Gubish: altar rug

Size: 40x100cm, 16in by 3ft

Weaver: Azucena Contreras

Materials and methods: criollo sheep wool and some fine merino blend with angora goat wool. Hand dyed with natural dyes: Bèé (cochineal) for reds and pinks; Xiuhquilitl (indigo) for hues of blue and green color. Pomegranate and Cempasuchitl blend for yellow background. This is among the last batch of yarns that I got to dye with my mom on this earth. Handwoven on a Zapotec style loom of the 16th century adapted from European styles. Woven using a 7 threads per inch reed and wool rayon blend for warp.

Design, Patterns and symbols. 

This rug is perfect for an altar rug with a space in the center to put special offerings, a vase or prayers. The design start with a smile patttern that reminds us that smiling and laughing is the source of inner medicine that we carry and we can share with each other. After two smile stripes there is a mountain pattern that is woven with pink and blue, the moutains are the natural altars of the world and elevate not only our bodies but also our spirit closer to the skyworld. Mountains also represent the precence of our ancestors in the landscape, the blue color evokes the prehistoric lakes beneath the foothills of our ancestral lands and there are seeds woven in this section, the seeds of our plantcestors that helped us build our civilization (corn, beans, squash, amaranth, chia seeds, epazote, marigolds, chilies among many others). 

The main design is an eye of the feathered serpent, the diamond that reminds us to live a life of balance and pursue beauty in everything that we do. The two oposite triangles in the center of this diamond represents the butterfly if wisdom and  love that comes when we see the world through a balanced way using the four types of awareness: intuitive, rational, earthly and spiritual. This diamond is surrounded by the agave patterns, the pointy leaves and the quiote are represented there to  honour agave as the Queen of plants that feed us before we planted corn, that dressed us before learning how to cultivate and weave with cotton, the plant that heals us and makes us merry. Agave plants spend from six years up to several decades gathering sunlight in their heart, this sunlight is alchemized into a spiritual drink by master distillers and when it is consumed with purpose and intent, Mezcal has many healing and spirtual properties. Honour your plantcestors. The yellow color background evokes the sun, the main source of energy and life for the planet, the place where our spirits want to fly to as a symbol for the source of consciousness and the direction where our prayers will be answered.