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El santero zurdo: The left-handed painter of saints

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El santero zurdo: The left-handed painter of saints

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Content EL SANTERO ZURDO: THE LEFT-HANDED PAINTER OF SAINTS
by
Sharon Berman
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTERS OF ARTS
(VISUAL ANTHROPOLOGY)
May 2005
Copyright 2005 Sharon Berman
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UMI Number: 1427966
Copyright 2005 by
Berman, Sharon
All rights reserved.
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DEDICATION
For my parents, Irv and Lila Berman,
and in loving memory of Ben Gabaldon
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My deepest gratitude goes to Ben and Jeannie Gabaldon, whose generosity
and good humor made us feel welcome from the moment we met.
Profound thanks to Juan Wijngaard for his support and deep insight
throughout the project.
I am indebted to Andrei Simic for inviting me to take part in this project and
for his strength of spirit.
Thanks to Ben’s sister Flora and his niece Angelina for taking the time to talk
with us. Many thanks to Charlie and Debbie Carrillo for welcoming us into
their home.
Thanks to Christy Snyder, my partner in this road trip.
Deep remerciments to Deirdre Evans-Pritchard and Nancy Lutkehaus for
their thoughtful direction.
Cheers to Zandy Moore.
Many thanks to my dear friends in no Limits for Women in the Arts for their
loving support.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication ii
Acknowledgments iii
Abstract v
Preface vi
Introduction 1
Chapter 1: The Project, The Players and this Paper 7
1. Affinities 7
2. Responsibilities 9
Chapter 2: Ben Gabaldon: El Santero Zurdo 12
1. Ben’s story 12
2. Ben’s father, Gregorio Gabaldon and his legacy 14
3. Ben’s wife Jeannie and their meeting 16
Chapter 3: Background 21
1. Catholicism in New Mexico: 21
a localized expression of devotion
2. Santeros and Saint-Making in New Mexico 23
3. Ben and Charlie: More than one way to be a santero 29
Chapter 4: Methodology 36
1. Preproduction: The Road Trip 36
2. First Contact 38
Chapter 5: Shooting and Editing Discussions 51
1. Films and Transmission of Information 51
2. Walkthrough of the film El Santero Zurdo 58
3. Expert voices 81
Conclusion 94
Bibliography & Filmography 98
Appendix: El Santero Zurdo - transcript of film 101
iv
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ABSTRACT
This thesis follows the process of making a film about the life and devotional
practice of a man in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
In retirement, Benjamin Gabaldon decided to learn to paint retablos—iconic
representations of saints in the Hispanic Catholic tradition—and in doing so
ultimately took on the responsibilities of a santero, or saint maker, coming full
circle back to the spiritual practices of his parents.
In the thesis, relationships between the film subjects and the filmmakers are
explored and research methodology and problems are discussed. Ben’s
personal expression as a santero is culturally and historically contextualized.
Readers are invited to consider the possibility that information found in films
is not only qualitatively different than information contained in books, but that
the two are complementary and of comparable value.
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PREFACE
!n the following pages I’ll describe the road we took to make a film about the
life and devotional practice of Benjamin Gabaldon and how the resulting
hour-long documentary was put together.
Chapter 1 introduces the film project and traces the relationships between
the main characters in the film and the filmmakers.
In Chapter 2, Benjamin Gabaldon’s life and relationships are put into
perspective relevant to the film—which of course was constructed around
Ben’s life. We meet Ben, his wife Jeannie, and learn about his family and
personal history.
Chapter 3 furnishes information about Catholicism as practiced in New
Mexico, the role of santos and santeros therein, and Ben and his mentor’s
personal expression and interpretation of their roles as santeros.
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In Chapter 4 our pre-production methodology is outlined, including identity
crises among anthropology students who felt they had been dropped into an
alternate reality.
Chapter 5 reflects on the gleaning of information from films. Commentary on
the film El Santero Zurdo is followed by a discussion of shooting and editing
decisions and character hierarchy.
I conclude by returning to the beginning of the journey, coming full spiral to a
place of recognition of the great gift we were given in getting to know this
generous simple man and his life.
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INTRODUCTION
Many films are a declaration of love, if we could but see it.1
Some years ago, a fellow student and I shared our concern with one of our
professors about an apparent bias against visual anthropology in traditional
anthropology circles, which we felt was being reflected and magnified in our
own department. He sided with the old school, referring with palpable
distaste to a tendency towards art in some ethnographic films, maintaining
that film was really only useful as an archival tool, in other words, as support
for written text. “ When you can make a film that contains as much
information as a book, come back to me,” he said as he shooed us
maternally from his office.
Since that discussion, I have encountered similar views that art is a lower
form of expression, certainly below that of the written word (which of course
1 David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998), 54
1
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is also an art form). Most of my fellow students—and I expect most
anthropological filmmakers—are drawn to the interdisciplinary dynamic built
into visual anthropology because of the powerful potential in that union of
approaches. In my opinion, it’s the best of many worlds in one neat package.
I am not so interested in proving superiority of one approach over another—
in fact, this kind of need for one idea to win over another is probably at the
root of much of our fine discipline’s disharmony, not to mention that of our
species. It is absurd to think that anything other than life itself can offer
complete understanding of the human experience. What a marvelous project
to undertake to communicate life experience through a poem, a piece of
music, a sculpture, an image or a book. What great insight it takes to then
combine many of these elements into a moving image projected onto a blank
wall or summoned into a glowing box.
I am tempted to make an argument for art, an argument for the visual path to
the study of human beings. But I was never good at arguments of this sort. I
2
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think these things speak for themselves—however I find myself forced to
discuss it here to fulfill my academic quotient...and I am glad to do it.
However, many thoughtful and eloquent people have gone before me, to
whom I owe much for the crystallization of my perceptions as well as sheer
inspiration and a reminder of why I am where I am. I refer to some of their
work below and am boundlessly grateful for their generosity and courage.
They will help me, not to argue, but to invite alternate pathways of
understanding.
In the pages that follow, I will discuss a film project that was passed on to me
by Andrei Simic, my professor and mentor. The film was to be about the life
and practice of a man in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Benjamin Gabaldon, who
decided late in life to take up the practice of a santero, or saint maker
according to Hispanic Catholic traditions in New Mexico.
“ You can’t start a story in the middle,” Benjamin “Gabby” Gabaldon is fond of
saying. “ You have to begin at the beginning.” Ben is retired now after
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working many years for the city of Santa Fe, New Mexico2. He had a variety
of positions during his tenure there ranging from traffic safety, pursuit driving
instruction, civil engineer, and peer counselor, to name a few. He was also a
champion boxer. But that was a long, long time ago. Ben is in his late 70s,
and lives in a brand new double wide mobile home with Jeannie, his wife of
30 years. “I don’t have a million dollars,” he says, “but I’m happier than
people that do.”
Ben suffers from congenital heart disease that took his mother and several of
his brothers at a very young age. He also has complications from arthritis,
which radically limits his mobility, and has chronic insomnia to boot. Yet Ben
radiates contentment and most people take an instant liking to this warm,
humble, unpretentious man.
2 Ben’s nickname Gabby is how he introduced himself to us. I use Ben in this paper
because he prefers it in this context.
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Ben sits at a small, paint covered table, in a small room he has made into a
studio, painting a clear blue sky onto a piece of wood shaped like a cutting
board. The painting depicts a man in a brown robe, standing in front of an
old adobe wall where some mud has flaked off, revealing the adobe bricks
underneath. The man smiles benevolently, holding an apple in one hand and
a loaf of bread and a cup of tea in the other. Two mushrooms sprout at his
feet and a chili ristrahangs from a nearby beam. 3 When the blue tempera is
dry, Ben quickly paints two small black “ Vs” that complete the picture—his
personal signature, birds flying in a clear blue sky. This is San Pasqual
Baylon, much loved patron saint of the kitchen, a golden halo hovering gaily
above his balding pate.
Privately, I equate Ben with San Pasqual and believe he is painting himself
every time he brings Pasqual to life on a new piece of shaped, sanded and
gessoed wood. For not only does Ben superficially resemble the saint—
especially the contented smile—but their life stories have some interestingly
3 A chili ristra is the omnipresent string or wreath of hot chilis hanging on doors, walls and
along porches in the New Mexican landscape.
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parallel elements...but let’s not start the story in the middle—we should really
begin from the beginning.
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CHAPTER 1 :
THE PROJECT, THE PLAYERS AND THIS PAPER
1. Affinities
Andrei Simic and his late wife Jacqueline were vacationing in Santa Fe and
happened to be staying at one of the hotels where Ben and Jeannie had a
gift shop. Andrei writes, “In August of 1989, while visiting Santa Fe with my
wife, I met Benjamin in the small gift shop that he and his wife owned at that
time. We purchased three of his retablos, and, as we were about to leave,
he asked us: ‘Where are my saints going to be living?’ This personification
deeply impressed us, suggesting that the significance of his retablos
transcended that of simple works of art. It was obvious that these retablos
represented for the artist both an act of religious devotion and a personal
quest.” 4
Andrei soon became inspired to make a film about Ben, and proposed the
idea to him. Ben was amenable, and Andrei began applying for grants.
4 Andrei Simic’s Request for Funds, 1997.
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Although no major funding ever came through, Ben and Andrei established a
good relationship via correspondence and telephone calls.
I met Andrei Simic, professor of anthropology at USC, the spring before
being admitted to the visual anthropology program there. I was living in
Montreal at the time and traveled to the west coast in order to get a feeling
for the program, had set up an appointment with the office by phone and
didn’t know what to expect. The minute Andrei opened the door I liked him
instantly and felt it was mutual. We spoke of a myriad of subjects and when I
emerged I felt we’d had a real conversation and hoped we would have a
chance for more. Andrei taught two of my initial courses at USC and we
continued to appreciate one another, so it felt natural that we continue
working together when, early on in my coursework, Andrei asked me to direct
the film he’d been attempting to get off the ground for years. I was familiar
with the project and thought it was a wonderful subject for both a
documentary film and a master’s thesis.
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Christy Snyder and 1 met in a teacher’s assistant training course when we
entered the visual anthropology program and have been fast friends ever
since. She and I share many life philosophies and viewpoints, and most
importantly a reverence, love and deep appreciation for the people, places
and things in this world. It was no surprise that we ended up collaborating on
this project, although at first this was not the plan. Christy also had an affinity
with Andrei, so when we decided to team up on the film project it seemed the
perfect arrangement for all concerned.
2. Responsibilities
Despite my delight in being asked to realize the project, I felt heavy with the
responsibility of making someone else’s film and believed I was way out of
my realm, as I had not made a full length documentary before. Andrei told
me, charmingly, reassuringly, genuinely: “Make it your own film. You’re the
director.” Yet I felt it was my obligation to attempt to satisfy the somewhat
daunting ideas in the grant proposal, and was aware that Ben might have
some expectations of his own as well.
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It was a complex arrangement of responsibilities. Not only was this to be a
documentary film, it was also my thesis project, and in addition to being co
director, producer, cameraperson and editor I was also a graduate student.
Andrei wore many hats as well, simultaneously serving as head of my thesis
committee and executive producer for the film.
After my initial journey to meet Ben and his family, Christy and I traveled
together a few months later to Santa Fe. After she decided to formally join in,
much weight was taken off my shoulders. Even so, the complexity thickened.
There were levels of roles and relationships (and some reversals thereof)
throughout this project that were at once reassuring, discomfiting and ever
changing. It took a while for Christy and I to figure out that we would be
happiest co-realizing as opposed to one of us directing and the other
producing.
To prepare for the first trip out to meet up with Ben and his family, I read the
materials from Andrei’s files—articles, correspondence between him and Ben
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and the ill-fated grant proposal. I asked Andrei to give me an idea of what he
wanted ideally out of the film. He replied that he wanted the viewers to come
away with a sense of the many paths to a spirituality, that beyond activism
and ethnic clamor are people who are expressing their identities in quiet,
unobtrusive ways. He wanted viewers to get a sense of old age, overcoming
obstacles in one’s life, and a feeling for distant ancestral ties. Andrei wanted
Ben to come away with the feeling that his life and works have been
immortalized and that he has received recognition for who he is. He also
wanted Ben to feel that Hispanic culture is recognized as being a distinct
culture of its own.
Sounded great to me. I had only a vague idea how to transform some of
those concepts into filmic language...but ever the optimist, I was confident
much would be transmitted naturally by virtue of what we intended to shoot. I
also spent a lot of time drawing up a script—in one sense useless in a
documentary but in another invaluable—after a preparatory visit to the capital
city of New Mexico.
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CHAPTER 2:
BEN GABALDON: EL SANTERO ZURDO
1. Ben’s Sforv
Benjamin Alfonso Gabaldon was born in Santa Fe, New Mexico on
September 3, 1926, the youngest of five children. Their father Gregorio was
a sheepherder and adobe maker who was to become a skilled artisan later in
life. Their mother, Emilia, had a great sense of humor but due to congenital
heart disease (which was to afflict many of her children) died in her forties.
Although Ben was only 8 years old when his mother passed away, he still
remembers her strong devotion to certain saints and how she would walk
through the house of a stormy night, holding an image of Santa Barbara in
her arms and praying for her protection.
Flora was the eldest of the five children, and when their mother passed away,
she took over the care of her siblings even after her own marriage and the
birth of her first child. After their father Gregorio’s death many years later,
Flora continued to live in the house he had built for his family on Camino del
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Monte Sol. Ben’s grandmother at one point had owned much of the land
along Camino del Monte Sol, where Ben’s father had built two houses for his
family. Ben spent most of his youth in this second house, which Flora
continued to live in until her niece Angela purchased it from her.
Ben grew up under the care of his father and sister. One of his brothers
taught him to box, and Ben’s left handedness transformed a blight into a
blessing when he became a boxing personality:
I had a very successful boxing career, in which I fought over
a hundred amateur bouts. I had 55 professional fights, 38
knockouts, I was never knocked out, and I was pretty well
known.5
When he was 19 years old Ben married his first wife, and his grandmother
sold him the lot next to his father’s house for the symbolic sum of $100. He
built a house and lived there with his first wife until he lost it in their divorce.
Ben was married once more before finding Jeannie. By the time we met him,
he was a recovering alcoholic and had been on the wagon for many years.
5 Ben Gabaldon, videotaped conversation, 1997
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2. Ben’s Father. Gregorio Gabaldon and his Leaacv
Spanish Colonial furniture making, with its characteristic hand-chiseled
carved detail and mortise and tenon construction had all but disappeared by
the 1890s due to assembly line furniture imported by train. However, the
early part of the 20th century saw a revival of Spanish Colonial arts,
developed and encouraged by Anglo-Americans6 from the Santa Fe and
Taos art colonies, “ who found the simplicity of handcrafted art from the
