It seems artists in the Guadalajara metropolitan area can’t stop drawing the ire of the city’s Catholic community.
A new sculpture in Zapopan’s Plaza de las Americas – smack-dab in front of the municipality’s large basilica – has been labeled by churchgoing critics as “demonic.”
Sculptor Alejandro Velasco was commissioned to create “Planeando el Viaje” – along with several other works – for the plaza and the adjoining promenade, the Andador 20 de Noviembre.
The negative interpretation of the Zapopan sculpture, which depicts a pensive, winged man crouching over a suitcase, drew amused laughter from Velasco, whose work is part of the inauguration of large renovation project to be initiated later this month.
“I’m a Catholic. I have two uncles who were priests. We are very respectful of the culture … but people will see what they want to see,” said the artist.
Velasco’s patron, Zapopan Mayor Pablo Lemus Navarro, was similarly dismissive of the allegations, and similarly ameliorative towards the religious community.
“I want to make very clear that I have total respect for church authorities, for the archbishop of Guadalajara and for the whole Catholic community. I myself as a Catholic would not only never permit the installation of demonic sculptures, I would avoid it at all cost,” asserted Lemus.
The sculpture, along with its partners, will remain in Plaza de las Americas through September of 2018. Lemus also announced that another work by Velasco would be installed in the next few days, on a scaffold in front of the Zapopan Musem of Art.
Criticism of the piece follows on the heels of a much-publicized church-led protest against “Sincretismo,” a centro historico-located piece by artist Ismael Vargas combining pre-Colombian iconography with that of the Virgin Mary (see story above).