The Project
MANIFEST
“The term black box has been used to describe something that performs a function,
but its inner-workings are complex and mysterious” Dr. Michale J. Behe
Oaxaca has one of the highest emmigration rates of all Mexican States. In response to this, Blackbox seeks to create a solid, high quality and creative handcraft industry that includes several communities in the creation of new products.
This project provides jobs in rural Oaxaca, and therefore respects an ancestral way of life that was inherited through the generations.
Every product is unique, breaks with the established and experiments with this form of creation. This is our revolution, our way to seek change, with mud or paper pulp on our hands, sawdust covering our faces and weaving a dream thread by thread, a dream of autonomy, opportunity and freedom that is full of expression…
The Store
In 2004 we started traveling from town to town, visiting communities dedicated to producing specific crafts. With respect and humility we taught what we knew, such as means and matter, and form and content….at the same time the artisans were instructing us in their traditions, and as well in the diversity of material resources in the region.
This has been an interdisciplinary give and take, in the end, we have created something unique.
To enable the project to work we created a storefront in the city of Oaxaca. The objective was to exchange knowledge with handcrafters in the different regions of the state and develop new designs, respecting their technique and ways of creation. The storefront allowed us visibility and publicity. The store is still open. We work with more than a dozen communities, artists and designers.
Blackbox website
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