Many years later, facing the fog of a blank page, Juan Rulfo remembered that remote morning when his father took him to Puebla and when passing by number 911 on 4 Poniente Avenue in the historic center he let him know that the façade of That 18th century mansion was the anteroom of the city's first business and a factory in which tableware, tiles, kitchen utensils, decorative objects and art pieces were created following ancestral techniques and which was also self-sufficient.
Rulfo's father was a travel agent and whenever he passed through the Mexican city he stopped at the Uriarte Talavera factory, a company founded by Dimas Uriarte in 1824 whose history has run parallel to the history of contemporary Mexico and which this 2024 celebrates 200 years of existence. tradition and permanent adaptation to new times.
Rulfo was so influenced by what his father showed him that, as Mario Bellatin tells in the book
El 5 de mayo de 1862 Talavera contemporaneous
(an editorial gem designed by Alejandro Magallanes), for a long time he dreamed of obedient dogs, all from Talavera, who were waiting for him to jump out of bed to free him from the ordeal that going to school meant for him.
If the impression of the Mexican writer upon seeing the Uriarte factory was great then, it is no less that of the visitor who today interprets the manufacturing process of the Talavera pieces.
We return to the street celebrating the history of a hallmark of Puebla and, therefore, of Mexico, and the pleasure of knowledge, what Saramago called “going from origin to origin, searching for roots and transformations until turning ancient memory into need of today.”
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Talavera Puebla (or tinware) was introduced to the City of Los Angeles, today Puebla, in the 16th century by potters from Talavera de la Reina, in Toledo, as well as other Spanish places with workshops such as Seville or Cádiz, such as response to the needs of generating new utensils and tableware.
It had ceremonial, decorative and, above all, functional uses for tables and kitchens (many of them from convents, true promoters of the unbeatable Puebla cuisine).
From the beginning, and until today, it was made according to the ordinances written by the master potters and the viceroy of New Spain Luis Enriquez de Guzmán, whose exciting manuscript from 1653 is still preserved in the Municipal Historical Archive.
“It is very rare to find written records of intangible heritage since, by its nature, this knowledge is inherited orally generation after generation.
This documentary treasure was the basis for the designation of origin of Talavera in 1995,” recalls Fabián Valdivia, director of the Municipal Institute of Art and Culture of the Puebla City Council.
“In addition, it was fundamental in the file for the joint registration between Mexico and Spain of the artisanal processes for the production of the Talavera of Puebla and Tlaxcala (Mexico) and the ceramics of Talavera de la Reina and El Puente del Arzobispo (Spain) on the representative list of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity.
This important recognition is based on the maintenance of tradition by Uriarte and represents an achievement of international significance, since it is the first Mexican artisanal technique inscribed on this UNESCO list, in addition to being the first binational inscription in Mexico and the first transcontinental cultural manifestation of Latin America.
A recognition with round-trip benefits between Spain and Mexico,” he adds.
Talavera Puebla (or stanniferous earthenware) was introduced to the City of Los Angeles, today Puebla, in the 16th century by potters from Talavera de la Reina (Toledo). Nacho Vega
By importing it to the new continent, Talavera highlights the pottery production of Mesoamerica and assumes new influences in the design, since the viceregal fashion for ceramics coincides with the enthusiasm generated by the arrival of Chinese porcelain from the Yuan dynasty and the Ming era. through the Manila Galleon that assumed trade with the Philippines.
As can still be seen today, neither the ornamental delicacy nor the harmonious combination of white and blue went unnoticed—although the first talavera was polychrome, its greatest identification is blue and white, which are, in addition, the colors of the city and of the sacred representation of the Virgin.
The curator and art critic Sylvia Navarrete remembers that it was in 1610, coinciding with massive imports from Taiwan, when Puebla reached the level of the first pottery center on the continent and that in the 20th century, with the tough competition from English and French tableware , manufacturing declined.
Something logical, since industrialization modified the needs of the population and the Talavera (purely artisanal, each piece is unique) became a luxury item, almost a historical curiosity, an object of desire for collectors.
A transformative visit
We carried out the visit to the Uriarte Talavera factory with the help of Mariana Muñoz Couto, managing partner (right hand of the current president, Luis Ángel Casas), who in the patio that precedes the workshops points out: “200 years after the foundation The same creative spirit of the founding moment of the company is maintained.
Uriarte survived the times of a tumultuous Mexico that was searching for identity and its form of political organization.
He did it by creating art and making it reach the farthest corners of the world.
"He has always lived in what Walter Benjamin called moments of danger, in the midst of completely mundane and real events."
Nothing could be more true: Uriarte was born the year Mexico became a republic (the independent country's first constitution dates back to 1824, precisely) without any environment of institutional certainty to found a company and take it to where it is today.
“The workshop located a couple of streets from the national trenches during the French military siege of 1863 did not stop working for a single day, behind closed doors.
“It resisted the attacks of the revolutionary hordes at the beginning of the 20th century and stood tall in the face of the consecutive crises of an unstable and changing country,” adds Muñoz.
Uriarte is, therefore, that constant memory that flashes and historically articulates the past.
It is resilience that feeds on the creative impulse and seeks new meanings to remain.
For years, the Talavera (purely artisanal, each piece is unique) became a luxury item, almost a historical curiosity, an object of desire for collectors.Nacho Vega
We start with clay, the origin of everything, the first phase, in which the black and white clay are mixed, strained and allowed to rest to later be modeled in the workshops, either with a wheel or with molds.
In the Mold Room the artisans apply the
tortilla
with that wisdom that can only be inherited.
Once the pieces are dry, they are baked at a temperature of between 850 and 1,000 degrees for 10 hours, and thus acquire the characteristic color of fired clay.
