Magic of alebrijes to charm Romania

Alebrijes

, fantastic beings full of vibrant colors and mysterious forms, will be exhibited at the XXII Olympiad of Traditional Artistic Crafts in Sibiu, Romania , to represent Mexico .

The Olympiad is organized by the ASTRA National Museum Complex in Sibiu, one of the largest museum complexes in Europe and will be held from July 25 to 30 . The event seeks to educate and sensitize students about the value of popular culture at an international level.

The Mexican delegation will present 40 alebrijes photographs and two of monumental size at the exhibition. The team in charge of the Mexican handicraft in the Olympiad is led by César Oropeza , international art promoter, who will be the curator of the exhibition; Augusto Quevedo Lara , professional of cartonería (papier-mâché works) for 11 years; Isaac Reyes collector of Mexican folk art and Ioana Kirculescu .

"We want to recover Mexico's traditional arts , to revalue and give them an international spotlight through this event, where there will be artisans and public from different countries like China and a great part of Europe ," commented to EL UNIVERSAL Augusto Quevedo , artist and papier-mâché craftsman.

They will also assemble an exhibition of Mexican handicrafts ranging from pieces of jewelry to traditional toys , made up of 40 pieces. According to the ASTRA Museum invitation, the event promotes the development of practices to produce handicraft objects that allow the spread of cultural identity .

"We will give two workshops of cartonería to young people and children," explained Quevedo, "so that each creates their own alebrije and create proximity to the Mexican culture . In addition, one of these workshops will be aimed at children with disabilities ."

"We are pioneers in participating in this Olympiad, no institution supported us, but we want to open doors , create ties so that in future editions craftsmen can take their valuable work to different countries," concluded Augusto Quevedo.

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