Hatter from Ojaco

Yoginio Martínez lives on the edge of the Oajaca community; beyond the suspension bridge, beyond the local house, beyond that end of what appears to be a caricature of a serious road. To get to your house, you have to cross the Zaratí river in two parts, jumping from one step to another, in summer; climbing a clean hill along the ridges of those small paths that encircle the mountains like a waist. There, in his house, we found him resting on the rammed earth porch.

There is no lack of a faithful companion shipping; suspicious and tied dog, who greets strangers with an incredulous bark. Iginio greets us warmly, surprised that we are going in those directions, where the communities are sparse and there are few neighbors, and invites us to rest. A man without a watch and in no hurry. Far from the hustle and bustle of the city and sheltered deep in the fields, he begins to see life, death and time from a different, resigned perspective. Hours become suns, and suns become months. A small radio connects you to the world.

I ask him about some hats that stand out, half woven there, obscured of the sun in the cold hallway of your house. Result A man as a craftsman, with an exceptional gift for weaving the dry and flexible fibers of the acorn palm.

Tthe intertwined art of the hat lasts for three weeks, from a loose thread to a rounded edge that protects from the summer sun and adorns even the clumsiest. Our painted hat; There is nothing to envy others and other widths. Made by the careful hand of those hatters who weave the white and black structure of dry fiber in meticulous patterns.

I ask him about the price of his art. Three weeks of work and dedication come at a price unfair market not to exceed about $35.00, in the mountains. However, Iginio diligently pursues his calling in a thankless profession. I could do other things; I could even work the land and perhaps be better paid; but he prefers to devote himself to making the magic of the hat, devoting hours to that trance of tiny fabric, which neither the wind lets in nor the water penetrates.

Man and field hat; equal to the artist and his creation. I am already convinced that some of that quiet field life is written on the hat, and the delivery of hours of peace and tranquility is marked in the seams of the fabric; what is that hats are a heritage of peasant folklore that some just weave and others just show off.