Colonial past a welcome antidote to mass-produced goods churned out by
the industrial age.” (Cirillo 1998, 70).
William Penshallow Henderson was one of the Anglo artists producing and
promoting Spanish Colonial crafts in the early part of the century. Ben’s
father Gregorio, who had been a sheepherder and adobe brick maker up until
this time, went to work for Henderson, who taught him to make furniture after
the Spanish Colonial tradition.
Mr. Henderson would design furniture, and my dad would
make it...Mary Cabot Wheelwright...moved to New Mexico
6 Anglo-Americans had begun to migrate to New Mexico after the opening of the Santa Fe
Trail in 1821.
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and fell in love with Indian culture [and] she had the money
to build the Navajo Museum.7 Mr. Henderson designed the
building, and my father was in charge of the building, and
he and an Indian man from San Juan [Pueblo] named Paul
Dojer did all the woodwork. They did the windows, the
doors, the carving, the furniture, everything...and my father
was in charge of the actual building of the museum.8
Gregorio became very skilled at furniture making, and filled his own house
with the beautiful, sturdy stuff, most of which Ben’s sister Flora inherited and
still uses. The family is very proud of Gregorio’s handiwork and believe much
of their resourcefulness and artistic ability (of which there is plenty) can be
traced to him. Regarding his father’s skill and efficiency, Ben told us that his
father was so good at assessing by eye how much wood a particular job
would take that after cutting up the wood nothing would remain but sawdust.
Gregorio was not of a traditional lineage of artisans, yet he became part of
something important—a rebirth of Hispanic tradition, a movement—that was
to continue well past his and Henderson’s lifetimes. And for his children and
grandchildren, his intelligence and skill were strong influences on them,
7 Since renamed the Wheelwright Museum.
8 Benjamin Gabaldon, videotaped conversation, 1997.
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especially little Benny, who would reclaim another aspect of the Spanish
Colonial arts that in fact fused together his father’s artistic abilities and his
mother’s religious devotion when he decided many years later to learn the art
and craft of the santero.
3. Ben’s wife Jeannie and their Meeting
Jeannie Gabaldon grew up in Baseville Arkansas, about 100 miles from Little
Rock, the daughter of a Baptist deacon. She went to business school in
Nashville, married and had three children with her first husband, who died
while the children were still young. Jeannie’s two sisters both lived in Santa
Fe, and they invited Jeannie to visit them after her husband’s death. She
took them up on their offer, and says of her impression of Santa Fe, “I loved it
so much I went back, sold my home, gathered my children, came back, and
I’ve been here ever since.”
That was in 1965. One of her sisters was badly burned about a year later and
died from complications from the bums. Jeannie decided to take up nursing
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and became a licensed LPN. Jeannie met Ben when she was nursing a
prisoner he was guarding in one of his many job incarnations. This “model
prisoner,” as she calls him, was a kind of angel in disguise, informing Jeannie
that Ben was interested in her, and encouraging her to go out with him.
Jeannie wasn’t sure she was ready to get involved yet and when on their first
date Ben was due to pick her up at home, she became so nervous she stood
him up. “I liked him,” she says, “but I just really wasn't quite ready to
become involved. So then I did go out with him, and I thought, well, you
know, he's okay. After that, we started dating a lot. And we were married on
May 25th, 1971.” 9
Born and raised Baptist, Jeannie had long been disillusioned with that branch
of Christianity. Although her father had been a deacon in the church, she felt
it was too strict and hypocritical. When she moved to Santa Fe, she began
attending Catholic church with her sister, who herself had married a Catholic
man. Many years after she and Ben married, Jeannie decided to convert.
9 Videotaped conversation, 1997.
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S: [W]hat made you decide to take the step? And when
did you do that?
J: It’s been two years. It will be two years in September.
[Ben] did not influence me either way. Because, see, I was
attending the Catholic church when I met him. And for a
long time he thought I was Catholic. He never asked me
and we just never discussed it. And so I decided I would
takes my steps to become Catholic. I said at least I’ll be
buried a true Catholic. It was late in life.
And then he wanted to—us to be married in the
church. He said that's one thing, before he leaves this world,
that he would like to be married in the Catholic church. So, I
took my steps to become Catholic. I went to classes for
about nine months...And then September the second, Father
Jerome renewed our vows in the Catholic church.
S: So you and Ben have been married twice.
J: We've been married twice. I never thought I'd see the
day I'd marry the same man twice. But I would do it again. I
don't know if he would, but I would.
Significantly, it was Ben who wished them to have their vows renewed in the
Catholic church. Though these had not been huge issues for them in the
past, Ben and Jeannie are proud of these recent developments.
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Though initially apprehensive as anyone might be with their new in-laws,
Jeannie feels very close to them now, especially since the passing of her two
sisters.
Q: Tell me what your impression of the Gabaldon family
was.
J: Well, I wasn’t sure at first. [I thought] Whoah, what am
I getting myself into? But you know, they have been so
good to me, and they treat me like a blood member of the
family, they truly do. Ben’s sister and I are very close; his
nephew and I; and we’re just one big happy family now. Well
they are my family since my sisters passed away. They’re
wonderful people, they really are. They’re very giving
people.
Q: What was it about them at first that you weren’t sure
about?
J: Well, I guess it was just me and nervousness—first
meeting your future in-laws, and I think they were skeptical
of me...maybe because I wasn’t Spanish, but then they
accepted me. My sister-in-law tells me I’m the best thing
that could’ve happened to Ben. She tells me that all the time.
So now I feel Spanish anymore. You know, I have very few
Anglo friends. They’re Spanish.
Now Ben and Jeannie get along and know each other so well they often
complete each other’s sentences.
B: We have been together for twenty-five years, and we
have gotten so close to each other that we seem to think
simultaneously about the same thing. Sometimes I’ll ask, is
there cantaloupe in the refrigerator, and she’ll say, you know
I was thinking about the same thing... Jeannie and I had our
ups and downs at the beginning, but now we know each
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other so well that we very seldom bicker about anything,
because it’s usually not worth it. And I feel that my
existence today is just to take care of her.
By the time we met him, Ben seemed to have few regrets and told us, “I think
I’m happier than if I were a millionaire, because I don’t have to worry about
losing my money, but I am happy with the life that I lead.”
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CHAPTER 3:
BACKGROUND
If I am painting a Santa Maria, I feel that she is with me in
the room.
--Ben Gabaldon1 0
1. Catholicism in New Mexico: a Localized Expression of Devotion
Each Catholic subculture seems to have its own style of devotional practices,
adapted and developed over time by the people’s own history and
experiences. Likewise, Hispanic Catholicism in New Mexico has its own
personality and characteristics that differentiate it from other Catholic
practices and expressions.
In the area now known as New Mexico, Catholicism, like the colonists,
struggled hard to survive. Several factors challenged the colonists’ faith: Not
only were the Catholic priests far too few to provide the growing colony the
kind of spiritual environment and leadership it was accustomed to, the
1 0 Recorded conversation, 1998
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priests’ primary mission was to focus on converting the indigenous people of
the land. (Cirillo 1998, 19) Therefore priests would make rounds throughout
the region, rarely having the time to devote much attention to the already
converted. The colonists’ active response to the dearth of religious
leadership produced a very specific brand of devotion which still today is
remarkable in its expression of faith, resourcefulness and strong community
ties.
Settlers were forced by circumstance in those early days to be increasingly
resourceful in order to survive. Similarly, colonial communities were driven to
create social networks and systems of worship to keep them going between
the infrequent visits of the priests. This included both formal organizations
such as the Brotherhood of the Penitentes, which operated (and continues to
operate) on a community level, and the less formal but equally dedicated
practice of women, who ensured that devotion flourished within the family by
maintaining the home altars and including the saints in household affairs.
(Cirillo 1998, 20)
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2. Santeros and Saint-Making in New Mexico
There is a strong visual element in Hispanic Catholicism, where iconic
representation of holy personages is a vital part of worship and devotion.
Saints are considered individuals and are treated as such—depending on his
or her need at a given time, a believer might pray to a patron saint, a favorite
saint, or a saint who has the power to resolve a specific problem.
In Catholicism, a saint is an individual who lived a life on Earth of “heroic
virtue” in serving God, and who is in some way responsible for the creation of
miracles in which “no human scientific explanation is possible.”1 1 Much
discussion and perhaps even confusion exists around the worship of entities
who are neither God nor Jesus Christ, in some circles considered an act
contrary to the monotheistic essence of Christianity. The Catholic Answers
website explains that saints are merely “ fellow Christians in heaven,” not
demi-gods. In short, the chain of command works as follows: a believer first
must pray or petition a saint for help, and then the saint will intercede by
1 1 Gabriel O’Donnell, “Saints and Saint Making in the Catholic Tradition,” The Living Light,
Winter 1998. (Washington, D.C.: Department of Education, United States Conference of
Catholic Bishops. Excerpted on the USCCB website at
http://www.usccb.Org/education/catechetics/livlghtwint98.htm#tradition)
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praying in turn to God on his or her behalf.1 2 Thus it is God, not the saint,
who ultimately answers the prayers.
Saints not only have individual stories and personalities but each saint also
has his or her own set of attributes.1 3 Santo Nino de Atocha protects
children, San Antonio helps retrieve lost items, and San Pasqual can be held
accountable either for a meal well cooked or ruined.
As a saint has particular attributes, a santo (the iconic representation of a
saint) equally has the power to govern particular concerns or life events and
to “protect against something that could or would cause evil.” (Carrillo 1998,
32) To believers then and now, a santo not only represents the real-life saint
who resides in heaven, it is “ empowered by the saint or holy person...[who]
gives power to his or her likeness created by a santero on earth.” (Carrillo
1998, 42) A santo then is not just a painted wood object, but acquires sacred
1 2 Catholic Answers, http://www.catholic.com/librarv/Pravina to the Saints.asp
1 3 Sometimes these attributes spring from the saint’s own often tragic story—as in the case
of Santa Barbara, who was burned to death for her faith by her own father, who in turn was
struck down by lightning. Among other things, Santa Barbara has the power to protect her
flock during storms and inclement weather.
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qualities which remain vital as long as it continues to be used in a devotional
context.1 4
Santos were hard to come by in the early colonial times, and the settlers
naturally looked inwards to provide for these needs as they had become
accustomed to do in their new environment. The santos took the form of
bultos, 3-dimensional carvings, and retablos, 2-dimensional paintings, both
using locally acquired wood. The artisans who crafted these santos were
normal members of the community who took on this practice in response to a
need—either their own or someone else’s—and would later come to be
known as santeros (saint-makers or makers of holy images). (Carrillo 1998,
31) These men and women worked individually or in groups—besides a
number of individual santeros, there were several schools or houses (called
talleres) under a master santero’s name in colonial times. (Cirillo 1998, 21)
These were self-educated artisans, taking inspiration from images they had
1 4 Carrillo 1998, 49 notes that santos continue to possess these sacred qualities until their
devotional use has ended, such as disposal by burial, burning or selling (most often to art
collectors).
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seen in the rare paintings imported from Mexico or from mass cards, prayer
books, and even images created by their contemporaries.
Today’s santos look quite similar to their 400 year old incarnations. This is
probably due in part to the nature of tradition, where knowledge is passed
down over generations and in part to the heavy influence of the Spanish
Colonial collectors’ in the early 1900s. (Cirillo 1998, 23) Santos then and
now are characterized by what the art world calls “naive” styling—the
retablos do not usually attempt to portray perspective nor do the bultos
endeavor to look like real people.1 5
The historical golden age of santero art lasted for about 100 years, from the
mid-18th to the mid-19th centuries. (Cirillo 1998, 21) The isolation of the
settlers in the territory during that time, both from sacred and secular
1 5 Barbe Await and Paul Rhetts hypothesize that one of the reasons these Spanish Colonial
images were almost medieval aesthetically is because the Renaissance reached Spain later
than the rest of Europe, so the settlers in the New World never had the chance to absorb the
newer, three-dimensional perspective that flourished in Europe during their own lifetimes.
(Await and Rhetts 1998,17)
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resources, encouraged a creative intelligence among the people that has
endured to this day, and the arts flourished in New Mexico until a
combination of developments threatened to destroy the tradition altogether.
Many factors contributed to the first and possibly most deadly fall of
traditional arts and crafts in northern New Mexico. First, the opening of the
Santa Fe Trail in 1821 brought not only imported goods to the region but a
whole new crop of people as well, English-speaking newcomers with their
own set of values and beliefs. (Await and Rhetts 1998, 19) In time,
imported, factory-made objects would all but replace the handmade items
fashioned by the colonists. The appearance of the railroad in 1880
heightened the influx of newcomers—not only settlers, but travelers—to New
Mexico and saw the beginning of the collection of Native American and
Hispanic art which would for the first time travel outside its native region.
(Carrillo 1998, 46)
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On top of the shifting of values from an economy which had relied on barter
and handmade crafts to the more prefabricated, capitalistic ideals of the
Industrial Revolution, there was pressure from the sacred arena as well.
Tradition has it that the French-born Archbishop Jean Lamy, named the first
Bishop of Santa Fe in 1851, discouraged the use of local devotional art in
houses of worship, instead electing to replace them with plaster
reproductions from Europe and the Eastern United States. (Await and Rhetts
1998, 19)
Although some santeros continued to practice their art and pass the
knowledge on to their children, traditional arts and crafts all but died out by
the turn of the century. Some maintain these traditions were saved only by
the interest of collectors and art societies in the early part of the 20th century
together with the Depression era WPA program of the 1930s, both of which
encouraged a revival of Hispanic art. Santero Charlie Carrillo believes that it
was the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s that truly allowed his
people to take back—he uses the term “reclaim” —their traditional art forms.
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Now, in the beginning of the 21st century, it would seem that these traditional
art practices flourish in what could be called a second golden age.
3. Ben and Charlie: More Than One Wav to be a Santero
After Ben retired in 1984, Ben and Jeannie opened two hotel gift shops. It
was something Jeannie had been wanting to do for some time, and when the
opportunity arose to take over a friend’s business, they jumped at the
chance. These shops catered to Santa Fe’s vital tourist trade, and they
carried items that would soothe the weary traveler as well as provide a one
stop shop for cultural mementos. Indian and Spanish crafts were popular
items, and Ben took up jewelry making a la Native American, and also went
to the local community college and took a workshop on retablo making.
Ben’s teacher was the well-known santero Charlie Carrillo. Although Charlie
is some 30 years Ben’s junior, Ben still calls Charlie his mentor, and uses the
information and wisdom he acquired in the class conscientiously and with
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great respect. We asked Ben and Charlie about this first meeting, and
included the following exchange in the film:
B : So, I met him then, and he told me, well he told the
class, when you first start painting retablos, follow the
pattern of the style of a santero whom you admire, or the
kind of work you think you can emulate, then as time goes
on, you will develop your own style...And that’s what’s
happened to me. And I owe a lot of what I—most of what I
