The small town of Escol, built on ancient volcanic stone, carves a ragged path through a high desert hillside in Central Mexico. Three hours northwest of Mexico City, this community of 3,000 people is surrounded by razor-sharp cacti and sun-scorched desert trees. Travelers could easily pass through the place without being noticed.
There is more to see on closer inspection.
The stone-carving workshops are all small and open air. Around 300 of the local men work in these shops as artisan stone carvers, and refer to their finished work as "cantera", a word derived from the Spanish word for quarry.
Few people in the world know this place exists.
The tradition of stone sculpting that extends back several thousand years can be traced back to the artisans in Escol.
The Olmecs, widely regarded as the first elaborate pre-Columbian civilization in the Americas, mastered the art of carving the human form thousands of years ago. The Aztecs produced large stone sculptures that were often based on Olmec designs.
This sense of shared inspiration continues to this day.
In January 2020, I first visited the esticas while looking for story ideas about compelling and overlooked subjects. I had never seen an industrial landscape like it, with small workshops, volcanic stone, clouds of dust, and a high desert sun.
The haciendas and churches in the area needed stone cut a hundred years ago. The quality of the art began to evolve as locals figured out how to do it.
You can buy carvings directly from the artists, and the cantera from Escolásticas is exported all over Mexico and the United States.
Carvers use electric grinding tools, hammers, chisels, and, finally, sandpaper, to bring a stone's basic shape to life, without the aid of computers or other modern technologies. They carve animals, archangels, fountains, fireplace facades, and many other designs after looking at a chunk of volcanic rock.
When I asked Francisco Maldonado what he could do, he said he could. What would you like to do today?
Stone carving is the most popular profession in the area. Children will hit a small hammer to a stone. Older mentors teach younger students how to carve.
I am told that many of the carvers die young from breathing stone dust. They have no sign or identification of their art. In a way, anonymity is an accepted fate.
A man is living in a shack next to the road in town. He could hit the trucks with a feather from his pillow. When I first met him, he was carving a raven next to the road.
I asked if he had considered showing his work on social media.
He said that his sculpture wasn't proof of an amazing intellect.
The inspiration for the drawings of Michelangelo is found in Rubén Ortega Alegria. His 10-year-old son wants to carve as well. During one of my visits, he walked to his father's open-air workshop to watch and learn. His father guided his son over the stone so he could feel the life inside.
He explained that you need to touch it and feel it move before carving it.
Alejandro is a carver. He turned to carving after an accident at the age of 17 left him unable to perform other heavy work. He depends on his sons to help him move the heavy stone. He is referred to by the other sculptors as Maestro.
I asked if he spoke to the stone. We are friends. I listen to it.
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