SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Nov. 11 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Cabildo of Tenerife will pay tribute to the Pottery Centers of Tenerife on the occasion of the Island Crafts Day that is commemorated on November 22. Specifically, the work of the Las Miquelas Pottery Centers (Candelaria), Cha Domitila de Arguayo Pottery Center (Santiago del Teide), Doña María Barrios Pottery Center (San Miguel) and La Guancha Pottery Center will be recognized.
The Minister of Employment and Education, Efraín Medina, pointed out that this recognition is made “for saving a craft of Aboriginal tradition and valuing an activity as close to our culture as pottery.” “The centers have also studied and brought to light the information of these pottery centers that at the time fulfilled an important task within the framework of an essentially rural community, accumulating secular knowledge in terms of ritual and peasant wisdom,” he added.
The island of Tenerife, throughout the 19th century and much of the 20th, had a large number of pottery centers that supplied the majority of the island’s population with a rich and utilitarian trousseau of clay pieces, worked by hand. and that were characterized by pre-Hispanic techniques, pieces made mostly by women and work done exclusively by hand without a lathe.
With the passage of time, those pottery centers suffered a devastating process, as well as the onslaught of a new model of life that contributed, with few exceptions, to their disappearance.
Currently and after a recovery process, the Las Miquelas, Cha Domitila, Doña María Barrios and La Guancha centers remain in force. The traditional pottery pieces worked in the centers are bernegal, carving, brazier, orza, lato, escudilla, toaster, jar, pot, basin, gánigo, cuquito and milking jar.