learned to Charlie, and the rest is just what I-
CC: But you continued studying. That’s the important
thing. You didn’t stop—I tell people, unfortunately, a lot of
people learn how to do it, and that’s the day they stop...I go
into homes all over Santa Fe, and I know your style. So I
can spot it a mile away. I can walk in a room and say,
“ There’s your style,” and everything else. So that’s, that’s—
B : See, one of my trademarks are couple of birds.
CC: Yeah.
B : Anytime I can find a background, I’ll have birds.
CC: Yeah, those little...
B : See? And that is my personal trademark.
CC: Trademark, yeah. So that‘s, you can always spot
those on a lot of your pieces and everything else.
Besides being a respected santero, Charlie has a Ph.D. in anthropology. He
grew up in Albuquerque and now lives in Santa Fe with his family. He and
his wife Debbie currently support themselves entirely from their traditional art
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practices. Charlie makes retablos, bultos and constructs altar screens, and
Debbie makes micaceous utilitarian ware.
Although historically a santero’s knowledge is passed down along family
lines, Charlie, like Ben, made the decision as an adult to learn the santero’s
craft. Though neither of their parents were santeros, both Charlie and Ben
had been raised Catholic and were intimately familiar with the saints and
devotions of the Hispanic New Mexicans. Charlie has never ceased his
studies and is still looking for scholarly answers to questions he and others
posed long ago. Ben is an amateur historian and reads voraciously, keeping
active files on santos and relevant New Mexican history in his studio. These
two men, like others in their community, made a conscious decision to take
on the traditional art practices of their ancestors.
Charlie and Ben are members of the same church, Santa Maria de la Paz
Catholic Community, an elegant newer structure on the outskirts of town.
Charlie’s art is prominently featured along with other traditional art there.
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Ben serves at Mass, sometimes during the service, but always afterwards,
directing traffic on the busy road as churchgoers come and go. In spite of
their involvement at Santa Maria de la Paz, Ben and Charlie rarely see each
other except in passing on the occasional Sunday and do not move in the
same circles. Even so, they were both delighted when we approached them
and asked them if they would be interested to get together and chat on
camera.
Although Ben considers Charlie his mentor, he does his own research and
pondering and has come to his own conclusions about the history and
evolution of traditional Hispanic arts since the colonial times. The following
excerpt from the film demonstrates their individual and somewhat
complementary thinking.
CC: This is my 20th year at Market, and urn, when I went to
Market for the first time there were 35 artists at the Market;
there’s 350 people at Market now. So a tenfold increase, you
know.
B : See, the resurgence of retablos and Hispanic furniture
came about during the WPA program that was in the 30s.
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CC: 30s, yeah that’s right. And then, that kind of leveled
off, and then, I really, it’s hard to believe but I think the Civil
Rights Movement in the 60s and 70s of all things had an
impact on all this.
B: Mm-hm.
CC: Because people were again told they could have a
voice. You know? And then people began to have a voice,
saying, this is our, these are the things we grew up with,
these are the things we believe in, let’s reclaim them. It was
kind of like a re—well, look, 1 mean both of us are perfect
examples. Your family weren’t santeros, nor were mine, but
we’re reclaiming that tradition, we’re reclaiming that to say
"This is -
B : There’s a resurgence.
CC: There’s a resurgence. And actually in a sense it’s
reclamation. We’re reclaiming this as our art form, and the
furniture, the weaving, the tinsmith, everything. The people
are reclaiming it... I think, I’ve always told my own people, we
don’t have to be loud or boisterous and revolutionary to
reclaim what’s ours, and the way you reclaim it is you grab a
hold of the tradition and start living it.
Charlie is careful to reinforce the idea of active and conscious choice among
his people to practice traditional arts and insists on the term “reclamation” to
describe the phenomenon, whereas Ben sees it more as a current or wave
that people are more passively swept up in, illustrated by his choice of the
term “resurgence”. In a way, each of these terms fits each of these men’s
approach to being a santero and the spirit with which they practice their art.
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in the film, Charlie discusses the relatively modem devotion of San Pasqual,
whose association with the kitchen was originally incidental and now who is
considered the patron saint of that space and all activities associated with it.
Not only then is San Pasqual kind of a “ santo by default”, as Charlie calls
him,1 6 but as depicted by Ben he also seems a particularly agreeable
personality, a cheerful uncomplicated fellow who enjoys life to the fullest.
Similarly, it would seem that Ben fell almost unintentionally into being a
santero himself—he never once stated in our many conversations that he set
out to take on that role consciously. In pursuing a yen to leam how to make
retablos to sell in their shop he found something far more profound than he
expected, and over time Ben found his niche somewhere between hobbyist,
historian, and holy man.
Perhaps not exactly parallel to San Pasqual Baylon’s story, Ben’s journey to
the simple life he and Jeannie now live has still not been without its share of
surprising twists and turns. Even the nickname he gave himself, “ el Santero
1 6 See the film transcript, Appendix I.
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Zurdo”, is somewhat ambiguous—how is one to interpret such a title? It’s a
fun and funny moniker, but it’s hard not to wonder if, with all the connotations
that go with the term “left,” or “left handedness”, there might be a
subconscious message there.1 7 Ben was teased in his youth for being left-
handed, and although his left hand earned him no small respect in the boxing
ring, his life story does not exactly follow the typical American ideal. While I
did prod the issue a bit, I never did manage to solve that particular puzzle with
Ben—plenty intelligent, he doesn’t seem to think about things that way. So I
will leave it as a teaser for those minds who will wander down the alternate—
dare I say, sinister— path to meditate on the message behind the medium.
1 7 Etymologically, “left” comes from an Old English (Kentish) word meaning weak or
worthless. Among the more straightforward definitions having to do with hand dominance,
“awkward”, “unlucky” and “dubious” are listed as secondary meanings. (The Chambers 20th
Century Dictionary, 1983, Edinburgh.) And as in numerous languages, in Spanish, the word
“zurdo” has similarly negative connotations to its English counterpart.
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CHAPTER 4:
METHODOLOGY
Image based media such as film and video rely extensively
upon the principle of discovery—the discovery of
relationships between images, linked not only by their
proximity but by their resonances.1 8
1. Preproduction: the Road Trip
The road trip is a tried and true analogy for discovery, exploration, self
knowledge, and other quests. On the physical plane it’s also a good time to
get to know yourself and your companion, be it a travel companion or the
companion you’re about to capture on film. I drove twice to Santa Fe for this
filming: first with my husband and his son, and then with a close friend who
became my filmmaking partner.
I had arranged for the preproduction trip to coincide with Holy Week (the
week preceding Easter) to meet the Gabaldons and any other people Ben
thought were important to the project. I hoped this would lay a good
1 8 David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
70
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foundation for the first shoot the following month. Introductions and
acquaintances would be covered and we would all have a clearer picture of
what to expect. I brought a video camera along with me—a heavy,
semiprofessional hi-8 rig—to document bits of this first meeting.
It was somehow perfectly fitting that the first meeting with Ben and Jeannie
was like a family visit, ending with Easter dinner at the Gabaldons.
I was filled with apprehension on many different levels that first trip. I was
going to meet a man I had never met, a sort of friend of a friend, and make a
film about him. I didn’t know how Ben perceived me or the project for that
matter. I knew he had a great admiration for Andrei from correspondence I’d
read and from the brief conversations we’d had on the phone. I was worried
he expected a Discovery Channel treatment of his life, which I looked down
on in principle for their mass-produced, sometimes insensitive treatment
while recognizing I could never match the production values of those types of
programs.
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2. First Contact
The first day in Santa Fe my husband, his son and I spent the whole day with
the Gabaldons. Jeannie had cooked up a special lunch to welcome us. It
was Holy Week.
Film Log - March 27, 1997.
Juan, Jan and I drove to Santa Fe to meet Gabby & Jeannie
Gabaldon. Arrived around 12:30 p.m., had lunch (tortilla
casserole, fresh potato bread, pinto beans w/ bacon, salad).
Sat around and talked. Drove in Juan’s van to Chimayo.
Passed more pilgrims along the way. Sat in the chapel for a
few minutes, walked into holy earth room (Jan collected a
bag of this)...Gabby flashed his honorary police badge at a
bunch of policemen who were standing in a circle by the van,
their cars blocking ours. They all shook hands and then
dispersed, letting us pass.
Ben and Jeannie are tremendously hospitable, generous people. They made
us feel instantly at home, which was a feat for such a motley crew. They
treated us like long lost family, and it really made a difference. We began
and ended that trip with a meal—when we arrived, a nice, home cooked
family lunch, and before we left they invited us to Easter dinner. The first day
they took us to visit El Santuario de Chimayo, a major pilgrimage spot during
Holy Week, which was in its final days during our visit. Ben regularly sold his
retablos in the gift shop there. That day we were tourists and left our
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cameras in the car—two years later we got permission to film on the site—
quite the accomplishment if you don’t have an “ in” or are not part of a
prestigious filming entity.
Even before meeting we had a special relationship thanks to Andrei and the
film project. Since the Gabaldons trusted Andrei and had known him for
years, they in turn extended that trust to us. In addition, there was an
interesting linguistic and art connection between Juan and Ben. Most
Hispanic New Mexicans of Ben’s generation are completely bilingual, gliding
back and forth between English and Spanish numerous times within a
conversation.1 9 Juan is from Argentina and is also an artist, so he and Ben
had a few major points in common. Ben had what I perceived as a habit of
calling Juan “ John." I kept correcting him in my ignorance and discovered
later that the lovely tradition of the bilingual gliding applies equally to names.
Sometimes Ben’s brothers were Joe, Pete and Jimmy, but other times they
1 9 People in the generations immediately following Ben’s did not tend to leam Spanish at all,
but their children—what would be Ben’s grandchildren’s generation—seem to show an
interest in owning the Spanish language and culture again. This is clearly seen in the
growing number of young artists who display their work at the Spanish Market and other
cultural and religious festivals.
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were Jose, Pedro and Santiago. These applied equally to Juan’s son Jan,
who Ben also called John.
I had made this preproduction trip to meet Ben and his family, see his
childhood home, witness part of the process of retablo making so I could
return with a more concrete idea of his life and practice and prepare for
filming. I was also there to satisfy Ben’s curiosity about the unknown
filmmakers who would be documenting his life.
It was Ben who initiated our several discussions about the film itself. He
wanted to know, naturally, how I fit into the scheme, and what part I would
have in realizing the vision he and Andrei had been dreaming up together for
years. The first day he asked me a question that drove home how little
practical communication there had been between Andrei and me.
Film Log - March 27, 1997.
We drove back—Gabby asked me what Andrei and my
relationship was re. the film. I felt very uncomfortable, as if I
had to cover up something. Later I realized that I felt it was
Andrei’s job to tell Gabby that stuff, not me. Discussing it
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later with Juan, we both felt I said what had to be said and
that it will all be fine. And yet I feel it would be good to
mention it to Andrei.
I was obviously so uncomfortable 1 didn’t even write down what I said to him
in response. I seem to recall speaking vaguely about it being a student film,
that I was the director but would be working off of Andrei’s initial concept to
make a film about Ben that would center around his work as a santero. That
is in fact how it worked out. But I think I expected Andrei to clue Ben in so
that when I arrived I would already have a place carved out for me, the
basics covered and little explaining to do. I felt a certain formality was
missing—like a formal introduction or passing of the torch.
Ben and I spent the next few days together while Juan and Jan went off
exploring. He took me to the childhood home his father had built on Camino
del Monte Sol. It was in the middle of major renovation—his sister Flora had
recently fallen ill and had been encouraged by her son to sell it and move to
another location. Almost every family plot of land had been sold off to
strangers and only one other house still remained in the family. Ben’s niece
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Angelina, who had married a military man and lived in another state,
convinced her husband that they should purchase the house from her aunt
so that it could stay in the family. He agreed and they moved into the small
house Angie felt so passionate about. Next door was the house Ben had
built with his own hands for himself and his first wife who is now Angie’s
neighbor.
Ben took me to his old school, showed me his brother’s house and pointed
out the irrigation ditches, fed by the Rio Grande, called acequias which in his
childhood had been cooperatively used and operated according to local
tradition. I fell in love with the concept of the acequia, somehow feeling it
was symbolic of the Hispanic spirit in New Mexico. The acequias had gone
dry but were just beginning to enjoy a renewed interest in the community.
They’d been cleaned up, were full of water, and were being put to use once
more. I was to return to the idea of the acequias time and time again but was
never able to find a natural connection between Ben’s life and acequias that
would make sense in the film.
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1 attended the Easter mass at Ben’s church. Ben served there and also
performed his weekly job as traffic safety director. Before the end of the
service he quietly excused himself and went out to the car. There he put on
a fluorescent orange vest and took out a safety wand, and proceeded to the
busy intersection that fed into the church parking lot. He conducted traffic
safely until the lot had emptied, then walked to the side of the road where
Jeannie had parked the van after the service and was now waiting for him, as
she always did.
Back home, Ben showed me how he cut and sanded boards before gessoing
and painting on them. We had many conversations about his life and the
history of New Mexico. He was proud of his Spanish heritage and I learned
from him that most Hispanic New Mexicans of his generation refer to
themselves as Spanish, as opposed to Hispanic. They trace their ancestry
directly to Spain and feel there is no link to Mexico or to Native Americans—
although aware that intermingling did occur, their identification is primarily
Spanish.
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Ben liked to talk when the camera was on—he liked to teach, actually. He
had been a safety instructor and had had so many positions that involved
giving talks that it was second nature for him to fall into lecture mode, deadly
for filmmaking. This was a difficult mode for me to overcome—skilled
filmmakers know how to redirect and rephrase questions to more film friendly
levels of conversation, but at first all I could do was squeak out the
occasional—“Urn, Gabby, you don’t have to teach me everything at once...”
But we got along great and we have some good footage produced with the
giant hi-8 video camera that unbeknownst to me was on its last legs. Then,
on the last day, Juan and Jan joined us again for Easter dinner—and so did
Ben’s sister Flora and her mentally handicapped daughter Emilia. It was a
nice day and a lovely moment.
At some point after the meal, Ben asked me some more questions that sent
me reeling.
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Film Log - March 30, 1997
Today Gabby asked me what our intentions for the film
were—distribution and prospects, etc. Again I felt somewhat
stymied—what has Andrei been telling him? I don’t want to
dash his hopes. Told him that Andrei was hoping to produce
something— 1/2 hour or hour-long documentary suitable for
public television. I added that I saw this as a goal to aspire
to—something that would require a series of steps—
submitting it to festivals, etc. Gabby asked me who would
see it, who did we have in mind? I responded that I saw it
being a teaching film—anthropology, religion, Hispanic/ New
Mexico studies, etc.—then rippling outward
to New Mexico Santa Fe region and hopefully, if it made it to
national TV, interested viewers of all kinds.
I asked him what his dreams/fantasies for the film were
himself—he couldn’t answer directly—spoke about wanting
to help us do the film, that he felt fortunate to have been
