Shneas gaarlin: the spiritual path

$ 30,000.00

Size: 150x250cm 4.9x8.2ft 59"x98"

Weaver: Juanito Gonzalez's workshop

Materials and methods: Criollo sheep wool spun in the mills of Tianguistengo. Hand dyed using natural dyes: Béé (Dactylopius Coccus), Yauhtli (Tagetes lucida) and Xiuhquilitl (Indigofera Suffroticosa). 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 is an acient pattern that is seen in many huipiles and garments found in archaeological sites. From my understanding of it, this design pattern represents the energy fields of life. Our ancestors understood that the reality is more than what we can perceive with our senses, they discovered that we have an energy field around our physical body similar to the magnetic field of the earth described by modern day science. Our ancestors spoke about energy lines that weave together all living beings on earth, they knew how to read and understand those subtle energy flows that connects all living beings to the spirit world.

When one gets the shivers not for cold physical reasons but due to a deep psycological conection, something called an easthetic shiver, we are using those subtle ways of perceiving, this is what we call Repi Scha'à which translates as energy rise (as in electricity). One could feel aesthetic shivers when one deeply agrees with someone, when one realises and feels aligned with a collective goal, during ritual, while listening to music or when watching a film. Before street lighting was widely deployed in our village, everyone relied on this way of perception much more than we do today. Biologically, this stimulus makes us puff up our hair to look bigger and face ny danger in order to survive but this same mechanism was used to communicate collectively with all living beings when the dark of night reigns or when language fails to serve us a the medium to communicate.

Besides this subtle energies, the zig zag snake pattern represents the snake, the way energy moves in waves. From the cosmic snake that descends from the sky in the form of lightning to bring down the rains, to the way rivers meander and zig zag around the landscape, shaping the earth and sowing life along the way, until it makes its way into the rivers of the under world and down to the Ocean, the immense and sacred waters of Daou (great spirit) where the water cycle will start again. No wonder why Coatlicue, the mother earth goddess wears her skirt of snakes, the snakes that shape the world, rivers.