Panels: Counter-events. Monument to the Martyrs of June 6.

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2020-2022.

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• Artistic Research

• Site-specific art.

• Drawing / Photographs / Documents.

 

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Santa Inés Ahuatempan.

Puebla, Mexico.

 

 

 

Santa Inés Ahuatempan ( Puebla, Mexico), 1932; a group of Ngiba indigenous people, led by Pedro Montes, Urbano Montes, and Agustín Galindo held the first assemblies to form “a committee” that would represent the interests of their neighborhoods: San Antonio Tierra Negra y Tierra Colorada. In 1932, Pedro Montes decided to form an orchestra of musicians, on a property located on the current street 6 of June, this property would house the committee: a house of limestone roofed in the palm in the manner of the traditional constructions ngibas. In addition to being used as a meeting point, rehearsal, and music school, this committee would serve as a venue for political meetings and meetings to offer peaceful or armed resistance to local authorities: Each rehearsal and musical performance of the orchestra would serve to hide the conversations of its members.

 

The violent response of the municipal government led by Pedro Ortega, and its supporters: Bartolo Luna, Cleto Rodríguez, Andrés Moran, Miguel Morán, and Felicito Moran, did not wait. A group of soldiers from San Juan (?) were taken to Ahuatempan with explicit instructions to assassinate the followers of Pedro Montes, so they did. In the early hours of June 6 at 5 a.m., a Mexican army battalion arrived in the neighborhood of San Antonio to comply with the order: while some of the committee members were inside, A fire set by the uniforms consumed the palm roof and spread into the interior. Some people died inside the committee, and the few who managed to get out found the bullets from the military: 7 ngibas died, and a dozen more (who came to give help) were mistreated, beaten, or imprisoned.

 

This series is a kind of archive that through the compilation of documents, drawings, images, and testimonies, tries to reflect the historical processes close to the events of June 6, 1932, always against the macro history and official sources.

 

The multiplicity of documents found in the community of Ahuatempan, in addition to various narratives in written format, is part of these panels that are built to be photographed. The panels are supported by people from the community, owners of documents, narrators of events, or relatives of the victims. The photographs show the document as a representation of the historical discourse, but also the "real" subject that suffers from the historical processes.

 

Taken together, these panels emulate the traditional configuration of an "archive", but they critically question historical documents: the principle of the source.

 

 

Ulises Matamoros Ascención.

"Monument to the Martyrs of June 6: panels, 2/10". 2020-2022.

Printed testimonials (digital audio file), photographs, drawings, and documents.

(65.5. x 65.5 cm) 25.5 x 25.5 plg. 

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© 2021  Ulises Matamoros 

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