chosen by Andrei, of all the santeros in New Mexico.
In the last 1/2 hour/hour before we left I feel our conversation
touched on some important stuff—about intentions,
assumptions, communication...thank God he asks me these
questions! The last question he asked blew me away—again
in the area of discovering how vague or nonspecific his talks
with Andrei have been. He asked me about the subject
matter of the film—I couldn’t be sure if it was a question or a
statement to be verified. Was it to be a film about Hispanic
culture/history/people in New Mexico, or a film about
santeros, where Gabby would u represent” santeros?
I told him that I wasn’t looking to take on such a broad
subject—wouldn’t presume to. I explained that I wouldn’t 1)
take on such a huge subject (in a student project) and 2) load
the huge and impossible responsibility of representing a
culture and such an individual expression as being a santero
onto one person’s shoulders. I told him that I thought it
would be more interesting and more feasible to make the film
about Gabby [himself] and in that way all the other stuff
would necessarily be brought in.
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Ben asked great questions which I answered as realistically and honestly as !
could. He had a sophisticated grasp on some larger issues which I was not
prepared to answer. I was concerned that issues of audience, distribution
and especially what kind of film it would be had apparently not been recent
topics of discussion between Andrei and Ben. It seemed to me that great
expectations hovered about and I wasn’t sure I would be able to realize them
all, nor was I sure I wanted to. It was too early to tell.
I returned to Los Angeles with several hours of footage and a much better
idea of who and what to prepare for on my return. I enrolled Christy to make
the second trip with me and assist me, after which we would become full
fledged partners.
We spent 10 days in Santa Fe on the first trip in 1977, staying in a musty
apartment complex on CerriiSos Road, not far from the Gabaldon’s home.
Andrei and his wife Maria joined us for a few days during that visit, which is
when the footage of Ben and Andrei was shot. The next year, in 1998,
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Christy and 1 , now full fledged partners, spent an entire month in Santa Fe,
and found an inexpensive and pleasant studio apartment to stay in very near
Ben’s childhood neighborhood.
Once our partnership was sealed, Christy and 1 decided to share the
responsibility for the film equally, if not the actual jobs. We each had our
strengths; where she was particularly good at keeping conversations flowing,
I was keen to shoot and think about imagery to complement the dialogue. I
set up the general elements, such as lodging, equipment and supplies and
general shoot schedule, and Christy took charge of coordinating individual
shoots once we arrived in Santa Fe.
The fact that we were able to make three separate trips to Santa Fe had its
advantages and disadvantages, much as shooting in video has its pros and
cons. That we were able to spend as much time as we did with the
Gabaldons made us all feel closer—we liked each other and it felt good to
see them each visit. We had time to get to know them and also get footage
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of Ben and Jeannie that revealed much of their warmth and love for one
another. The down side is that we shot over forty hours of footage and still
felt we needed more. This was partly due to our inexperience with shooting
and obtaining appropriate feedback. I have a good eye and an excellent
instinct for what to shoot but am unable hold a camera steady without a
tripod or other support gear. Christy has a steady arm but was not
comfortable with the responsibility of the technical side of things. In
retrospect it would have been valuable for both of us for her to venture more
in that direction, for she would soon have learned that she is quite competent
with equipment and I would have had a chance to try my hand at other
aspects of filming, such as directing the flow of conversation, something I
have since learned I also am able to do well.
We discovered after our first official shoot that Ben’s fragile health required
that we give him more time between visits to rest, and at Jeannie’s
suggestion arranged to see Ben every third day. We soon realized that what
had initially seemed inconvenient was a blessing in disguise; not only did this
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imposed schedule help us to feel we were more in touch with Ben’s needs
and therefore no longer in danger of imposing ourselves upon both him and
Jeannie, but it gave us a chance to schedule shooting and research trips that
did not require Ben’s presence. We visited Ben’s sister Flora, explored the
state archives and ordered some stills and film footage (copied onto video),
spent time at Santa Maria de la Paz Catholic Community filming and
speaking with staff, and filmed various spots in Santa Fe such as the Plaza,
Ben’s past and present neighborhoods as well as the surrounding
wilderness. We were also able to make good use of our time when we did
see the Gabaldons during shoots at their house and also traveling with them
to Chimayo as well as accompanying Ben when he gave a presentation to an
elder hostel group in Glorieta, about 30 miles southeast of Santa Fe.
I am not convinced I was ever able to satisfy Ben’s curiosity on the issues he
had brought up during that initial visit. I do suspect he continued to expect
the more familiar cable-style documentary than what we ended up with (he
did see our final cut, however). Christy and I contemplated these and other
matters deep into the night during and between our trips to Santa Fe, and
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again I feel that had we known how—or perhaps had the confidence—to
seek relevant feedback we would not have felt quite as in crisis as we
sometimes did. One of the largest issues facing any consciencious
filmmaker, especially one coming from a visual anthropology background, is
one of representation. Representing someone else’s life on film is no easy
task, and not one that we necessarily felt we were up to. This is one reason I
suspect we took several years to come up with an edited version of the film,
and several more before being able to write about it.
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CHAPTER 5:
SHOOTING AND EDITING
By encountering the world visually, the filmmaker creates an
art form that is complementary to a text, but surpasses it by
unveiling levels of experience for which words are
insufficient.2 0
1. Films and Transmission of Information
There is an irony in the disjunction that has grown up
steadily between anthropologists and filmmakers, in that
anthropologists ...have wished film to make...verifiable
descriptions of what can be seen... whereas filmmakers have
shown a growing interest in precisely those things that
cannot be seen...not the body but the experience of existing
in it 2 1
It seems to me that the what is truly problematic in the quest for the perfect
medium for transmission of information, anthropological or otherwise, is that
this pursuit would seek one trophy, one grail, one medium as victor. Books
or film. Film or books. However, there can really be no winner, because
nothing can substitute for experience, a life lived, knowledge gathered
through the senses and over time, taken together, digested, internalized,
2 0 Sharon R. Sherman, Documenting Ourselves: Film, Video and Culture. (Lexington: The
University Press of Kentucky, 1998), 254
2 1 David MacDougall, Transcuiturai Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
121
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absorbed. There is no way to convey the totality of one’s life experience.
Not through writing, artwork, film or some kind of computer aided virtual
reality setup. Yet more difficult is the attempt to convey someone else’s life
experience.
My mind keeps returning to my former professor’s assignment to new
graduate students confused by the seemingly conflicting attitude in
anthropology that both embraced and shunned the newer discipline of visual
anthropology. His mission for us? “Show me a film that contains as much
information as a book...” I find it fascinating that books—in this case
ethnographies—should be thought to contain more information than films. Is
it possible to compare 200 pages with 60 minutes of film? Is it possible to
compare apples and oranges? Of course it is. In fact, it’s really fun to
analyze and compare things. That’s why academia is so successful. Human
beings love to qualify the essence of things—once necessary to our survival
it has become a favored and respected pastime. But is it possible to
compare the value of the essence of things on any but the most subjective
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level? Subjectivity is not bad or good, it simply is. It simply is dependent on
a body for its perspective.
If goodness, or quality, is purely subjective then it would be impossible for
any one person to truly know what is good or best other than for him or
herself. However, having said that, I am convinced that for my former
professor books are best, for he depends on books and their information for
his knowledge and is an expert at distilling and retaining information from the
written word. I am convinced that for others films are best and they get their
best information from film and visual media. And for yet others the ideal
might be a combination of the two, or another medium might be added to the
mix.
S suspect that in general our culture is not well trained to gather information
from film in the most efficient way. The weeks, months and years that it
takes to create a film cannot be understood in one viewing of the 60 minute
long result. The years it took subjects—or the filmmaker for that matter—to
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become who they are and do what they do cannot necessarily be absorbed
in an hour by a novice or untrained viewer.
An average novel is rarely read in less than a handful of hours, and an
information rich ethnography might takes days or weeks to read. Sometimes
readers take notes. Sometimes they underline interesting passages in
pencil. Sometimes they write a review or use it as a study aid in class.
These methods require more than one reading of the text, and they require
time for reflection in order to write a response or prepare for a discussion.
Therefore, if a film is to be “read” efficiently, it may require various viewings,
using the pause button or rewinding to review a certain scene. The sound
might be turned off, or the visuals might be extinguished in order to focus on
the audio. The film might be watched for body language on one viewing,
language use in the next, editing decisions in yet another. Time might be
taken to notice what was not included in the film, what questions arise during
viewings, and what questions are or are not answered in subsequent
viewings. Gleaning information from books and films takes time as well as
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practice—novels and ethnographies, feature films and documentaries each
require specific techniques for quality gleaning.
It is possible to read a book once and get a very acceptable amount of
knowing from that book. It is entirely possible to see a film once and absorb
a high amount of information from the one viewing. There are several
explanations for this kind of successful gleaning—It might be a very well
written book or a very well made film that translates its experience with
minimal effort by the reader or viewer. Then again, it might be a well trained
reader or viewer that has practiced techniques over time and learned how to
extract information from these mediums in a relatively short amount of time.
Most of us in the West raised in the latter half of the 20th century grew up
with television and movie theaters. Most of us have learned over our
lifetimes what to expect from a sitcom, a drama, a commercial or a feature
film, and with little effort can communicate its meaning to a friend or a
classmate. Yet most did not grow up reading academic treatments on ethnic
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minorities in foreign lands. A select few make a conscious choice and train
themselves to learn to use this material and understand it, with the instruction
and guidance of several experienced mentors. It would follow that even
fewer have learned to glean information from the documentary or
anthropological film in this kind of specialized way.
A filmmaker might have an agenda, in fact most certainly will have an agenda
which will be highlighted by virtue of what was captured on film and how it
was edited. But in spite of these intentions, a filmmaker cannot entirely
control what a viewer takes away from the film. “First premise,” states David
MacDougall in Transcultural Cinema, “ The filmmaker can never see the film
as others see it.” As the film unfolds, meaning comes together for viewers.
Where one person might remember one scene, one gesture, another might
recall a whole different set of moments, while for the filmmaker, “ the film is an
extract from all the footage shot for it, and a reminder of all the events that
produced it.” 2 2
2 2 David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
27
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“Information” is a term that in the end can have a whole range of definitions.
Today it connotes something highly respected, to be trusted and relied upon,
like the news, which furnishes information in the form of numbers, statistics,
facts—analytical, quantifiable information. Yet information can also be
experiential and subjective. Which kind of information is more real, and is
one of them is more valuable than the other? Again I feel the question is not
only moot, it is irrelevant. These approaches to knowledge are not polar
opposites, they are merely two tendencies which have matured in recent time
and have gained a fan base. MacDougall proposes that these two seemingly
opposed approaches to acquiring knowledge, analytical and experiential, are
complementary and comparable in value.2 3 I second that motion and invite
other, equally important ways of knowing to join in.
2 3 David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
93
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2. Walkthrough and Commentary on the Film El Santero Zurdo
[Anthropological films present a genuine process of inquiry.
They develop their understandings progressively, and
reveal an evolving relationship between the filmmaker,
subject and audience. They do not provide a ‘pictorial
representation’ of anthropological knowledge, but a form of
knowledge that emerges through the very grain of
filmmaking.2 4
In this section I’ll do a brief overview and commentary which will complement,
and not substitute for, viewings of the film. Some issues which came up
related to shooting and editing will be introduced here and expanded upon in
the following section.
Opening Scene. In this scene, shots of traveling along the freeway during
different hours of the day are interspersed with scenes from the Gabaldon
household.
Against the wisdom of recommended editing strategy, the opening scene of
the film was the first scene we put together. Much as the introduction in a
2 4 David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
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paper tells you what to expect, so do the opening credits of a film give the
viewer a taste of things to come. And, just as writing introductory sections to
a paper, filmic opening scenes are usually fashioned late in the editing
process, sometimes last. Long before we figured out how to put the film
together, we had made an opening scene, which remains in the film to this
day. To us, the opening scene represents the joy of discovery and inquiry
(see David MacDougall’s above quote), as well as the many providential
developments that made the process so rich for us.
Andrei/Ben 1: How they met. In this scene, Andrei and Ben are seated,
chatting about their initial meeting at the Gabaldon’s hotel gift shop.
This is one of the first shoots we coordinated, and it shows! We didn’t learn
until later that unless there are two cameras to work with, it is far easier to
seat two people close together than across the room from each other. We
had a hard time getting good reaction shots of Andrei in real time and didn’t
shoot them afterwards due to time constraints. Andrei doesn’t appear for
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long in the film, which might make his character less accessible than we
would have liked. It would have been good to shoot a few more
conversations with the two of them, or even Andrei in his office, which would
have given us more material to work with in terms of filling in the blanks.
Ben paints. Visual of Ben painting while Jeannie’s voice-over explains how
he got into being a santero.
This is fairly straightforward in terms of information, although it lacks a
subtitle to introduce Jeannie as Ben’s wife.
Ben with camera. One of my favorite moments in the film is when Ben does
his own filming. He had never used a video camera before, and I’d asked
him if he’d like to have a go at it. He learned quickly and proceeded to
document the dear things in his life, starting with his wife and dogs. He does
a lot of wonderful in-camera editing, short pans that show but don’t linger on
various elements around the house. He goes into each room of the house
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systematically, then outdoors to show his work area—the beloved cuartito (a
prefab shed), and the yard with a shrine to Mary and a few of his father’s old
tools hanging from the fence. Last, he returns to the house for the final two
rooms—the piece de resistance. First he takes us into the foyer where his
retablos hang, and finally into his little studio, where he paints the gessoed
pieces of wood.
B: This wall shows my collection of retablos. And I don’t
have too many in stock and that is one of the reasons I have
not entered fairs, because I do not have a large enough
inventory. They sell as fast as I make them...Saint Dominic.
San Pasqual, San Juan Nepomuceno, St. Francis, Santo
Nino de Atocha, Santa Maria con el Nino, y San Pedro. And
