Let her come with her flowers blooming,
with flowers in her body,
Holy Mother Breast,
Sacred Earth,
Holy Wildwood.

Artists' Books From Spain and Latin America, an exhibit and sale at Garcia Street Books, opens today, July 15, and continues through Sept. 12. The show features first- and second-edition copies of Incantations, along with books containing the original graphic works of Joan Miro, Pablo Picasso, Wifredo Lam, Rufino Tamayo, and Antoni Tapies. Many of the books on exhibit are in Santa Fe courtesy of Ursus Rare Books in New York City.

Incantations by Mayan Women, published in Tzotzil and English this spring by Taller Lenateros (Woodworkers Workshop), is a book with a face. The three-dimensional cover, cast from recycled cardboard, corn silk, and coffee, represents the Mayan earth goddess Kaxail. Her eyes open onto handmade endpaper blackened by soot and studded with palm fronds. She rules the sun, the moon, all living beings, and the primeval forest, where life eternally regenerates. Incantations seeking the lost soul's return are directed to her, as are half the texts in this collection laden with secrets, whispers, and belly laughs. Petu Bak Bolom writes:

Bring her back
with pine cones,
with wild berries,
and candles of many colors.

Incantations is the product of a 20-year effort to compile a kind of modern Mayan codex in which art and language marry to commemorate the most fundamental beliefs of a culture that traces its roots back more than 1,000 years. Measuring approximately 10 inches square, the 295-page book contains dozens of silk-screen illustrations based on ancient Mayan folk-art patterns but painted by contemporary women, many of whom have never before held a brush. Most of the illustrations are set against a background of charcoal-based black so deep it radiates the spectrum.

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