The former cloister of the Church of the Immaculate
Conception (Las Monjas) now defines the space used for the
Cultural Center (Bellas Artes) which Miguelinos call "El
Nigromante." All of the land once owned by the
Catholic Church except for the inside of churches was
nationalized during the 1860s by president Benito
Juárez and turned over for secular purposes
-- the start of a tortured relationship between the
Catholic Church and the Mexican state. Formal persecution
ended late (officially in 1992.)
Today the cloister shelters symbols which remind us of the
religious/political turmoil of the many years when Mexico
struggled to find the right balance between church and state.
For some Mexicans (and a whole lot of expats), religion
has been replaced by Art: "El Nigromante" serves as the
center of San Miguel's cultural life including a school of
the arts, exhibition space, and a concert hall.
An Oasis of the Arts
After trekking down cobblestone-paved but sparsely
landscaped streets in an arid region, visitors enter this
large and beautifully landscaped space radiating like a
tropical jungle from the central fountain area seen above.
Some consider this to be the most ambitious cloister
in Mexico; but not because of its size or riches but rather
for the lavishness of its gardens. Most convents served
as retirement homes for wealthy (and widowed) matrons who
brought their servants and pets with them. This
dictated many internal rooms to house the help --
resulting in less courtyard space. Not so here.
Maria Josefa, the 16 year old founder of the order of
the Conception Sisters, insisted that her nuns live
without servants.
[46]
The atheist in the cloister
The nickname "El Nigromante" honors San Miguel writer
Ignacio Ramirez, called the Voltaire of Mexico because
of his atheism and satirical wit. He chose the
term
Nigromante
(Sorcerer, Magician, Necromancer) as his nom de plume as a
student, since nearly everything he wrote would have
caused punishment during the 1800s. He served as the
only radical on the Supreme Court and was the only free
thinker at the Mexican Constitutional Convention of
1856.
[114]
Confiscated from the church by the federal government (like
most church land), the
cloister was used as an elementary school in the early
20th century. During the revolution, it housed
cavalry regiments. (By then, the federal
government was strongly anti-clerical and had expelled
most priests and bishops.) In 1937, Peruvian artist,
Felipe Cossío del Pomar started the first art school
here called Escuela Universitaria de Bellas Artes. That
institution grew into the
Instituto Allende which moved in 1951 to
Josefa's birthplace and the old Canal summer estate in the
southwest corner of town.
This cloister then became the cultural center and
took Nigromante's nickname in the 1960s.
Arts walk
The north corridor contains the common rooms of the ex
convent; these larger interior spaces are used for ballet and
other performing arts.
A lamb no longer of god
(
Above) At the
center of the courtyard rises a large fountain with the
traditional Christian symbol of the lamb. (
Below) Native Mexican
poinsettias add color to the lush green of the courtyard and
reminded us of Christmas three weeks hence. Mexican
tradition holds that a peasant girl, too poor to buy flowers
for the nativity scene, was told by an angel to put weeds at
the foot of the statues. They, of course, turned into
poinsettias.
Note in the above picture that this is a two-story cloister.
After its liberation by the federal government, the
cloister deteriorated, especially the upper floor.
[47]
Today maintenance is much improved today and the second floor
holds a concert hall.
The atheist in the
refectory
In the northeast corner of the cloister is a room thought to
be the refectory, the dining room. If so, the nuns ate
in a dark place with only two windows at one end to let in
the San Miguel sun. As you can see from the pictures
below, it has been considerably lightened by abstract
murals.
The painting was started (but left unfinished) by famous
Mexican muralist David Alfaro
Siqueiros during a workshop he taught here at the Bellas
Artes center in 1949. Siqueiros had a temper and
the story goes that while painting this mural, he threw one
of his pupils down a flight of stairs.
[47]
These walls are obviously abstract;
however, Siqueiros was a
social
realist. With Diego Rivera and José Clemente
Orozco, he is considered the father of Mexican
Mural Renaissance, the
first Latin-American movement to alter the shape of
Western art by providing a realistic alternative to
abstractionism. A Stalinist who won the Lenin peace prize, he
was exiled in 1940 for trying to assassinate the
anti-Stalinist Leon Trostsky.
Today floor lights illuminate Siqueiros's mural, making up
for the lack of natural light. The wrought-iron
artifact at left suggests that this may occasionally be a
gallery space although we found it empty. Begun in 1948
but never finished, the mural is entitled "Vida y obra de
Ignacio Allende."
[234]
Exactly as pictured.