last is the crest of the Gabaldon family...This is a stock of my
retablos ready to be painted. And this is my Hispanic library.
This is the table I use to paint, with the trays to keep the
santos apart and keep them from being rubbed one against
another...my tray of different colored paints, and my radio.
My step-daughter Sally. A picture of Charlie Carrillo.
Some comment that this section is too long or too shaky—and we did edit out
a few bits—but that’s how Ben filmed it, and we were loth to separate the
original sound from the picture or to reshoot it. This is the only section where
Ben personally introduces us to his world, and his love and pride are evident.
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Carrillos 1. The first of three scenes at the Carrillos residence. Debbie
answers the door and welcomes Ben; he gives them a present of two of his
retablos; Charlie and Ben recount their meeting.
I would have liked the audio to be better for Ben’s entrance, as some of his
words are swallowed, especially as he enters their living room and admires
their “ collection,” 2 5 and after hugging Charlie and presenting him with his gift,
tells him by way of explanation, “ You’re my mentor.” This is all but lost in the
audio. I thought it was such a key moment I was tempted to subtitle it, but as
the film’s style is somewhat naturalistic we left it as it was. There is a lot of
information in this little scene—whether or not it can be gleaned upon a
single viewing is another story. Ben’s relationship with the Carrillos is shown
to be friendly but not familiar. Charlie and Debbie are very respectful towards
Ben, yet I’m not sure either one of them caught the meaning of Ben’s thank-
you gift, or heard him call Charlie his mentor. Yet they clearly enjoy the
2 5 Debbie was uncomfortable with this term and explained that the objects were mostly items
they had been given, not pieces they had sought out to display in their house.
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conversation around the table, which would never have happened had we
not orchestrated it.
Again I feel a second camera catching a wide shot would have been a great
help in this situation, where I ended up sitting at the round kitchen table
hand-holding the camera, panning (of course, unsteadily) from person to
person, attempting to get reaction shots au naturel without orchestrating it.
Now, years later, I would probably get in there and get better footage with the
use of different techniques and shooting reaction shots afterwards, though
the experience for the film subjects would be less natural.
In terms of subject matter, we shot three hours of material at the Carrillos
residence, some of it before Ben arrived. We had ideas about what subjects
were relevant to the story, yet in the editing process realized that almost all of
it had to stay on the cutting room floor. This was one of the most painful
decisions for us during the editing process, as we found much of the
discarded material fascinating and ultimately relevant in the big picture— but
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in terms of Ben’s story it would have been either a red herring or would have
diluted his side of the picture.
San Ysidro’s Storv. In this short scene, Ben tells this relatively humorous
miracle tale while he paints. Mostly the images are details of Ben’s San
Ysidro retablos and at one point there is a shot of a New Mexican field. This
is the first of several brief saint stories. We felt it was well placed after the
first Carrillos scene, where Ben has just given two retablos to his mentor.
There is no formal explication in the film about just what retablos are and
what they mean in the context of Hispanic Catholicism, yet the puzzle pieces
are all there. We decided our film would reveal bits of information along the
way, and hoped that by the end the viewer would have major questions
resolved.
Santa Maria de la Paz. This scene begins with shots of the exterior and
interior of the church, which is home to much traditional Spanish Colonial
religious art. Ben and Jeannie enter and attend mass, after which Ben
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directs traffic to and from the church onto the main highway. Jeannie picks
Ben up when he’s finished.
This scene is self explanatory on one level—the Gabaldons are faithful
attendees of the church and serve there as well. However, it is their
familiarity with the people at the church and the very routineness of their
service which transmits the importance of this ritual in their lives. Ben’s
previous work as volunteer policeman and safety instructor make him right at
home in this role as traffic officer.
Angelina 1. In this scene, Ben introduces the house he grew up in which his
father built, which his niece now owns and inhabits. In the introductory
segment, the house is being noisily remodeled behind him, and Ben’s audio
is weak. We placed a subtitle which attempts to explain where and when this
takes place to smooth the transition to footage shot a year later when the
remodel was finished. If we had decided to go the route of off-screen
narration by one of the characters (probably Andrei or myself), we would
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have been able to contextualize this more comfortably. As it is, I suspect the
tiny prefacing scene might take people out of the film momentarily while they
consciously work out what’s going on. However, we left it in despite its
imperfections as Ben does give valuable information about his and his
family’s connection to the house. The main content of the scene addresses
the house and the great amount of property that their family once owned
along Camino del Monte Sol. Clearly, Ben is no millionaire, and as Angie
points out, had the property remained in the family, they would all be sitting
pretty today. As it is, she and her husband were well off enough to purchase
the house that Angie has many fond memories of from her childhood.
We did want to include more about the changes that occurred in Ben’s
childhood neighborhood, but it seemed forced each time we tried adding a
scene about it. This once humble neighborhood is now home to some of the
most desirable property in Santa Fe, located dose to the much frequented
“Museum Row.”2 6 Some dirt roads remain in the neighborhood, but on the
2 6 Museum Row is comprised of the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, Museum of
International Folk Art, and Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian.
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whole streets are paved, and high walls insure privacy for the occupants,
effectively cutting them off from their neighbors.
Walls are photogenic and good symbolic fodder for films, but again we
weren’t able to justify focusing on them in the film. Walls were a common
presence when Ben was a child, but they were perhaps three feet tall at the
most. Now the neighborhood walls are typically six, eight, even ten feet high.
In addition to wall height, buildings that were primarily one story high have
been renovated and added onto in all directions. The locally made adobe
construction is still used but whereas the houses were regularly whitewashed
in Ben’s youth, most adobes have been painted a pleasant though precious
pink tint that has come to represent the Southwest in non-native minds. Tour
buses with loudspeakers frequent the increasingly busy streets of these
historic neighborhoods—and even Angie, who took much care in renovating
the family house in an authentic manner, felt her privacy was so invaded she
was sorely tempted to erect a high wall like the others.
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Ben’s Story. Ben tells us the story of his life while he paints. Visuals include
various shots of him painting interspersed with photos and details from scrap
books.
This is chock full of biographical information—not only the obvious details:
married three times, recovering alcoholic, boxing champ—but also Ben’s
acceptance of his journey, and his contentment with his chosen path,
especially the part that involves Jeannie. In a way, the painting footage is
somewhat limited—he is painting San Pasqual, so there is a lot of brown and
sky blue—but as San Pasqual is one of Ben’s patron saints and gets
mentioned several times, this keeps the theme going throughout the film.
We had acquired some archival stills and footage which we had intended to
insert throughout the film, especially in segments discussing the past, as Ben
does here—but it felt too impersonal and we ended up using very little.
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Glorieta. Ben drives to an educational institution in Glorieta, a more rural part
of New Mexico, and does a presentation for an elder hostel group. This is
one of several segments that include driving. There is a lot of driving in this
film, and should anyone care to connect driving and road trips to the idea of
self-discovery, it wouldn’t be misplaced. However we didn’t plan it that way;
it just seemed important to include the getting from one place to another in
the film. The footage of Ben’s presentation ended up being somewhat dull
due to several factors. Firstly, we didn’t have a good audio setup and were
forced to tape a microphone to a stand at one end of the long table which
displayed a selection of Ben’s retablos. Ben constantly traveled from one
end to the other, and then to the chalkboard and easel to illustrate his talk, so
it was difficult to include much of this footage, as he is constantly speaking
throughout the presentation. In addition, the first half of Ben’s presentation
ended up being a mini lecture on New Mexican history, which while eminently
characteristic of Ben’s approach—"you have to start a story from the
beginning” —was not the most charismatic footage. Both Ben and the
students brightened up when he got to his own work as a santero, and San
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Santiago’s story is included here, fittingly of a more historical nature than
some of the other, more moralistic and fairy tale-like saint stories:
B: This is San Santiago. He was the General MacArthur of
the Spanish army that pushed the Moors back to Africa. And
you will see on the bottom of each hoof is a face of a Moor.
You see? That is to give the picture a background or a
history. And that is to represent Santiago leading the Moors,
or conquering the Moors.
Carrillos 2. The discussion around the Carrillos’ kitchen table continues, the
subjects ranging from Ben’s painting style, San Pasqual’s story, and the
commercial aspect of retablos—what sells and why. Again, the footage at
the Carrillos is packed with information for anyone interested in the levels
inherent in any tradition (and since this is a devotional tradition there are
even more layers to take into account). I am aware of many unanswered
questions in this area—not necessarily missing from the film, but lacking in
my own personal knowledge. Some of these include how San Pasqual is
regarded in the community in general as well as the religious/devotional artist
communities. Is he taken as seriously and given the same kind of treatment
as some of the other, more “universally known” saints, as Ben puts it, such
as St. Francis, St. Jude and Mary? When Charlie talks about being able to
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recognize Ben’s style, what does that mean? Ben jumped in and talked
about his signature birds before Charlie could elucidate, and the conversation
took another turn. Another shadowy area is how santeros think about each
other’s work, and if there some kind of hierarchy or measure that they use.
Clearly, Charlie and Ben work in different spheres as santeros—yet how
does that affect the value of their work—“ value,” of course, being an entirely
subjective and contextually driven concept. One can speak of devotional
value and commercial value, somewhat self-explanatory concepts. Charlie’s
work might sell for more than Ben’s, but I wonder if devotional value can be
measured and compared other than by virtue of the santo’s involvement in
devotional activity. There is also personal value—for instance, the retablos I
have which Ben made are of great value to me because he is my friend, and
because the santos we have are special to me for my own reasons.
Santa Appollonia’s Storv. Here, 1 ask Ben to tell us one of the “bloody
woman” stories while the camera zooms in, too shakily, I’m sorry to say, on
his retablo of Santa Appollonia, blood pouring from her mouth as her teeth
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are being pulled out. While less than perfect technically, we felt it was
important to include one of these kinds of stories in the film, especially as
there are many of these women saints whose individual suffering has the
ability to comfort on a universal level.
The Plaza. In this brief scene, Ben explains that, whereas he could spend all
day downtown in his youth that today the Plaza has no draw for him or other
Santa Feans of his generation due mainly to the city’s focus on tourism. This
is the only scene that uses archival footage—and not much of it—but it
shows that physically the Plaza has altered very little although its function
has completely changed. Ben’s speaks in a voice-over as the images blend
one into the other, archival into contemporary. The connection with the
following scene may or may not flow for the viewer—for us it made sense
because we know that outsiders moving to Santa Fe affected the spirit of the
city as a whole as well as individual neighborhoods, such as Ben’s childhood
home. The transition to the continued conversation with Ben’s niece Angie
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therefore implies a greater rippling out from the center than one might expect
when talking about tourism’s influence.
Musical Interlude. Music performed by the church choir supports a montage
of images from and around Santa Fe, including Ben and his St. Francis
retablo. This two minute scene is a tip of the hat to many lovely elements
which did not make it into the film much or at all. This impressionistic
moment is unlike the other, more linear scenes, except perhaps the opening
scene.
Angelina 2. Angie shows us a tiffany-style lamp she has made using a
process she has for all intents and purposes invented. Ben and Angie speak
about Gregorio’s legacy, and how his skill, creativity and resourcefulness as
an artisan deeply influenced the entire family. Ben emphasizes the spirit of
“ make do” among the Hispanic people—this is something he mentioned
again and again in our conversations together, with a mixture of pragmatism
and pride.
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Andrei/Ben 2. While Andrei and Ben watch footage of Ben working on his
retablos, Ben briefly explains the process he goes through and compares it to
the historical tradition. Andrei almost forces Ben to admit that he is a
success by virtue of the fact that he has more orders than he can fill. This
little scene has a substantial amount of information available for the gleaning.
Not only in the comparison between old and new methods, but also touching
on how santeros are viewed by their communities. This is the only time Ben
mentions the status of his office:
B : I have read that in the old days the santeros were more
or less—not really revered, but looked upon as being more
Catholic than the general population because they went from
village to village painting santos and they were considered to
be a little more Catholic than other people. And I never
thought of myself that way, Tm just a regular Catholic, and I
was painting retablos and then I began to read up on the
different santos and became familiar with their lives. So
when I was painting a santo I was thinking about what that
santo meant to the people that wanted him.
Some santeros will promote themselves by virtue of this reputed holiness,
emphasizing their connection with a particular sacred practice, thereby
implying that their work has more value than that of others with less
impressive connections with the world above. And while Ben modestly
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denies any kind of elevated status, one could argue that his practice of
meditating on the saints’ significance to his clients while creating the retablos
is, if nothing else, a very special kind of activity indeed.
Ben also emphasizes that he does not consider himself an artist—this is
something his niece also strongly underlined in our conversations with her.
Being an artisan is an important distinction among this generation of
Gabaldons—Ben does not have to fret about artistic realism and can simply
put the colors where they ought to go. Perhaps this means to Ben that he
does not have to assume the responsibilities or the importance of an Artist,
but can enjoy what he does without having to justify or analyze his life.
Chimavo. Ben and Jeannie drive to and visit this sacred pilgrimage site
outside of Santa Fe. He takes a box of his retablos into the gift shop to sell,
and takes a snapshot with Father Roca, the head priest. Later, Ben can be
seen in another shop speaking with the Padre, and when he emerges, he
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informs Jeannie that his legs have just been blessed. “ Well, bless him,” she
replies. “Bless you,” she tells Father Roca, when she catches his eye.
This is one of the scenes that we spent the most time over. We wanted the
beauty and peacefulness of the place—which is really quite a special spot—
to come out while also showing Ben’s relation to it on a more pragmatic level.
He sells his retablos at the Sanctuary gift shop, as he did in the hotel gift
shops he and Jeannie used to own. This was a very difficult scene to edit for
a variety of reasons—technically speaking, the audio was a challenge, as
there were voices and sounds unrelated to the image in every recorded
second. We felt it important to use actual sound from the location, and this
philosophy, while admirable, made for an almost impossible task. I would not
necessarily change this scene given the opportunity, but in future situations
might opt to bring in artificial sound depending on the ultimate spirit or feeling
S was going for in a given filmic moment.
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In addition to the technical challenges, there was the fact that Ben was not
actually bringing his santos to the gift shop that day—they had plenty in
