Introductory Hall.

To go through the Webmuseum of LatinAmerica is more than just browsing some exhibition areas. For us it means the fulfillment of a dream which since its birth took us thrugh all kinds of adventures and anecdotes which we want to share with you, our dear visitor.

Due to the fact that today more than ever, we who operate this technology must feel and make feel to others the warmth of the links which join us as a community in the great ecosystem of the Earth. We want to offer you this work, the feeling that palpitates in our latin hearts.

What is the Webmuseum of LatinAmerica ?

The story starts with SIGGRAPH, abbreviation of the Special Interest Group in Graphics which is part of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM). SIGGRAPH centers its interest in the technological development, graphics and computer animation and interactive techniques. The Mexico City SIGGRAPH Professional Chapter is a non profit association which is part of this international group.

At the beggining of this year in the Mexico City SIGGRAPH Professional Chapter an idea came forth to develop an original project to present it at the 22nd International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques in the venue of Interactive Communities. In this way the group called all those members who were interested in participating in it.

This way we integrated a team wishing to use interactive technology to show the most authentic manifestations of our communities and at the same time leave the precedent in the latinamerican region over the application of this medium for the diffusion of culture.

We are a multidisciplinary group which every member has put the necessary parts and elements to create the proposal. In this way starts the project of the WebMuseum of LatinAmerica, the fulfillment of a vision by specialists in many areas which are voluntarily working and creating a hipermuseum.

Why a museum? Because it is a communication phenomenon which lets you know the heritage of a region and its community through many processes which besides being educative, they are entertaining and fun, inciting the imagination, curiosity and amazement.

We thought in Internet as the most adecuate electronic medium to reach from one community to another. The final proposal is to gather in a World Wide Web(WWW) page latinamerican museums which carry in their specific theme a fragment of our reality.

We present here the first stage of a development which looks for growing further in quality and quantity.

The walkthrough the museum offers today refers to different moments of the three centuries of european colony in the latinamerican region.

The discovery and conquest of this continent of great ecological richness, in which hunters lived together with advanced agricultural societies, brought in the definitive process of biological and cultural unification in our planet.

The conquest wars were mainly of an economic and political character, and they confronted two worlds not only in armed conflict but also in the learning of new environments, systems and social structures, new diseases against which the indians had no defense, and also new ideologies and religion.

A new life order was imposed over the one which initially atracted the conquerors when they first laid their eyes upon these lands. However, beggining with that moment, as two water flows which find each other a new society arises, another culture in which indigenous tradition survives with great cleverness and in ocasion with a new meaning.

In 1493, a year after the discovery of America, the Pope gave to the Catholic Kings the possesion of the New World in exchange of the responsability of the spanish crown in the conversion of the indians.

For this end were designated the majority of monasteries and convents. The religious orders were first given to the task of conversing to the catholic religion the indians, with which they had contact. First were the wandering missionaries, and later with the help of the converted they built churches and convents in strategic points to maintain and spread the message of the new faith. Religious complexes were built in the center of the indigenous villages, frecuently where a prehispanic temple stood before.

In the construction of a religious building materials and hand labor were demanded as a tribute without paying anything in exchange. This labor made possible the designs and projects of the missionaries.

The conventual atrium was a big patio with a cross in the center, was used to give mass to a large number of indians.

"On sundays and hollidays this order was given: that by dawn the indians were to be gathered, on the church's patio, where they were brought, and in case of not attending, then they would be forced to attend and be given half a dozen lashes over their clothes..." [Conventos de Morelos ]

Indians quickly assimilated the most visible parts of the christian religion, even when they conserved many of their old rites and beliefs. missionaries founded art and crafts schools to teach indians about the plastic european language. [Museo Franz Mayer]

During the first ten years of the conquest, the spanish political power was exerted by its soldiers. Afterwards the crown developed a centralized government, against the interest of the former. The king advised by the Indias council, which took care of the affaires related to america, designated the Viceroy and the members of the audience. The Viceroy reunited in his person the direction of all the government branches: administration, army, public finances and on top of it he was sponsor to the church.

The audience managed justice, advised the Viceroy and, sometimes, took the place during his absence. With the creation of the Virreinatos a form of government was created that would last for three centuries.

Towards the seventeen century the mingling of indian, spanish and black people created a ethnic society with a blended culture. Africans where brought to America in large quantities as slaves in order to take the place of the natives that were killed by epidemics.

Spaniards, africans, mestizos and a great number of indians strolled daily , riding a horse or carriage; on the plazas some were on their way to the nearby trade places or public offices, wether to fulfill religious needs, errands or to the artistic or handcraft workshops

In the novohispanic cities, towns and villages, plazas became a place of great importance for daily life since around them stood the main church, the house of government and arcades for commerce. [Museo de Coro]

Cathedrals dominating the novohispanic plazas were the most visible symbol of urban life as a center of faith and of the city.

The cathedral showed a spectacular and didactic environment to reach a better understanding of catholic faith. It did this combining also other artistic genres as painting and sculpture. This phenomenon received the name of baroque style.

Nowadays the indigenous people of latinamerica has a double cultural legacy: on one side it has retained and developed elements of the prehispanic cultures and on the other hand it has assimilated, since the XVII century, characteristics coming from Europe, Asia and Africa. [Museo E.T.F. de Amazonas ]