builder's art throughout their country. To quote from an article in that highly interesting, but now defunct, American periodical, Modern Mexico: "Architecture, in Cuernavaca to-day, differs so little from that of centuries ago, that it is almost impossible to tell a new building from the oldest . . . "; and these words are hardly more applicable to Cuernavaca than to large sections, at least, of many other towns and villages—Puebla, Guadalajara, Oaxaca, Colima. It is true, that in the entrance to the spacious ​public hall in the last-named town, there has been erected, of late, a rather severe arch which recalls that at the foot of Fifth Avenue, New York, likewise reminding the beholder of the pseudo-classic Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile at Paris. But this arch is an anomaly in Colima, where, all along one side of the plaza, there is an arcade which is redolent of mediaeval Spain, portales being the name which the Mexicans themselves give to the picturesque archways supporting structures of this description. Scarcely more salient at Colima than at Oaxaca and Cholula, these portales form the very key-note, so to speak, in the majority of Mexican cities, the thing chiefly impressing itself on the visitor's memory, so far as the visible is concerned; while another thing which he or she is bound to remember is the bright colour garnishing the façades of countless houses.
To turn from domestic to ecclesiastical architecture, a remarkable illustration of this order is to be seen at Puebla, in the beautiful Cepillo del Rosario; for the interior of this church was completely redecorated so recently as the end of the nineteenth century, the additions withal being wholly in keeping with the venerable edifice containing them. And a great deal of equally tasteful rehabilitation of churches has been done, during the last few years, at Vera Cruz; while a church built as lately as 1908, in the Calle de Orizaba, harmonises most perfectly with all the old edifices in the immediate vicinity, the design in this instance having come from Cessare Novi, one of the best known and cleverest of contemporary Mexican architects. Again, the rare little Capello de San Antonio, in the environs of Mexico city, a church which formed the subject of one of Miss Florence Wester's many engaging contributions to Modern Mexico, dates only from late in last century, yet looks almost as if it had been erected in the days of Cortés; while, although that ​arch-enemy of the architectural art—the speculative builder, whose one idea, when at work, is to be economical with time and with materials has been allowed to ravage much of the business part of Mexico city, even there some imposing buildings have been raised of late, among them the National Bank and several offices in the Calle Cinco de Mayo, the Mexican Wall Street. These last, however, cannot be acclaimed as being among those perpetuating the bygone Spanish styles; but another structure, most certainly to be included in that honoured category, is a small church which, in 1909, the British residents of Mexico city caused to be built there for their own use, the site being in the British Cemetery.
Her large quota of artistic buildings notwithstanding, Mexico shows little bias towards decorating façades with sculpture; and such works in this art as she Sculpture. has produced in the last few decades, such as she is producing just now, are nearly all of the independent kind. As already observed, she is one of those countries where pottery and sculpture are still affiliated; and this holds good, in particular, of the potters working at San Pedro Tlaqueplaque, situate on a high hill near Guadalajara. For these men are not more preoccupied with making vases, and the like, than with modelling figures and groups, the subjects being invariably chosen from the life of Mexico to-day; indeed, there is hardly anything in that life which these artists do not represent on occasion, nearly all their work, moreover, being done in a finely downright fashion. This village of San Pedro is likewise the home of two brilliant Indian sculptors, Panduro père and fils, working exclusively with clay, and living almost in the manner of their remote forefathers, their studio being a primitive hut. Either the father or the son will do, in a matter of half an hour, and for a few dollars, a wonderfully lifelike portrait-bust, so that the services of the Panduros are much courted, alike by their own neighbours and by tourists. Indeed, their ​clientèle has embodied numerous distinguished men, and they are very proud of telling that Porfirio Diaz himself sat to them repeatedly; while they invariably add, when relating this, that their likenesses of the President are far ahead of those by any other artists, whether painters or sculptors, who have received the questionable benefits of scholastic training. Apropos of such people, it was maintained in a recent article, in the New York Herald, that they engage sadly little official patronage in Mexico. But this statement does not bear scrutiny, because, ever since Mexico city unveiled, in 1803, at a prominent spot in the Plaza de la Reforma, the vast bronze equestrian statue by Manuel Tulsa of Charles IV of Spain, a marked affection for sculptural monuments has been evinced by Mexican municipalities, these having frequently shown fairly good taste. It is true that that self-effacement, mentioned as being practised largely by architects throughout Mexico, has long been rather common also among sculptors active there. And no one at Cuernavaca, for example, appears to remember