stock, and didn’t need a top up. He didn’t inform us of this, however, so as 1
filmed him going into the gift shop with his box of retablos, I was confused
when he stopped just inside the doorway, stood there for a moment, then
carried it back to his car. This was the only “reenactment” that we included in
the film—and had we known it was to be a reenactment and not the real
thing, we might have done it differently.
Finally, there was the very ambiguous problem of obtaining filming
permission at the site. We had attempted for several years to shoot on the
premises by telephoning in advance, and had always been denied
permission. We knew that other, more prestigious operations had been
granted this permission, so it clearly was not an issue of protecting the holy
space in some way from the media. Yet when we arrived, Father Roca told
Ben that we could film anywhere on the site except the gift shop. We never
could figure out what changed his mind and why the gift shop was
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considered off limits. We were permitted to shoot in the newly constructed
bookstore, where Father Roca blessed Ben’s legs, as well as the church and
surrounding property.
I do not feel we were successful at obtaining footage that conveys the
unforgettable impression of the place, both in its natural and architectural
beauty as well as the peaceful feeling one gets while walking through the
space, even as non-practicing tourist. This is the scene that I feel the least
certain about in terms of value for viewers for these and other reasons.
Carrillos 3. In this final scene with the Carrillos, Charlie speaks about
santeros’ presence in Santa Fe culture and their relations with one another,
emphasizing that competition amongst santeros is missing the point,
especially as more and more people begin taking up the tradition. Ben
characteristically wants to contextualize this historically and credits this
renewing of interest in Hispanic traditions to the WPA program in the 1930s.
Charlie believes the renewing of interest—again, he calls it “reclamation” —
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was mainly due to the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s and 1970s. Both
men credit something that happened during their own lifetimes which they
can personally relate to, and they are probably both right. The next section
explores more profoundly the editing challenges we faced in this penultimate
scene.
Ben Paints at Night. Filmed from outside, Ben enters his studio and paints at
night. I love this footage and feel it does a good job conveying the
peacefulness Ben mentions experiencing while painting the santos. There is
something a little unearthly in this scene—knowing that Ben’s health was
fragile, for me there has always been an element of the Beyond in this final
moment in the film. This is emphasized by the soundtrack, which features
the only music which I believe is successfully placed in the film—an ambient,
peaceful excerpt from Ingram Marshall’s Fog Tropes2 7 A technical note: we
constructed this shot by using a “privileged angle”, as it is called in
filmmaking circles, in other words, an unnatural or impossible placement of
2 7 NA002, New Albion Records, San Francisco, 1984, re-released in 1988.
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the camera. We asked Ben’s permission to remove one of the screens in his
window in order to get the clearest image of him, then we stood outside and
filmed him—known voyeurs. Though we did manipulate his environment
slightly it’s not by any means an artificial recreation, and we had no qualms
about using it in the film.
Credits. The credits appear over a black background. In the final version,
the Patsy Cline song “ Walking After Midnighf plays over the credits.
Although Ben did listen to Patsy Cline while he painted at night, I’m not sure
the lyrics of this song are relevant. I will change the audio track here if given
the chance to make another cut.
The preceding commentary brings up some of the issues and challenges we
faced while making the film, especially related to our knowledge (and by
implication, ignorance) of the bigger picture, including Ben’s life and practice,
santeros’ presence in New Mexico and especially Santa Fe, and Santa Fe as
a kind of entity unto itself. In the next section I will focus on one of the major
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challenges we experienced while making our documentary, that of the value
placed upon “ experts” in a given field, and the resulting tendency of viewers,
not to mention filmmakers, to give them the first—or last—word.
3. Expert and Other Voices
In the 40 plus hours of footage we generated and gathered, many characters
and many voices were available to us. In our cast of characters there was
the Gabaldon family: Ben, Jeannie, Ben’s niece Angelina and his sister Flora.
There was Andrei the professor, who we’d filmed talking with Ben in his living
room. There was Charlie Carrillo the santero, Ben’s mentor, who we met and
filmed with and without Ben at the Carrillo home. There were people
associated with religious institutions—Father Roca, the venerable head priest
at El Santuario de Chimayo, Dolores at the sanctuary bookshop, and Sister
Colleen, who worked and was a member of the choir at Santa Maria de la
Paz, where both the Gabaldons and the Carrillos attend mass. There is
footage obtained from the New Mexico State Archives that has its own very
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specific voice and tone, and finally there is a bit of footage of Christy and I,
the student filmmakers, in Santa Fe and on our road trip.
Each person (or entity, in the case of the archival footage) has a variety of
faces and voices and in most cases we only caught a few of them. However,
we spent a lot of time with Ben and he permitted us to film many of his facets.
There was Ben the stereotypical Old World teacher, didactic and static,
almost monotone. There was Ben the engaging, energetic storyteller, and
Ben the proud champion athlete, devoted husband, brother and son. There
was Ben the humble and honest recovering alcoholic. And there was Ben
the mischievous prankster and eternal child. It was our job to let these
voices mingle and form an accurate, respectful and loving portrait of this
man.
One of the raisons d’etre of the film, however, was to touch on the art of saint
making and its place in Hispanic Catholic society in New Mexico. We had
decided from the start that this would not be a film of the classic educational
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genre where the viewer would come away a minor scholar. Our original
intention had been to focus on Ben’s work as a santero in order to bring out
various elements in his history and even the history of his people, so in
keeping with that we felt the best way to accomplish this would be to let other
experts have a voice too.
Besides Ben, who is of course the foremost expert on his own life and
practice, there are two classic expert type characters in the film, Andrei Simic
and Charlie Carrillo. Both of them have doctorates in anthropology. Andrei
has taken the road of academia and has a professorship, while Charlie is
now a leader in the Santa Fe santero community who continues to be both a
devoted student of and respected authority on Spanish American colonial art.
As filmmakers, we had to think long and hard what kind of roles these two
men were to have in the film. Without them, the film would not be
complete—there would be no Santero Zurdo without Charlie’s instruction,
and there would be no film about him without Andrei’s serendipitous meeting
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with Ben and commitment to the project. Yet during editing we noticed how
easily either one could take over the film.
Because we are used to the expert voice in filmmaking—whether via a host
or off-screen narrator—most of us have been brought up to let ourselves be
led quite unconsciously by these voices. Such convenient material is like
manna to an editor—it’s a lot easier to put together a documentary with
voices of experts who provide sound bite after sound bite, as opposed to
having to construct a complete story out of field material. Yet we felt it was
Ben’s story and that he is ultimately the expert in his life, so we went with
choices that kept him where he belonged—front and center.
The raw footage taken at the Carrillo home, for instance, is wonderful,
powerful stuff and a whole film could have been built around the discussion
at the kitchen table, which began before Ben arrived and continued several
hours thereafter. We touched upon politics—of Santa Fe, of the Spanish
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Colonial Arts Society2 8 and its relation to the artists. We touched upon
tradition—linguistic, as in the dichos or sayings that crop up in every
conversation; culinary, such as shrimp cakes or the tradition of drying fruit,
gathering wild parsley or pinon nuts; medicinal, like the osha root that people
used to chew on to keep sickness at bay, now available in tincture form.
Charlie brought up the historical accuracy and the eternal dedication of some
to solve mysteries in this centuries old tradition of saint making. He showed
us an altar piece he’d made that was being stored in his living room, and
talked about the proper way to read them—how the figures are related, the
colors are significant and how it now takes a trained mind to gather it all
together to uncover the intended meaning or story therein. We discussed
pottery making, which Debbie continues to practice as she was taught by her
grandmother, apparently somewhat of a holy woman in her own right. None
2 8 The Spanish Colonial Arts Society was founded in Santa Fe in 1925 by two Anglo-
Americans, writer Mary Austin and artist/writer Frank G. Applegate. Its original purpose was
to “preserve and perpetuate the Hispano art forms that have been produced in New Mexico
and southern Colorado since the region was colonized by Spain in 1598.” The Society now
sponsors a semi-annual, juried Spanish Market held in Santa Fe, as well as “a range of
outreach programs.” (The Museum of Spanish Colonial Art, http://www.spanishcolonial.org/)
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of these points left the cutting room floor, but each of them could be a film or
research paper in itself.
Elements that were included had to be relevant to Ben’s life and make sense
in this cameo sized portrait of a man whom volumes could be written about.
In the conversation around the Carrillos’ kitchen table, Charlie, Ben, Debbie
and Christy discussed what being a santero means and how the artist
community does and does not support its own. They talked about the
commercial aspects of this art and how supply, demand and misconception
have shaped and guided the making of saints. They discussed Ben’s art, his
meeting with Charlie and how that resulted in his own personal expression as
a santero. Ben and Charlie compared notes. Charlie, the eternal scholar,
was quick to explain, point out, elaborate and at times even politely disagree
with Ben’s theories.
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In the following example, Charlie fills in the blanks about San Pasqual—this
bit did make it into the film, but we edited Charlie’s explanation. Here it is in
its entirety.
CC: You know, and the funny thing about Pasqual is that
he is, that’s a modern devotion. That’s the funniest thing
about him. And I don’t know where it started, nobody seems
to really know, but the depictions of him from Colonial
Mexico, in Colonial Spain, I mean in Spain from the Colonial
period, always have him depicted either in front of a fireplace
in a kitchen, with flames coming out of the fireplace, and
above him is floating a monstrance with, that holds a
Eucharist, because he had a devotion to the Eucharist, but
what it was is, he joined the Franciscan order, he was a
shepherd who joined the Franciscan order who was then put
in the kitchen, at that time it was a kitchen, and what he was
in charge of was making communion wafers, he was making
communion wafers, that what his job was. And so by default
he’s cooking.
C: Right.
CC: Yeah, because in the Colonial period in New Mexico
the devotion of San Pasqual, he was the patron de los
pastores, he’s the patron saint of shepherds.
BAG: He was a shepherd.
CC: Yeah.
BAG: And he was illiterate. He had a book with him and
every time that someone could read he would ask that
person to read that book and teach him what there was in
that book.
CC: Yeah.
BAG: And when he joined the monastery and asked to be
assigned to the kitchen, so that he would spend more time
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meditating on the Holy Eucharist. And because of that he
was associated with the kitchen.
CC: But that’s a modern thing. They didn’t—all the, all the
things that, you know, all the things that I’ve looked in the
last, that have been written over the last 100 years about
Pasqual never mention him as the patron saint of cooks and
kitchens. Never. Never, it’s just—
BAG; No.
CC: I think that happened probably in the 30s and the 40s.
BAG: Yeah.
CC: When people were coming to the, to, out here to New
Mexico and seeing him depicted kneeling in the kitchen, and
it was by association, by default. I call him the santo by
default, [laughs] It's the fault of the kitchen, [laughs] It’s, and
those things get going and before you know it you have a
whole new tradition. And San Pasqual is probably one of
your best sellers.
BAG: It is, it is.
CC: Urn, because people have by again default given him
the patronage of the kitchen. And it’s a good thing. And I
suspect he’s doing a good job.
If we had left it intact, Charlie would have appeared either heavy handed or
Ben would have appeared ignorant, neither of which is the case. We had to
let Ben be the star, as the film is about him and somehow show that he is still
an apt and eager student to his very charming and knowledgeable mentor,
Charlie. In the original conversation Ben restates some of Charlie’s points—
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whether to prove he does know major elements of Pasqual’s story or to
reflect back to his teacher that he’s listening is immaterial. This kind of
exchange feels different in the intimate context of a conversation than it does
up on the screen, and it took us some time to figure out how to keep in the
essential bits, such as San Pasqual being a “ santo by default" (a great sound
bite!) while keeping the total conversation down to a reasonable length in the
film. Due to time constraints in the film we were also unable to show how
respectful and kind Charlie and Debbie were with Ben that day, though
perhaps a bit of that does show through, as when Debbie welcomes Ben at
the door, they accept Ben’s gifts and Charlie prepares coffee.
Charlie’s voice is an educated, expert voice to Ben’s everyman, experiential,
not particularly politically correct voice. Andrei and Charlie, while every bit as
down to earth as Ben, have been formed and cultured by their chosen path
as experts in their field, and they involuntarily speak and command a certain
respect by virtue of their presentation. They do not mean to, but they
upstage Ben every time they open their mouths. It was therefore difficult to
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figure out how much we could allow Andrei and Charlie to speak in a film that
was about Ben and his life.
Personally, we found these choices difficult and painful because we happen
to feel warmly about all three men. As anthropology students ourselves, also
steeped in academia, we could see where Andrei and Charlie were coming
from, and in some cases could also see, especially in Charlie’s case, that his
knowledge is strong and deep, and that his rendering of the big picture
makes a lot of sense. This is a lovely fact; however, at times Ben and
Charlie’s big pictures don’t look quite the same, and Charlie’s background
and language tend to lift him up. Andrei’s specialties are ethnicity and aging,
and it so happens that another of his areas of interest is religious devotion,
and he studies the painting of icons in his own Serbian Orthodox practice.
He is therefore perfectly suited, as is Charlie, to have something to say about
Ben and his life.
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Another voice in the expert category is Ben’s “ teacher” voice, perhaps
brought into play by his feeling of responsibility as a representative of
santeros and of Spanish Americans in New Mexico. In a mixture of habit
borne from years of presentations for the city of Santa Fe and a
preconception based on decades of watching television documentaries
combined with the information contained in Andrei’s grant proposals, it took
some effort to guide Ben’s default on-camera teaching persona into other,
less didactic voices.
Strangely, the most luck we had in getting Ben to speak naturally was during
a painting session—he was painting San Pasqual as we filmed, and we put a
microphone on the desk and began to ask him about his life. It was a
beautiful moment for us, although we discovered later that it wasn’t the most
photogenic footage—how long can you look at the back of someone’s head
as they paint and tell you their life story?
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The real cherry on top of the expert sundae was the combination of our own
preconceptions, assumptions and beliefs, some of which took us some time
to identify. We ourselves were coming from the academic world—yet the
reason why Christy and I are friends and decided to be partners is because
of our apparently unorthodox life philosophy. (I say “apparently” because it
felt and continues to feel entirely normal to us.) We were drawn to visual
anthropology for a reason, or for many reasons. I for one have always
suspected that there are worlds of richness that exist on the nonverbal plane,
and while I enjoy reading and sometimes enjoy writing, have not always
found words the most satisfying means of expression. All that to say, we
went to Santa Fe expecting some kind of Old World, wise, wizened artisan,
somehow exotic yet not, a little holy in his own way, a little this, a little that—
poppycock.
What we found was far richer and took us some time to sort out. We found a
real man, not much older than our own parents, who was practicing his art in
such a matter of fact way that I was embarrassed to realize I’d been initially
