IFAM Saturday festivities include Colombian hip-hop artist, craft drinks by Tumbleroot
Jul. 9—Melissa Mann wanted to make the International Folk Art Market more appealing to young people this year.
"We know that our average guest is about 65 years old," said Mann, the market's CEO. "We know that there's a movement of sustainability among the youth. We know that there's an interest in just that genuine personal connection and cultural connection.
"So how do we make that available to a younger audience to that may never have heard about us?"
The answer? A Saturday Night Market featuring live music by the Colombian hip-hop collective Kombelisa Miat and craft cocktails by Tumbleroot.
The group of musicians, singers and rappers come from Palenque, Colombia, known to be the first settlement of freed slaves in the Americas. They speak Palenquero and hope to keep their culture and language alive through their songs.
Tickets to the evening market, from 6 to 9 p.m., are $20.
Providing evening hours for market shoppers also was way to draw more Santa Feans, Mann said.
"I'm mindful that there's a lot of people in Santa Fe, who may never have been up here to Museum Hill," she said. "We know that people often work during daytime hours, so we wanted to have a different session where people could come on their own schedules."
While the Folk Art Market focuses on the traditional works of people from around the globe, organizers also invited local artisans to take part this year, including Waddie CrazyHorse, a third-generation silversmith from Cochiti Pueblo.
"I learned from my dad," CrazyHorse said of his work, "just through observation and shadowing him in high school."
CrazyHorse said he always thought silversmithing was an art he would fall back on when he retired, but instead jumped into it 10 years ago and has been making jewelry ever since.
CrazyHorse said it would benefit the young people in his community to pick up a craft like he did.
"I think what they're lacking is like a skill or a way to express themselves," CrazyHorse said. "Give them anything, like drum making, working with clay, pottery and stuff like that just to use their hands."
Most artists at the market use natural and sustainable materials.
Woodworker Óscar Granja and his father, Gilberto Granja, decorate wooden bowls and vases with elaborate designs using Pasto varnish, made from the mopa mopa tree, which mainly grows in the mountainous regions of western South America.
The technique is unique to his home Pasto, Colombia, Óscar Granja said in Spanish. He learned the technique as a child by watching his father work and has now dedicated his life to continue his craft, he added.