what hand is responsible for the memorial, erected there in 1891, to the soldier, Carlos Pacheco; no one in Vera Cruz seems to know who wrought, in 1892, the town's statue of the politician, Manuel Gutierrez Zamora; nor is information to be had even concerning the big piece of statuary, set up at Chapultepec in 1881, celebrating the romantic little Thermopylae enacted there during Mexico's first war with the United States. It is possible, then, that some of these striking works are not by native artists; while it must be owned that the fine Christopher Columbus, placed in 1877 in the first glorieta of the Paseo, Mexico city, must be credited, like the splendid Maximilian portrait in the Museo Nacional, to the French school, the sculptor having been Charles Cordier. Nevertheless, all this does not in the least vitiate the contention that Mexico is ​singularly rich just now in gifted artists in statuary, among the best being the brothers Yslas, usually working in collaboration, whose finest and most famous work, completed in 1880, is their large monument to the patriot, Benito Pablo Juarez, author of Los Reyes de la Reforma. This imposing memorial is contained in the Pantéon de San Fernando, Mexico city; another very noteworthy piece of sculpture in the capital being the Monumento á la Independencia Nacional, which was unveiled in 1910, and to the making of which various different artists contributed, the chief being Enrique Alciati, a professor in the Académia Nacional de San Carlos. Two further sculptural monuments of great note, in Mexico city, are one commemorating the Portuguese cosmographer, Enrico Martinez, and that more famous one to the memory of the last prince of the Aztecs, Guatemotzin; the latter work finished in 1887, the former in 1881. It is in the Jardin del Seminario, and was modelled by Miguel Noveña; while as regards the other work, standing in the second glorieta of the Paseo de la Reforma, here once again there were several different artists employed. The general idea apparently came from Francisco Jiminez, but parts of his design seem to have been carried out, not by himself, but by Noveña, who was sole sculptor, furthermore, of certain tablets let into the base, depicting episodes in the Conquest of Mexico; while some neighbouring tablets, of a votive order, are by Gabriel Guerra, one of those comparatively few Mexican masters who are well known in the United States. Sculpture is also well represented by Señores Bringas, Toledo, Goitia, and Rosas.
The almost constant friction between the United States and Mexico has necessarily tended to inhibit, rather, a just recognition of Mexican artists in the former country, which really has a far greater love of the fine arts, withal, than most Europeans seem willing to realise. At the great Panama Pacific International Exhibition, held at San Francisco in 1915, the superb collection of painting and sculpture ​represented artists of Cuba, Uruguay, and the Argentine, the Philippine Islands, and even Finland, yet none of the Mexican school, this absence being the more noticeable considering that, hard by the Tower of Jewels, there stood equestrian statues of Pizarro and Cortés. But there is a department of old Mexican paintings now in the Pennsylvania Museum, Philadelphia, to which institution they were presented by Robert N. Lamborn, author of Mexican Painting and Painters (New York, 1891), a very valuable book; and although, when the World's Columbian Exposition was being organised at Chicago, Mexican artists did not apply for a section until even at the eleventh hour, their request was gladly granted. The amount of space allotted to them was somewhat inadequate, inevitably smaller than it would have been had the application been made timeously. Nevertheless, this Chicago gathering, in 1893, was a memorable one; and it was when showing here that Guerra won his American reputation as already stated, the work from his hand which chiefly elicited homage being a bronze group, entitled "A Mockery of Cupid." Other beautiful pictures by him on view on this occasion were studies of Christ and the Virgin Mary, together with busts of Carlos Pacheco and Porfirio Diaz; while a good bust of the latter was also shown by Jesus Contreras, this artist's fine gifts being likewise illustrated by a head called "The Past." Some excellent sculpture was exhibited, too, by José Maria Centurion, in particular his "Francisco Morales"; and sundry medallions by Antonio Galvanez must not pass unnoticed; nor must those of Luis Cisñeros, his exhibit including one of Christopher Columbus. One more sculptural work, which must certainly be cited with honour, is "Spring," carved in ivory by Felipe Pantoja; while among the best things in the small muster of etchings was the "Aztec Flower Girl" of Luis Campa. Bearing in mind the rarity of good devotional art nowadays, it was interesting to observe to what fine purpose Biblical topics had been handled by a number of the Mexican painters—Alberto Bribiesca, Gonzalo ​Carrasco, Pablo Valdes; while artists showing meritorious landscapes were Ygnacio Alcarreca, Cleofas Almanza, Luis Coto, Carlos Rivera, and José Velasco—those by the last-named being over twenty in number. Art inspired by Mexican history was well to the fore also, able pictures in this category being those of Rodrigo Gutierrez and Leandro Yzaguirre; while "The Aztec Baptism" of Manuel Ramirez justly evoked much eulogistic comment, as too did José Jara's "Episode of the Founding of Mexico City," a big canvas, wherein are shown some fifteen Indians grouped in a finely eurythmic fashion.