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disappointed to find a real person instead of some kind of stereotypical
medicine man. Such is the enchantment of anthropology, and such is its
downfall. We have not really advanced that far from the romantic notions of
the first anthropologists, naively, excitedly out to discover some exotic reality
that you have to half close your eyes and intone a mantra to access.
Ben and Jeannie saw the film, but I was not able to get any concrete
feedback from him about it, other than Jeannie didn’t like seeing her image in
the opening scene and wanted us to remove it. How could they know that we
watched them hundreds of times and felt that the sweetness of that moment
in the kitchen had to be included? We were deeply touched by them and felt
we had gotten to know them, not only because of our multiple meetings, but
also due to the fact that we watched them on the video screen over and over
and over. Because of this one-sided relationship (excepting the occasional
phone call or letter), I wonder how fairly the film does represent Ben and his
life.
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CONCLUSION
In the end, visual anthropology may need to define itself not
at all in the terms of written anthropology, but as an
alternative to it, as a quite different way of knowing related
phenomena 2 9
This paper takes a look at my perspective on realizing a film and research
project from start to finish. Affinities played a large part in assembling the
crew, from Andrei’s first interaction with Ben to Andrei asking me to take on
the project to Christy joining us soon thereafter. A bevy of crises awaited us
in the area of responsibility, from issues of representation to actually making
the film. Ben’s background is touched upon and his decision to take on the
work of a santero is contextual ized within the broader framework of New
Mexican religious traditions. Our methodological process is explored and
finally the film’s treatment is addressed, both in terms of gathering footage
and editing it.
29
David MacDougall, Transcultural Cinema. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998),
63
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While the paper opens with mention of a former professor’s challenge to me
to prove, in essence, that film is a worthwhile anthropological medium, I
respectfully submit that the premise is flawed, if not irrelevant. It remains
unclear to me why one must choose between books and film, and why
indeed one should stop there. There may be other media, or media as yet
undiscovered that will blow our minds and reshape our world in new and
wonderful ways. Will we welcome them in the same way that film has been
welcomed?
We did our best to piece together a portrait of a humble and extraordinary
man, and to do him and his story justice—yet I cannot say if our film
manages to convey the kind of information that we intended, that Ben
wanted, or even comparable information to that contained in this paper. In a
way, that can only be determined by Ben himself and other viewers outside
of the project and unrelated to Ben.
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We had begun with highfaluting ideals, sugar plums of ethnicity dancing in
our heads and hopes of catching nuances, subtleties, and beautiful truths on
videotape. At one point our confidence had deteriorated to the point that it
felt like we were making a film about a man who drew cartoons on wood,
colored them in and sold them in his gift shop to tourists. Now my feelings
have come full spiral, if you will, not exactly back to the starting point but a
point somehow shifted outwards.
Whether or not we managed to communicate all we felt and have gained
from knowing Ben, his family, his mentor and his land, I feel indebted to all of
them, and especially to Ben, for their generosity of spirit. We walked in there
with our recording equipment and were given a real gift. We made a film
about a man who knows who he is and is interested in knowing more, doing
more and sharing his experience with others. Many times Ben told us he has
devoted his life to helping people and that he was glad to be helping us out.
At the time I didn’t know what he meant. In truth, Ben led me in a whole new
direction and for that I am eternally in his debt.
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Journeys are nothing but a series of beginnings, 1 now see plainly. The
documentary required that we become acquainted with the land between Los
Angeles and Santa Fe, that we get to know Santa Fe past and present, and
most importantly, the people of that city, especially Ben Gabaldon and the
people who touched his life. These discoveries repeatedly led us back to
the same territory—the same unanswered questions, and ultimately back to
ourselves.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Acuna, Rodolfo. Occupied America: The Chicane’s Struggle Toward
Liberation. San Francisco: Canfield Press, 1972.
Await, Barbe and Paul Rhetts. Our saints among us: Nuestros santos entre
nosotros; 400 years of New Mexican Devotional Art. With essays by Thomas
J. Steele and Charles M. Carrillo. Albuquerque: LPD Press, 1998.
Bentley, James. Calendar of Saints. New York & Oxford: Facts on Tile
Publications, 1986.
Boyd, E. New Mexico Santos: Religious Images in the Spanish New World.
Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico Press, 1995.
Briggs, Charles L. The Wood Carvers of Cordova, New Mexico: Social
Dimensions of an Artistic “ Revival. ” Knoxville: The University of Tennessee
Press, 1980.
Chavez, Angelico (Fray). Origins of New Mexico Families in the Spanish
Colonial Period. Santa Fe: William Gannam (originally Historical Society of
New Mexico, 1954), 1975.
Carrillo, Charles. “ The ‘Making and Breaking’ of New Mexican Santos.” In
Barbe Await and Paul Rhetts, Our saints among us: Nuestros santos entre
nosotros; 400 years of New Mexican Devotional Art. Albuquerque: LPD
Press, 1998.
Cirillo, Dexter, in collaboration with Nancy Pletka Benkof. Across Frontiers:
Hispanic Crafts of New Mexico. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1998.
DuMars, Charles T., Marilyn O’Leary and Albert E. Utton. Pueblo Indian
Water Rights: Struggle fora Precious Resource. Tucson: University of
Arizona Press, 1984.
Gavin, Robin Farweil. Traditional Arts of Spanish New Mexico: The Hispanic
Heritage Wing at the Museum of International Folk Art. Santa Fe: Museum of
New Mexico Press, 1994.
Grimes, Ronald. Symbol and Conquest: Public Ritual and Drama in Santa
Fe, New Mexico. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1976.
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Taylor, Lonn and Dessa Bokides. New Mexican Furniture 1600-1940: The
Origins, Survival, and Revival of Furniture Making in the Southwest. Santa
Fe: Museum of New Mexico Press, 1987.
Kalb, Laurie Beth. Santos Statues & Sculpture: Contemporary Woodcarving
from New Mexico. Los Angeles: Craft and Folk Art Museum, 1988.
. Crafting Devotions: Tradition in Contemporary New Mexico Santos.
Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1994.
MacDougall, David. Transcultural Cinema. Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1998.
Mather, Christine and Sharon Woods. Santa Fe Style. New York: Rizzoli,
1986.
O’Donnell, Gabriel. “Saints and Saint Making in the Catholic Tradition,” The
Living Light, Winter 1998. Washington, D.C.: Department of Education,
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. (Excerpted in
http://www.usccb.Org/education/catechetics/livlghtwint98.htm#tradition)
Olien, Michael D. Latin Americans: Contemporary Peoples and their Cultural
Traditions. New York & Chicago; Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1973.
The New Mexican Hispano. The New Mexican Hispano. New York: Amo
Press, 1974.
Salvador, Mari Lyn C. Cuando Hablan Los Santos: Contemporary Santero
Traditions from Northern New Mexico. Albuquerque: Maxwell Museum of
Anthropology, University of New Mexico, 1995.
Sanchez, George Isidore. Forgotten People: A Study of New Mexicans.
Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1996.
Sherman, Sharon R. Documenting Ourselves: Film, Video and Culture.
Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1998.
Stanford Center for Chicano Research. Hispanos: Ethnic Identity in
Cariones; Working Paper Series No. 20. Stanford: Stanford Center for
Chicano Research, 1987.
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Steele, Thomas J. Santos and Saints: The Religious Folk Art of Historic New
Mexico. Santa Fe: Ancient City Press, 1982.
Szasz, Ferenc M. and Richard W. Etulain. Religion in Modern New Mexico.
Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1997.
Van Ness, John R. Hispanos in Northern New Mexico: Development of
Corporate Community and Multicommunity. New York: AMS Press, 1991.
Vigil, James Diego. From Indians to Chicanos: A Sociocultural History. St.
Louis & Toronto: The C.V. Mosby Company, 1980.
Weigle, Marta, ed. Two Guadalupes: Hispanic Legends and Magic Tales
from Northern New Mexico. Santa Fe: Ancient City Press, 1987.
Weigle, Marta and Donna Pierce, eds. Spanish New Mexico: The Spanish
Colonial Arts Society Collection. Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico Press,
1996.
Weigle, Marta, Claudia Larcombe and Samuel Larcombe, eds. Hispanic Arts
and Ethnohistory in the Southwest: New Papers Inspired by the Work of E.
Boyd. Santa Fe: Ancient City Press, 1983
Filmography
DeBouzek, Jeannette and Diane Reyna. Gathering Up Again: Fiesta in
Santa Fe. Santa Fe: Quotidian Independent Documentary Research, 1992.
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APPENDIX
El Santero Zurdo - Transcript of Film
TRANSCRIPT
Characters, in order of appearance:
B : Benjamin “ Gabby” Gabaldon
J: Jeannie Gabaldon, Ben’s wife
DC: Debbie Carrillo, Charlie’s wife
CC: Charlie Carrillo, santero (Ben’s teacher)
C: Christy Snyder
S: Sharon Berman
AS: Andrei Simic
A: Angelina Gabaldon Shaffer, Ben’s niece
FR: Father Roca, Head Priest at El Santuario de Chimayo
G: Guard at Giorieta Baptist Assembly
Opening Scene
J: You know what I forgot was coffee cream. Darn it!
B : It’s in the refrigerator.
J: Oh I forget about that, you mixed up—but I meant, I did mean to get
some powder. 1 don’t know where it is.
B : It’s in that tall bottle. I’ll get it out.
J; It ran away?
B : Oh, here it is.
J: Thank you.
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Andrei/Ben I
AS: Do you remember when i first came into your shop? When was it, 6
years ago maybe?
B : Yes. That was—about 6 years ago.
AS: Anyway, I bought a retablo, and as i was about to leave, you said, hey
wait a minute. Urn, I’d like to know who you are and where my santo is going
to be living. And so we talked for a long time and that was I guess how we
first became friends. But I was really impressed by the fact that the santo
was more than just a painting to you. It was something, It was a personality
that had a life, and that’s what really gave me the idea that we should do this
documentary about you, because I was really moved by your relationship
with your saints.
Ben paints
J: Well, he retired in 1984 from the city of Santa Fe. And he took up
painting retablos as a hobby. And then people wanted to start buying them.
And so that’s, and then he started selling them in our shop. And he’s been
busy with them ever since. I think it’s changed his life in a lot of ways... for
the better.
Ben paints
Ben with camera
S: Press it once. Make sure it says record in there.
B : Oh!
S: See?
B : I see. Now, but I need to be able to look...where are you...oh there
you are. Now I zoom back.
J: Here’s Tippy.
B : There’s my girl. [Sound of typing] You look very efficient.
J: What?
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B: You look very efficient.
B : Recording...
J: I would have straightened up in here had I known you were going to...
B: No. We don’t want to straighten up. We want to see what it looks like.
B : This wall shows my collection of retablos. And I don’t have too many
in stock and that is one of the reasons I have not entered fairs, because I do
not have a large enough inventory. They sell as fast as I make them...Saint
Dominic. San Pasqual, San Juan Nepomuceno, St. Francis, Santo Nino de
Atocha, Santa Maria con el Nino, y San Pedro. And last is the crest of the
Gabaldon family. It’s written in Spanish...This is a San Pasqual T-shirt
copied after one of my San Pasquales. This shows my tape collection, the
drawer that I have of folders for each santo that I make, and my reference
books. This is a stock of my retablos ready to be painted. And this is my
Hispanic library. This is the table I use to paint, with the trays to keep the
santos apart and keep them from being rubbed one against another...my tray
of different colored paints, and my radio. My step-daughter Sally. A picture
of Charlie Carrillo.
Carrillos I
DC: Hi, how are you doing?
B : OK, how are you?
DC: Real good, and you?
B : Oh, it’s nice to see you.
DC: Good. It’s good to see you too. Come on in.
B : Thank you.
DC: Gabby’s here.
B : What a beautiful collection.
DC: They’re in here.
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DC: Thank you.
CC: Hey, how are you?!
B : Hey! Amigo! Como esta? [laughter] What's goin' on?
CC: We never— you're always directing traffic so we never get to say—
stop and say hello, [he laughs]
B : I know. I - 1 wave at everybody, but I never...
CC: No, every time we—we never get a chance ‘cause you make the
beeline out to get in traffic before—
B : Yeah.
CC: —people start leaving—
B : I know.
CC: —so then we get in the traffic and we never get to see you, you know?
B : I know.
CC: We—we wave and everything else, but you're too—
B : I know, I saw you at mass yesterday—
CC: Yeah, you're, were too busy with, uh—you know, waving people over,
“ come on, come on, come on."
B : This is for you, uno regalo.
CC: Regalo?
B : Si.
CC: Oh, my God, look at this. Oh, you know what? Debbie, look at this,
how beautiful. And he's my—
DC: Oh, how nice...
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CC: —patron saint 'cause—
B: Oh, he is?
CC: Actually, Michael's my patron saint—
B: Oh he is?
CC: —but I made him my—patron because I'm always in the carpen—I
always feel like a carpenter.
B : Well, how about that?
CC: This is the first St. Joseph I ever get from anybody, and a lot of my
friends know I have a devotion to him, but this is the first one, so [he
laughs]... Thank you.
B: You're my mentor.
CC: Oh... And there's another—look at this, l-it's Christmas, Debbie.
Here, you look through, pull the other one out,since I— since I pulled one out,
we'll leave him on there.
B : I know at one time, oh, sometime back, you were gonna exchange—
CC: Yeah, and I— and I have to do it—
B : —you said who—who you wanted, and I forgot.
DC: St. Francis.
CC: Oh, my God, we don't have a St. Francis retablo, either, Santa Fe—
B : And, uh, Jean selected that this morning for you.
CC: Oh, fantast—we don't have a— we don't have a St. Francis—
DC: Thank you.
B : That's my version of it.
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CC: It's nice with the hills and everything else ...the snow that hasn't
melted yet...
DC: Thank you, Gabby.
B: Um-hm.
CC: Oh, my God, look at how beautiful.
DC: Thank you.
B: You're very, very welcome.
CC: Well, sit down, Do you drink coffee?
B: Oh, sure.
CC: Would you like a cup of coffee?
B : Yes.
B: You know, I've been wanting to get together with you for the longest
time—
CC: Well, we never—well, you know what the trouble is?
B. —but you're either—you're busy or I'm busy, and we don't seem to be
able to—to make contact.
CC. To— to—to hook up.
B: But I'm always aware of where you're at and what you're doing.
(Sitting at table)
B : 1 had been interested in painting retablos for a long time, but I didn’t
know the ins and outs, and I read an article that there was going to be a
demonstration of retablo art by Charlie Carrillo, at the museum of Navaho—
the museum of
CC: International Folk Art.
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B : International Folk Art
C: Did you know him before that?
B/CC: No.
B : So, I met him then, and he told me, well he told the class, when you
first start painting retablos, follow the pattern of the style of a santero whom
you admire, or the kind of work you think you can emulate, then as time goes
on, you will develop your own style, you can’t change it. And that’s what’s
happened to me. And I owe a lot of what I—most of what I learned to Charlie,
and the rest is just what I—
CC: But you continued studying. That’s the important thing. You didn’t
stop—I tell people, unfortunately, a lot of people learn how to do it, and that’s
the day they stop. And my concern is always that somebody learn to do it,
and it’s, the more they do, the more they want to know.
San Ysidro
B : Another interesting story about another retablo that is very popular
with the Spanish people is San Ysidro. San Ysidro was a, what you would
call a workaholic. He had a large farm and a large family, and he would, he
would not go to mass. He would not go to church. But he prayed beautifully.
God loved the way he prayed and he prayed while he was working. So God
sent an angel down to talk to Ysidro, and have him go to mass. And Ysidro
said, “look at all the fields I have to plow, look at all the work I have to do, and
the mouths of all my children I have to feed. I have not—I don’t have time to
go to church, but I will pray.” And God didn’t like that. So the angel came
back and began to talk to Ysidro and threaten him with locusts. He says, “I
can’t go. Bring on the locusts.” And then he threatened him with flood. And
Ysidro said, “I’m sorry, I can’t make it, I just can’t go.” So then finally the
angel threatened him with a nosy neighbor. “ Ah, that I don’t want. I don’t
want a nosy neighbor. I’ll go to mass.” So he went to mass and when he got
home, he found that his fields had been ploughed by an angel. And the
moral of the, of San Ysidro is that regardless of how important or how busy
you think you are, you should devote a little time for God, as you see him.
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Church
Woman: Danielle, come on.
J; Morning, girls.
Gs: Good morning, welcome.
(Ben directs traffic)
B : Jeanne is not going to Angie’s because her back has been bothering
her. So I’m going to go take her and then i’m going to go to Angie’s and
meet you there. Ok?
S: OK. Perfect.
B : Swell.
J: You did your good deed for the day, Daddy.
B : Thank you.
Anaie’s I
(Ben standing in front of house)
