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. Las Huellas de Ayer y de Hoy by Pedro Rafael Gonzalez Chavajay
La Vida de los Campesinos by Matias Gonzalez Chavajay
Recorriendo el Camino al Mercado by Mario Gonzalez Chavajay
When asked all Tz'utuhil Mayan artists will say that they paint to record for future generations the disappearing traditions of their culture. They paint in a style which Kryssi Staikidis calls imagined realism because they paint the vanished traditions from how they imagine they were rather than from real life. The paintings cumulatively represent a colorful ethnographic record of highland Mayan culture both secular and religious. The Arte Maya collection represents the cream of the crop—the best paintings of the best artists over many years. No collection, not even in Guatemala, comes close in quality and scope to this collection.
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The major paintings in the collection tackle some of the most uncommon and difficult themes, such as the violence which affected all Mayan communities in the early 1980's, as well as some of the most common and beautiful subjects such as picking coffee and the night market: large paintings.

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Unless an artist has a client requesting a large painting, they usually won't attempt the large format because they will not easily get paid for it when they finish. Such large paintings take a month or more to paint with the artist working eight or more hours daily. As a result many original paintings are painted in a somewhat smaller size which sells more easily: medium paintings.
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I found it impossible to part with quite a number of the small paintings because in theme and execution they stood out from thousands of small paintings produced each year for the tourist market.
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