But although, to repeat, this Chicago exhibition was a memorable one—doubly so, inasmuch as it enlightened many people, almost oblivious, previously, to the existence of a lively Mexican school of art—it would be quite unjust to maintain that these paintings in oils and water-colours, these prints, drawings, and pieces of sculpture, constituted a really adequate symbol of contemporary Mexican artistic prowess. As George Eliot observes in one of her novels, it is by "hidden lives" that the great things in the world are achieved; and there is literally no branch, perhaps, of all human activities, concerning which the novelist's acute words hold good, more essentially, than of artistic creation. Men living in very humble circumstances, strenuously busy for sheer love of their art, gaining no official laurels, their works and very names unknown save to a small band of shrewd people—it is from such that great work usually comes: it is mainly works wrought thus which emerge with honour from the great sifting carried on by Time, arch-arbiter in all aesthetic matters. And no doubt there are many fine artists, working in this quiet fashion in Mexico to-day, responding year by year, to their country's almost unique incentive to art.
Like all Latin peoples, the Mexicans are exceptionally musical, and the Government long ago discovered that a ​plentiful supply of music was essential to peaceful rule, probably on the assumption that he who was not supplied with "concord of sweet sounds" was "fit for murders and conspiracies." Music. The Indians are also intensely addicted to music, and possess their own types of folk-songs and their own military bands. The half-caste element of Mexico has been described as being as musical as the Hungarians, and there is little doubt but that a Mexican Brahms would find as much and as superior material to his hand as his Hungarian prototype, were he suddenly to arise.
The type of folk-song to be heard among the half-breed and the Indian classes is plaintive, melancholy, and beautiful, couched usually in a minor key, and very reminiscent of old Spain and its semi-Oriental music. The native bands are particularly melodious, their members receiving but little instruction. The son learns from his father the rudiments of the art, and the leader does the rest, the result being that in many of the thousand plazas of Mexico, excellent music may be heard throughout the soft tropical evenings. Dance-music, with its weird and rhythmic movement, is most in favour, and is played in perfect time and tune: for the ear of the musician is remarkably correct, and his taste almost faultless. The national dance, resembling somewhat the Cuban habanera, has a slow, swaying movement, conforming to the strains of the orchestra; and the songs are somewhat of the same description, a striking feature being their melancholy tone. In fact, Mexican music is as individual in its character as the Hungarian czardas or the German Volkslieder. The best bands are undoubtedly those of pure Indian race. The delicacy and harmony of their performances, their masterly command of their instruments, the originality of the compositions they render, and their ability to capture the soul of the music are quite exceptional among untrained and even among professional musicians. The two-fold gift of utterance and composition is theirs. These bands ​play twice or thrice a week in all the large towns, even in the poorer quarters, and are a great source of pleasure to the citizens.
The Indians and mestizos are also extremely fond of the guitar and the mandoline. Nowhere is such mandoline playing to be found as in Mexico, not even in Spain itself. It can be said that these stringed instalments are the national instruments. The performance of a Mexican guitar and mandoline band, its rhythmic harmony, its twittering beauty of tone and its richness of melody usually comes as a surprise to the foreigner who expects little of the poor Indian or despised half-breed.
The same applies to native singing. The climate of Mexico—clear, pure, and healthy—is just the air for song. The Native Singing.natives are often possessed of beautiful voices, and are as ready at improvisation as any Neapolitan.
Opera in Mexico is usually provided by touring companies. In Mexico city, opera is usually performed in the National Theatre (completed in 1910), or the Teatro Renacimiento, in the Calle de Puerta Falsa de San Andres, which is a handsome theatre, seating 1,900 people. The operatic companies which tour in Mexico are usually Italian, but occasionally French opéra bouffe companies visit the Republic. The singers in these companies are not always of the best type, and are usually often veterans in their art; but in this respect Mexico is in no way behind the British provinces, which have usually to put up with artistes of a third-rate character.
The other theatres in Mexico besides these already alluded to are the Teatro Principal, an old house, built in the middle of the eighteenth century, but which has been extensively altered. Its performances are usually suited to its audiences, which are by no means the cream of Mexican society. It is, however, a real Mexican theatre, and no attempt has been made to denationalise it. The Teatro Arbeu, in the Calle San Felipé, has been established for about forty years, and ​is usually rented by theatrical companies from the United States.
Most Mexican towns of any size have a playhouse of their own; but the theatre is decidedly not an institution in provincial Mexico. Some of the provincial houses, as at Guadalajara and Guanajuato, are constructed on the most elaborate modern lines, but there is little patronage of these palatial buildings, as they are only open on the occasion of a visit of a large opera or dramatic company. In this way, many houses are closed for months together. The bull-ring has killed theatrical appreciation among the lower classes in Mexico, who prefer its more sanguinary excitements to the milder pleasures of the sock and buskin.