S: Tell me where we are, Gabby.
B : 434 Camino Monte Sol, standing in front of the house that my father
built about 1935 when I was about 6 or 7 years. And my father left the house
to my sister, who took care of him when he passed away, and my sister
suffered a serious illness a few months ago and she sold the house to my
niece.
(One year later - Conversation in living room)
C: Your grandmother owned a lot of the land, so your great
grandmother?
A: My great-grandmother owned 32 acres here, if we had that acreage
now I’d be sitting in the south of France, (laughs) Not really, but...
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C: It was all this—
A: She bought—we would have owned all of Camino Monte Sol, from
Canyon Road all the way up, beyond the museums, and if you take a left
going up Old Pecos Trail—no, it’s old Santa Fe Trail the land extended that
far, and she just sold it, parcel by parcel, through the years, as she needed
money or whatever. Unfortunately...and that’s one of the reasons I was
determined that we wouldn’t, that this house wouldn’t be sold...because you
just can’t let go—once this house was gone, we’d never get it back. And I
was determined we couldn’t do that. This house was a focal point for most of
my life growing up, and for all my cousins and even Benny, I mean, we used
to—all the holidays were spent here, the whole extended family. Every
Christmas Eve we were all crowded into this living room, exchanging gifts,
and the family was all—the whole extended family was always together for
everything. We’d go on picnics together, we would—do a lot—my, our social
life, growing up revolved around the relatives. And sometimes some of the
relatives might invite a friend, you know, we might bring someone, but...we
were, we were our friends. We did everything together. And, and it was
really nice.
Ben’s Story
(Driving, arriving home. Ben paints)
B : I’ve had a very, what you would call, not a colorful life, but I’ve done a
lot of things. I had a very successful boxing career, in which I fought over a
hundred amateur bouts. I had 55 profession fights, 38 knockouts, I was
never knocked out, and I was pretty well known.
B : I’ve been married 3 times. The first time I got married when 1 was 19
years old, and my former spouse was 19. While I was married to my first
wife is when I, I was still fighting, and that’s when I began to drink heavily and
became an alcoholic, and the divorce resulted as the result of my excessive
drinking. And the problem with my 2nd marriage was that in the 2 years that
we were married she was in and out of hospitals and institutions about 26
times.
B : I did fall of the wagon and I fell with a crash, until I realized that I could
live without alcohol. And I didn’t know how good life could be.
J: Hi kids.
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B : Hi Mama.
J: Hi Daddy.
B : We’ve been waiting on you.
J: I’ve been visiting with Florence.
B : Oh, you have?
S: How’s she doing?
J: Been over there for 2 hours—great, she’s doing her cookies and, had
a nice visit.
S: You look beautiful.
C: You do.
J: Thank you.
S: Did you get your hair done?
J: You need your glasses checked. Just kidding.
B : See, today I am retired, I’m doing retablos, and I don’t have a million
dollars but I’m happier than people that do. I don’t have a yacht, I don’t have
much of anything material, but in my heart and in my soul I’m a very
fortunate, and very...rich man.
Glorieta
(Driving)
B : Now, behind those hills over there is El Dorado, and it is full of houses
that cost from 250-300,000 dollars or more, and they were built when
developers were in their heyday, and now they’re realizing that the city has to
stop building, because we’re running out of water.
B : Doodle deedle deedle dee, now let’s see, let’s see...Oh yeah.
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Guard: Hello there.
B : Good morning. I’m with the Santa Fe Community College. I’m
a presenter. Do you know which direction I need to go?.
G: Well, that depends—are you here for a conference?
B: I’m a presenter.
G: OK, then New Mexico Hall. Sharp right hand right down the hill,
follow the red line on the pavement—
B: Right here?
G; Yes sir. Just follow it around, you’ll see a U-shaped building on
the left. It’s called New Mexico Hall. Just walk in Registration’ll be happy to
see you.
B: OK, thank you.
B : I’ve been teaching for so many years that I don’t plan my lessons. I
know what I’m going to talk about and I usually begin by presenting myself,
my background, and the subjects I intend to cover during the class session.
I’m not a historian, I have taught for many years but have never been a
certified teacher or a college trained teacher, I just teach what I know.
B: This is San Santiago. He was the General MacArthur of the Spanish
army that pushed the Moors back to Africa. And you will see on the bottom
of each hoof is a face of a Moor. You see? That is to give the picture a
background or a history. And that is to represent Santiago leading the
Moors, or conquering the Moors.
Carrillos II
Cc: I go into homes all over Santa Fe, and I know your style. So I can
spot it a mile away. I can walk in a room and say, “ There’s your style,” and
everything else. So that’s, that’s—
B : See, one of my trademarks are couple of birds.
CC: Yeah.
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B: Anytime 1 can find a background, i’ll have birds.
CC: Yeah, those little...
B: See? And that is my personal trademark.
CC: Trademark, yeah. So that's, you can always spot those on a lot of
your pieces and everything else.
B: It’s so, so relaxing, that if I’m going to paint a certain saint, I feel that
that saint is with me.
CC: Oh, yeah.
B: And if I am painting a Santa Maria, I feel that she is with me in the
room. And if I make a mistake or error or something, why, she's just is all
right. Just like San Pasqual. See, women hang Pasqual in the kitchen and if
their food is good, and people acclaim the food, they don’t take the credit,
they say, “ Oh, it was Pasqual, it wasn’t me. it was Pasqual.” But if the cake
falls, they take Pasqual and turn him to the wall for a couple days to teach
him a lesson. And then give him another chance.
CC: You know, and the funny thing about Pasqual is he is a modern, that’s
a modern devotion. That’s the funniest thing about him. You know. All the
things that I’ve looked in the last, that have been written over the last 100
years about Pasqual never mention him as the patron saint of cooks and
kitchens. Never. Never, it’s just—
B: No.
CC: I think that happened probably in the 30s and the 40s.
B : Yeah.
CC: When people were coming out here to New Mexico and seeing him
depicted kneeling in the kitchen, and it was by association, by default. I call
him the santo by default, [laughs] It’s the fault of the kitchen, [laughs] It’s,
and those things get going and before you know it you have a whole new
tradition. And San Pasqual is probably one of your best sellers.
B : It is, it is.
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CC: Um, because people have by again default given him the patronage of
the kitchen. And it’s a good thing. And I suspect he’s doing a good job.
[laughs]
B : When I had the gift shops, Charlie, the saints that 1 sold the most were
San Pasqual, St. Francis, St. Jude, Mary, and the Sacred Heart, because
they are universally known. People who are not of the Catholic religion or
have no knowledge of the history of retablos know St. Francis because he is
universally known. So people would buy St. Francis, or St. Jude, because he
is universally known as the patron of impossible cases. And the same thing
with other, these other santos that I told you about, but there were some that
did not sell too well to people from out of town, because they were not
familiar with the association with that particular saint.
CC: See, the hardest thing for me to sell, and you’ll probably agree, is
figures of the Christ, retablos of Christ.
B : People don’t like, see—in the old days, the saints always had a frown
on their face, because they were strict. If you sing, you’re going to go to hell.
And there was always a frown or a, you know. But people nowadays like to
see saints smiling.
C: Like San Pasqual.
B : And I know that I’ve made some saints that I depicted as they were in
the olden days, they don’t sell.
CC: Well, you know, Cristos don’t sell because they’re bloody, people
aren’t ready to hang a picture of a suffering man crucified a cross—Christ,
you know, in their house, because they want to see happy saints. You’re
right.
Santa Appollonia/St. Francis
S: Here’s another bloody woman story. Tell us about her.
B : Santa Appollonia was a martyr because she would not relinquish her
religion. Her teeth, her hands were tied and her teeth were pulled, and she
escaped from her guard and ran into the fire that is shown in the background,
and her body and soul were consumed immediately to heaven. She is the
patron of dentists.
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B : Saint Francis is the patron of Santa Fe, New Mexico. The full name of
Santa Fe, New Mexico is “la villa Real de la Andalusia de la Santa Fe de San
Francisco de Assis.” The royal city of the holy faith of St. Francis of Assis.
Shortened to Santa Fe. Holy Faith.
B: I’m proud of being Hispanic. I’m proud of the culture, I’m proud of the
people, I’m proud of my religion, and I was born and raised in a mostly
Spanish populated state. And the population of Santa Fe has for many years
been mostly Hispanic. So I feel at home, I feel at ease with Spanish,
because I can go downtown and meet people that I know who are bilingual,
and we can start a conversation and switch from English to Spanish and not
lose a beat.
The Plaza
B : I remember when I was growing up we used to go to the plaza and
spend all day in the plaza because everybody went. And you saw people
that you hadn’t seen for a long time and we could stand at a corner
downtown and spend the whole day talking to people that we knew because
everybody went downtown. When I was at city hall of course I used to go
downtown and I was all over town. But what has happened lately is that so
many people from out of town or out of state have moved in that there isn’t
much for the Santa Fe native to go downtown for. Because the shops
downtown are geared to the tourist trade, and the stores that the locals go to
are the malls and the marts, which are in the outskirts of town. So for all
intents and purposes, the older local people like myself don’t go downtown
because there’s nothing for us there.
Angie’s II
A: That is a poppy lamp, it’s my own concept of—it’s a recreation of a
Tiffany style poppy lamp, but the technique is my own, and it's very time-
consuming, it’s a very tedious process, and that’s probably why more people
don’t do it, but 1 angle and raise the glass to give the lamps depth.
A: Throughout the whole family line there seems to be people are
just...very creative, and I don't know why that is.
B : It’s something that's been handed down.
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A: Yeah. It was always nurtured in us, I think, because Grandpa was so
creative, you know, he was a woodcarver, and 1 think we kinda saw that. I
grew up always making my own things, making my own doll clothes, making
our own toys—not out of necessity, my mother could’ve bought doll clothes—
but I preferred to do that, we were always, the creativity was always
encouraged from as far as I can remember.
B : My father, I think, was one of the last of the artisans who worked
without electric tools. He never used an electric tool that I ever saw. And his
furniture was made with glue and doweling. The only metal parts were the
hinges and the latches, but the rest he did himself, and he was self-taught.
He did not take any training anywhere, and if you go back in the Hispanic
history, the people that lived here had to make do with what they had. If
there was a piece of iron left over for something, or from something, they
molded it into a tool they needed, or they could use, so that’s the way people
existed: “make-do”. And I find that a lot of times, like now that I’ve started
beginning to get interested in wood carving, I found a screwdriver and I filed it
down, and I made a little chisel out of it. And I got another piece of angle
iron, and I cut it off, and I filed it and rounded it with a vise, and made a half-
round chisel out of it. I could have very well gone to a store to buy one, but
it’s, to me, part of the enjoyment of doing something is creating my own tools,
or doing things myself.
Ben and Andrei II
B : What I usually do is one day I’ll get all my boards ready and another
day I’ll cut. And then a third day I’ll sand, do nothing but sand, and then on
the next, on the fourth day, I will gesso.
B : I have made my own gesso, and I have made my own paints, and I
have used the cactus, the Spanish sword cactus pieces, and I have used
chicken feathers as brushes. Not for the purpose of making retablos, but for
the purpose of saying that I have done the work that was done by the colonial
santeros. I want to be able to say that 1 did I the way they did it. But I
wouldn’t do it now because it would be too expensive, too time consuming.
B : I have read that in the old days the santeros were more or less—not
really revered, but looked upon as being more catholic than the general
population because they went from village to village painting santos and they
were considered to be a little more catholic than other people. And I never
thought of myself that way, I’m just a regular catholic, and 1 was painting
115
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retablos and then I began to read up on the different santos and became
familiar with their lives. So when I was painting a santo I was thinking about
what that santo meant to the people that wanted him.
B: If I was a Santero and went to your village or to your home in the old
pioneer days, and say that you wanted a certain saint, St. Jude, for example.
Well, you’d tell me that you want a St. Jude and i’d make one for you, and
you’d give me a couple of chickens for it. And I brought the chickens home,
and that was the way I made my living.
AS: How many chickens do you get for a santo now?
B. [laughs] I don’t think I would get any chickens. But as far as price is
concerned, I still maintain the fact that I do not consider myself to be an artist
per se. I’m just a person who is devoted to a degree, I’m a good Catholic, I
try to live a good life. And painting retablos is something that I like to do
because I have always wanted to paint, and painting retablos is easy for me,
because they don’t require depth and perception and change in tone and
color. You just paint something red and something green and something
blue, and that’s where it’s at.
AS: But you have become a success. You have more orders than you can
fill.
B : Yes, I do.
AS: And they’re in some gift shops like at Chimayo, and I don’t know
where else.
Chimavo
B : Father Roca?
B : Padre, this is Sharon.
S: Hello.
FR: How are you? Welcome.
S: Thank you very much.
B : [in Spanish] Universidad de California.
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FR: From California.
FR: Here is the right place.
B: Want to take his picture?
S: Let me take a picture of both of you together.
B : Oh, OK.
S: See if I can get the Church in the Background.
FR: We’re like Mutt and Jeff.
[later]
B : He blessed my legs.
S: He did?
B : Yes, he did.
J: Well, bless him. God bless you.
Carrillos III
CC: It’s a small world. Fortunately, we, it’s like I was telling you both
earlier, this isn’t about competition.
B: No.
CC. You do your stuff, I do my stuff, we share, and everything else. There
has been of late some competition. Some santeros are only in it because
they want to win awards at Spanish Market and all that kind of stuff, and
that’s OK, for them. But they have to realize that this is a bigger—once
they’re gone, there are going to be people continue to do it, if; I think now
there are going to be people to continue to do it. 1 think 40 years ago there
weren’t many people doing it. 20 years ago there weren’t many people doing
it. There were 35 of us at Spanish Market, 35 artists 20 years ago.
C: Wow!
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CC: This is my 20th year at Market, and um, when I went to Market for the
first time there were 35 artists at the Market; there’s 350 people at Market
now. So a tenfold increase, you know.
B : See, the resurgence of retablos and Hispanic furniture came about
during the WPA program that was in the 30s.
CC: 30s, yeah that’s right. And then, that kind of leveled off, and then, I
really, it’s hard to believe but I think the Civil Rights Movement in the 60s and
70s of all things had an impact on all this.
BAG/C: Mm-hm.
CC: Because people were again told they could have a voice. You know?
And then people began to have a voice, saying, this is our, these are the
things we grew up with, these are the things we believe in, let’s reclaim them.
It was kind of like a re—well, lookit, I mean both of us are perfect examples.
Your family weren’t santeros, nor were mine, but we’re reclaiming that
tradition, we’re reclaiming that to say “ This is -
B : There’s a resurgence.
CC: There’s a resurgence. And actually in a sense it’s reclamation. We’re
reclaiming this as our art form, and the furniture, the weaving, the tinsmith,
everything. The people are reclaiming it.
CC: I think, I’ve always told my own people, we don’t have to be loud or
boisterous and revolutionary to reclaim what’s ours, and the way you reclaim
it is you grab a hold of the tradition and start living it.
Ben Paints at Night
Credits
END.
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Asset Metadata

Creator Berman, Sharon (author)

Core Title El santero zurdo: The left-handed painter of saints

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

School Graduate School

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Visual Anthropology

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag anthropology, cultural,Art History,Cinema,OAI-PMH Harvest,religion, general

Language English

Advisor Simic, Andrei (committee member), Wijngaard, Juan (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-47167

Unique identifier UC11327441

Identifier 1427966.pdf (filename),usctheses-c16-47167 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 1427966.pdf

Dmrecord 47167

Document Type Thesis

Rights Berman, Sharon

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA