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Collaborators

Zoë Heyn-Jones


Momoxca Xochicalco:
La Casa de las Flores
Year:
2023-ongoing

Location(s):
Malacachtepec Momoxco/Milpa Alta, Mexico City, Mexico

Co-authors:
Calpulli Tecalco (María Angélica Palma Rodríguez & Héctor Celedón Muñiz)



In order to preserve plant-based ancestral knowledge, I was invited to collaborate with Calpulli Tecalco—an organization with over 25 years of experience working for the preservation of the cultural and natural patrimony of Indigenous cultures in San Pedro Atocpan, Malacachtepec Momoxco/Milpa Alta—on the creation and activation of a regional herbarium. As curator in residence, I worked with Calpulli Tecalco co-founder and co-director María Angélica Palma Rodríguez and biologist Héctor Celedón Muñiz to initiate the community herbarium. We then developed a program of events, workshops and artistic commissions in order for the herbarium to be activated in innovative ways by artists and educators.

How can we deploy the tools and structures of the herbarium in service of anticolonial pedagogy and the preservation of plant-based ancestral knowledge?

In initiating the project, we researched herbaria and their scientific and community uses and best practices. We met with plant biologist Dr. Marta Martínez Gordillo at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) and toured the herbarium of the Faculty of Sciences that she directs, learning about the characteristics that an herbarium needs to be internationally registered. We began the collection of plant specimens in and around the Milpa Alta/Malacachtepec Momoxco region and have been experimenting with ways to preserve and exhibit them. 

We began a series of oral history interviews with community members about local plants and their cultural, spiritual, ritual, medicinal and comestible uses. In collaboration with Angélica, Héctor and Calpulli Tecalco, I curated and organized the first series of public events to activate the nascent herbarium: a botanical hike for children, youth and families; a botanical illustration workshop for youth; a natural plant-based dyeing workshop with artist Antonia Alarcón; and a cooking workshop. 

Momoxca Xochicalco: La Casa de las Flores is an ongoing project; we are working to expand the herbarium, gather more audio interviews with elders, and activate the project with further cycles of public programming. Above all, we are working to create pedagogical tools for local schools and community groups.




Collaborators:
Doña Carmen Rodríguez; Libro Club Fernando Benitez “In Cualli Ohtli;” Antonia Alarcón

Support:
The Gwartler Stiftung; the Canada Council for the Arts.

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