As with our stock companies half a century ago, the Mexican theatrical performances are usually divided into several acts or little plays, each lasting an hour or so, called a tanda. The theatre-goer may purchase a ticket for one of these or for the entire performance. The people sit in the foyer like those waiting their turn at a picture-house, and when the tanda is done they take the places of those who leave at its conclusion. There are usually four or five tandas in an evening's "show."
Prices are cheap—from the twopenny seats in the gallery (where the darker castes sit) to the sixpence-per-tanda fauteuils beneath. One does not pay as he enters, but his money is taken by a collector between the acts when he is seated. The males in the audience do not remove their hats until the rise of the curtain, and at its fall at once replace their head-gear. It is not usual to dress for the theatre except on gala occasions, which generally occur on fiestas and Sundays, when the house displays a scene of brilliance and animation not to be surpassed anywhere. Smoking is indulged in in all parts of the house, and refreshments are handed round.
The circus is much more popular in Mexico than the theatre. Its glitter and its horsemanship an art so dear to the Mexican of all grades—naturally attract the people.
​It is, indeed, regrettable that this time-honoured form of amusement so suitable to children (and their parents) should have been practically abandoned in this country. Mexico can support several circus troupes, all of which flourish exceedingly. There is a mystery about the circus, a fascination tinged with orange and sawdust, to which no mere theatre can ever hope to attain; and this calls to a similar mystery in the Mexican soul—a mystery of the flamboyant, the glittering, the ostentatious. The music halls in the large towns recall similar places of amusement in Continental cities, and are none too exalted in the type of entertainment they afford.
The Mexican drama has not been wanting in writers of force and brilliance. The authors of opera dialogues and farces are legion, and even the higher drama has had its protagonists like Alfredo Chavero Mexican Drama. with his "Quetzalcoatl" and "Xochitl." These dramas abound in thrilling scenes, and I translate a short passage from one of them in order that the reader may have an opportunity of judging the merits of the best type of Mexican play. As it is in verse, I have cast it into blank verse form. Cortés is telling his page, Gonzalo, of the arrangements he has made for the safety of Marina during an uprising.
| Cortés. | Boy, there is talk of rising in the air. |
| | It is not meet that you, a tender youth |
| | Should be involved in it; 'tis well to die |
| | In soldiers' strife, but fighting the vile mob |
| | Is not a soldier's task. You and Marina |
| | Shall leave for Orizaba with the dawn. |
| Gonzalo | And she shall here remain without my aid. |
| (aside) |
| Cortés. | Report yourself to me at dawn, Gonzalo, |
| | When I shall give you passports to depart |
| | You and a veilèd lady. |
| Gonzalo | Veiled, Señor? |
| Cortés. | Yes; 'tis my wish the soldiers should not know |
| | Who travels with you. As you leave so early, |
| | Go, take your rest. |
| Cortés. | Now I depart and take myself to Spain, |
| | So that the enemies who plot my ruin |
| | May be confounded; yet as I depart |
| | I still think of your happiness. |
| Marina | My happiness, Don Hernan? |
| Cortés. | Yes; your worth |
| | Deserves a fitting state. |
| Marina | Ah, what vile treason |
| | Vexes my spirit? |
| Cortés. | You must be well provided, wealth and state |
| | A husband—Don Juan de Jaramillo… |
| Marina | Cease, Hernando, cease! |
| Cortés. | To-morrow you shall leave for Orizaba. |
| Marina | "Tis thus you crown my loyalty and love; |
| | Thus you abandon me? Impious man! |
| | Thou hast a son by her thou wouldst desert: |
| | Wouldst leave him, too? The panther of the plains |
| | Would not desert its helpless spotted young, |
| | And yet the puissant Christian conqueror |
| | Is less compassionate than she. |
Mexico has no actors or actresses of any note. In fact, Mexican audiences greatly prefer imported talent, French or Spanish. There is small chance for native Mexican actors, as there is no school of acting in the Republic and there is much more inducement to become a successful bull-fighter.
* ↑ A small, but tolerably good, reproduction of this painting appeared in the issue for November, 1913, of The International Studio.
* ↑ Some excellent photographs of this church, showing the modern additions, will be found in a book by Antonio Cortés, La Arquitectura en Mexico, published by the Museo Nacional, Mexico City, 1914.
* ↑ This article appeared in 28th June, 1914. Notwithstanding the error referred to above, it is an interesting and valuable contribution to the history of modern Mexican art, and should certainly be consulted by the student of that subject.
* ↑ A print of this picture accompanies the article already mentioned in the New York Herald for 28th June, 1914.