This second phase is called “Jahuete” or “Sancocho”, which would mean partially cooked.
It is then, once the pieces have been polished, when they can receive the enamel (based on silica sand, lead and tin) prior to painting (also called glazing) that provides the traditional shine of authentic Talavera, a unique texture and a unique color. that does not become white.
Then it is time to stencil: the Talavera designs are marked on the pieces with so-called stencils, which transfer the flat designs to the ceramic.
We appreciate the logical graphic evolution in the traditional feathering design, in addition to the influence of Chinese porcelain and new designs by contemporary artists such as Francisco Castro Leñero, Maribel Pórtela, Fabián Ugalde, Sarah Porter, Rosario Guillermo or Carlos García de la Nuez, who They have been refining the mimesis between artisan and artist.
There are six colors authorized in Talavera: black, cobalt blue, orange, yellow, light blue and green, all six made from mineral oxides made specifically for Talavera.
Traditional mule hair brushes are used to paint, the same ones used by visitors who, at the end of the tour, want to paint their own Talavera piece.
Renewed tradition
If something draws powerful attention in Talavera, it is its ability to adapt to the passage of time.
“When talking about innovation and modernization,” says Mariana Muñoz, “there is a polygon of forces: on the one hand, the market itself in which the product is inserted, where ceramic materials have evolved to sophistications that technological advances introduce, such as hardness , thinness, very thin lines, resistance... and, on the other, the aesthetic evolution of taste and the pace of life, where ephemeral consumption and immediacy displaces what is ordered to be done.
Talavera belongs to that primitive ceramic family that comes directly from the earth, from natural elements processed empirically and that escape the designs of standardization."
There are six colors authorized in Talavera: black, cobalt blue, orange, yellow, light blue, green, all six from mineral oxides made specifically for Talavera.Nacho Vega
There is no doubt that Talavera has connected emotionally and aesthetically with different eras and fashions and, in turn, has preserved its historical identity and the value of traditional knowledge.
The materials and their processes are taken to the limit of their essence, without losing it or betraying it.
“Safeguarding heritage does not consist of protecting a series of useless knowledge, but rather taking care of the cultural practices that give us identity.
As Gustav Mahler said, tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire,” Muñoz recalls.
In addition to pieces by the Catalan Enrique Luis Ventosa, who revolutionized and gave new impetus to Talavera at the beginning of the 20th century, the impressive rooms on the second floor display the works of contemporary authors, risky and combative proposals.
An artisan working in the workshop.Nacho Vega
“Talavera must also serve to transmit a message, its history is one of miscegenation, of colonialism, which can be seen positively as syncretism or as imposition, and in some way explains feelings of identity.
The Frenchman Pierre Valls and the Spanish Eugenio Merino propose Talavera as a language used in reverse, and through their pieces they contemporary the language from the silenced voices of the defeated in social movements since 1994."
This spirit of renewal is reflected today in the number of contemporary artists who come to these workshops in residence, who occupy the old rooms of this mythical building, who need artisans to apply their work and who continue to give meaning and character to the nobility of Talavera, Puebla's cultural product and heritage of Mexico.
These projects allow for that lovely transition in which artisans become artists and artists become artisans.
“In this symbiosis we seek to transcend that almost derogatory idea of minor art of repetitive strokes, without aura, and use the strength of its historical and identity weight for emotional connection.”
The admiration that Talavera arouses is so great that even the German brand Adidas was inspired by it in 2021 to create its Forum Mexico City footwear model;
with which he wanted to “pay tribute to Mexican cultural wealth.”
In case there was any interest, the model sold out within a few days of going on sale.
Lance Wyman and the bicentennial
For its 200th anniversary, Uriarte has had the collaboration of graphic designer Lance Wyman, an old acquaintance of the country who in 1968, invited by the architect Pedro Ramírez Vázquez, designed the logo of the Olympic Games and the institutional graphics of the entire metro network of Mexico City, in addition to the new graphic identity of the archaeological site of Teotihuacán and the iconic logo of the Camino Real hotel in the Polanco neighborhood, an absolute masterpiece by Ricardo Legorreta.
“I met Lance Wyman 10 years ago,” says Muñoz, “and since then we began collaborating on a tile design line, which was followed by the rest of the products we make.
We thought that the strength of the monogram of our logo could never be touched, until the opportunity of the bicentennial arrived and with it we entrusted Wyman to work with the new identity of the brand that will be presented this year to historically articulate our past.
A group of women painting the ceramics.Nacho Vega
Lance Wyman, a world figure in the craft, has designed a new collection of tiles and tableware.
He is unable to hide his love for Mexico and confesses that he had been a Talavera collector since the sixties, when he did not even know where it came from: “My wife Neila and I have Talavera plates from those years that we appreciate and continue to use.”
He also does not hide his interest in experimenting with new materials such as ceramics: “What excites me about Uriarte is that he reinvents tradition.
It seems paradoxical, but many things can be achieved by combining manual work, computers, typical and newly created materials.
Being pure tradition, working with Talavera has been a learning experience because only certain colors and specific materials can be used.
“I love continuing to collaborate on projects in Mexico more than 50 years later and I consider myself very lucky that my work is part of the Mexican identity.”
Octavio Paz, always so precise, said that craftsmanship belongs to a world before the separation between the useful and the beautiful.
The Talavera exemplifies better than any other cultural product this condition of superior link between artisanal tradition and the work of art itself.
In each piece of Talavera there is a fragment of the history of Puebla and in every corner of the Mexican city its presence stands out by ornamenting a facade, a convent, a fountain, a table.
Beautiful mirror for a complex production process based on techniques from an artisanal tradition of more than 400 years in which Uriarte has been present for almost half.