{"id":15191,"date":"2020-04-23T14:53:59","date_gmt":"2020-04-23T14:53:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/?p=15191"},"modified":"2020-04-24T11:07:32","modified_gmt":"2020-04-24T11:07:32","slug":"tlaloc-water-source-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/tlaloc-water-source-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Tl\u00e1loc: Water, Source of Life"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap\">I was born in the rain city, also known as Seattle. In Mexico, they have a god for that. The Aztec&#8217;s call him &#8220;Tl\u00e1loc.&#8221; I first met him at the Templo Mayor museum (below). Now, one of my travel mantras is, &#8220;sometimes it&#8217;s better to be lucky than smart.&#8221; And up to that point in our journey, it seemed like we were neither. Could Tl\u00e1loc change our course? It was worth a try.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Museo Templo Mayor<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/templo-mayor-rain-god-card.png\" alt=\"Tl\u00e1loc\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Tl\u00e1loc actually has his own entry on the Aztec calendar. As the god of rain, lightning and thunder, he was seen as a fertility god. He was widely worshipped as a beneficent giver of life and sustenance. He&#8217;s also a wrathful deity, responsible for both floods and droughts. So a mixed  bag on the change-your-luck front. We weren&#8217;t quite desperate, but&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Fuente de Tl\u00e1loc<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the artists inspired by Tl\u00e1loc was Diego Rivera. He contributed to a major installation in Chapultepec Park that&#8217;s dedicated to the diety. It&#8217;s an off-the-beaten path location. Why not start there? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Our cab dropped us off at the edge of Chapultepec and we had to make our way to the fountain from the drop-off point. We checked the park map. And my phone map. It was a short walk. Some kids at play temporarily distracted us. Why not? We were on vacation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video\"><video controls src=\"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/IMG_4006.mov\"><\/video><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Diego Rivera began the Tl\u00e1loc project in 1952, to commemorate improvements in the infrastructure of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.atlasobscura.com\/things-to-do\/mexico-city-mexico\">Mexico City<\/a>. What better place to start than the municipal water system? Created at the head of the Lerma River leading out to the city\u2019s reservoirs, Rivera created a massive tiled sculpture of Tl\u00e1loc, that spanned a pool 100 feet across.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/diego-rivera-tlaloc-4.png\" alt=\"Tl\u00e1loc\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Constructed lying on his back, water used to rush over the rain diety. (That water has since been diverted.) Note the two ears of corn in his outstretched hand. In Mexico, corn is life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/diego-rivera-tlaloc-1.png\" alt=\"Tl\u00e1loc\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/diego-rivera-tlaloc-2.png\" alt=\"Tl\u00e1loc\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p> As is characteristic of much of Diego Rivera&#8217;s output, he often worked at great scale. The size of the fountain is difficult to communicate in a single shot &#8212; or even multiple shots. To compensate for that, I took multiple videos. I thought, yeah, I&#8217;ll stitch &#8217;em all together. Someday. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video\"><video controls src=\"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/IMG_4086.mov\"><\/video><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video\"><video controls src=\"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/IMG_4090.mov\"><\/video><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Along with the fountain, Rivera also decorated the <em><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"C\u00e1rcamo de Dolores (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/C\u00e1rcamo_de_Dolores\" target=\"_blank\">C\u00e1rcamo de Dolores<\/a><\/em>. It&#8217;s a massive sump, once used to control water levels. The water originally flowed through the back of Tl\u00e1loc&#8217;s head (shown below) and into the sump. At some point &#8212; right about now &#8212; one starts to wonder about the practicality of these ambitions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/tlaloc-back.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>As luck would have it, the <em>C\u00e1rcamo<\/em> was open. For a small fee. In the photo below, you can (barely) see the back of Tl\u00e1loc&#8217;s head (top center). The water once ran from the sculpture and then through the elaborately painted interior of the <em>C\u00e1rcamo<\/em>. Not your ordinary sump, the then-underwater mural was called&nbsp;<em>Agua, el origen de la vida<\/em>&nbsp;(&#8220;Water, source of life&#8221;). <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/diego-rivera-tlaloc-interior.png\" alt=\"C\u00e1rcamo\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Teotihuacan<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p style=\"text-align:left\">We were not looking for Tl\u00e1loc at <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Teotihuacan (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/we-cant-seem-to-get-out-of-town\/\" target=\"_blank\">Teotihuacan<\/a>. But he was there, at the <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\"Temple of the Feathered Serpent (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Temple_of_the_Feathered_Serpent,_Teotihuacan\" target=\"_blank\">Temple of the Feathered Serpent<\/a>. I had to look it up, though. And I learned that, depending on who you believe, he was there in plentitude. <em>Water, source of life<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/teotihuacan-serpent-tlaloc.png\" alt=\"Teotihuacan\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Anthropology Museum, Mexico City<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Unbeknownst to me, my first encounter with the diety came at the Anthropology Museum in Mexico City. There is a reproduction of the Temple of the Feathered Serpent and Tl\u00e1loc is a star. Suddenly we&#8217;re no longer in the land of luck. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is serendipity. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/images\/tlaloc-antropologia.png\" alt=\"antropologia\"\/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was born in the rain city, also known as Seattle. In Mexico, they have a god for that. The&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[91,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-mexico"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Tl\u00e1loc: Water, Source of Life - Leland E. Hale<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Tl\u00e1loc is the Aztec god of water. Diege Rivera built a Tl\u00e1loc installation in Mexico City as an infrastructure project. 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