Under Mezcal Influence

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project © Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project © Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project View all images ↓
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Following the rise of the international demand for mezcal, the project adopts its magic imaginary to challenge its actual global narrative, looking intimately at Oaxaca's pueblos to reach for a better understanding of the Mexican agave culture.

Mexico is home to the world’s richest biodiversity of agaves of all the globe, hosting hundreds of species and thousand years old human-agave interactions. Over the last decade, the growing international demand for mezcal, an agave-based spirit, has been pressuring the Mexican territory and its inhabitants at a pace that is far too aggressive for both the rural dynamics and the plant’s intrinsic temporalities. Although, the storytelling around mezcal in the Oaxaca’s touristic region is highly positive, selling an Arcadian vision of ancestral purity and wrongly referring to pre-hispanic origins.

Coming back from a crisis of the industry at the end of the twentieth century, mezcal is now the star of the worldwide’s spirituous scene for the uniqueness of its artisanal production, made in rustic vernacular infrastructures with humble equipment. The fragile entity of the pueblo suddenly arises from a narrative exalting the concepts of tradition and authenticity, while the figure of the maestro mezcalero reaches the individual recognition of an artist, challenging socio-cultural dynamics among the communities. Following the demand, the pressure becomes heavier on the small producers, on the land and on the soil, leading to problematics such as intensive plantations, monoculture, plagues, and inequities among the actors. With the intensification of the production, quantity is slowly winning back over quality, but accessibility is always more questionable as what was once an alcohol of the campesinos becomes the alcohol of an elite that paradoxically acclaims a proud past of indigenous deities. Submitted to the liquidity of the market and to the manipulation of the industry by Western investors and their brands, the agave world is currentlyfacing distortion and contradiction.

In the common language emerging among the mezcal world, it is said that its consumption makes you magical. Under Mezcal Influence visually adopts this magic imaginary to take a closer look at the varieties of myths and misconceptions around mezcal, but also shedding light on the daily reality of the pueblos mezcaleros of the State of Oaxaca. Influenced by a foreign interest, but immersed in the enchanting esthetics of its rural dimension, the mezcal situation is reflective of a forever dichotomy characterizing the Mexican nation, in between indigeneity and modernity. Stepping back from the superficial narrative and seeking for an understanding of the roots of an agave culture, the photos aim to show the subtile and sensible testimonies of a territory and its community, living the environmental and cultural consequences of their own economic apogee.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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In the sierra, some tales tell the legend of duendes, magical creatures that can transform themselves into loved ones and get you lost. This imaginary is part of a union that transcends nature and flirts with a popular supernatural conception of the world.

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In Oaxaca's pueblos, migration to "the North" has been challenging the communities, but mezcal is seen as an opportunity for a return to the motherland. On the other hand, the high demand incites people to plant agaves in non-endemic regions, resulting in an other type of forced migration, a vegetal one. Such is the case of these plants, now growing in the humid zone of the coast.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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Because his agaves are located about a two hours ride from his pueblo, up in the sierra, Chilo, a maestro mezcalero, sometimes sleeps several days in a hut he constructed himself in the middle of the fields, among the plants.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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The picudo is a plague that has been eating all kind of agave species to death. Their appetite for agave is due to the decrease of other typologies of plants in the fields, consequence of long periods of dryness and of the use of chemicals. Its abundance is difficult to manage, particularly in monocultures, where it is resolved by the use of even more pesticides, stimulating a vicious circle.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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In most of the Mexican regions, agave has been part of pre-hispanic daily life, being used in many ways. In the Valle del Mezquital, the ixtle (maguey fiber), is still part of the local economy, although its daily use has been replaced by plastic materials. It is now sold to visitors as crafts pieces. The hñähñu word for the fiber is Maxitha (old people hair), due to its texture and color.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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Putting some wild animals in mezcal bottle is an old marketing strategy developed in the 70's that still fascinates both collectors and tourists. In general, the design of the bottle is important for the brand owner, even if the best mezcals are often found in re-used plastic bottles, coming directly from the reserve of the maestros mezcaleros in the pueblos.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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In some remote communities, access to water is limited. The river becomes a point of meeting, a bath, a laundry room and a playground. Some palenques (artisanal mezcal fabrics) have the bad habit to drop the toxic waste coming from mezcal production in the rivers, as no territorial strategical plan has been developed for mezcal management.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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A cross is put on the mezcal's oven, sepulted for some days during the cooking of the piñas (the agave's heart). It is a common practice in some comunidades mezcaleras, where the social organization and the spiritual believes still highly respond to catholic religion.

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Life in the palenque is extremely social and traditionally involves all the components of the familia mezcalera. Even though new production dynamics are beginning to emerge, it is common to use the palenque as a gathering place, where the whole community can participate in some key moments of the production. Here, a boy comes home from school to her grandmother, who helps behind the tasting bar.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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Yair, a maestro mezcalero's son, is stepping on some prehispanic ruins on the hill behind his house. While the mezcal industry tends to idealize indigeneity, the situation in the pueblos nativos is actually fragile and complex, still under the influence of Western and neocolonial dynamics. These stones are a strong echo to the history of this pueblo who already lost the use of its native language.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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While the pueblos used to produce mezcal out of wild agaves, a lot of these species are now endangered because of the market's hunger. New landscapes are being modelled out of the monoculture of Espadín, the most common agave for mezcal production. In the sierra, no chemicals have been used on this field, still rich of other plant species and maintaining a decent biodiversity.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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The market is heterogeneous and unplanned. Some touristic infrastructures such as modern palenques featuring bars, tasting room, restaurants and hotels are growing as fast as the Espadín. The architecture typology is as heterogeneous as the market itself. This neo-renaissance pavilion built near a wild agave plantation field is still under construction and part of a larger private complex.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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The pearls are part of the new mezcal language and imaginary, and refers to the small bubbles created by the pouring of the liquid in a glass. It is used as an empiristic way to determine the quality of the mezcal, as the pearls form when it holds a graduation of about 45 to 55% of alcohol. This is an indicator that the mezcal has not been diluted too much nor mixed with chemicals or sweeteners.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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During the period of festivities, the cohetes (rockets) constantly shine in Mexico. In the days of Todos Santos, a group of persons celebrate in the middle of an agave field, as mezcal holds an important symbolic role during the festivities in the communities.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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The machete is one of the most important tools in a maestro mezcalero's life. It is used to cut the agaves from the fields to the oven, a series of physical works that require a lot of strength. Women in the mezcal production are often stigmatized as their body is generously not recognized as strong enough for the work, although this machist narrative is slowly evolving.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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The palenques are artisanal fabrics of mezcal, who generally answer to a criteria of tradition, enhanced by mercadotechnia. Differentiating according to regional specificities, they are characterized by humble equipment, vernacular materials and the adoption of self-construction practices. The space is divided following the steps of the production and is sometimes an extension of the living one.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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Most of the remote communities do not have access to levels higher than highschool. Economic difficulties can discourage young people to reach for higher education, but emotive reasons due to family, cultural and natural separation, added to the discrimination still ongoing in the biggest cities, are also at the center of the struggle.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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An altar in the first palenque of Beneva shows a picture of its first owner, who has been assassinated. Violence and impunity, highly linked with money and rural business, are a problem in Mexico. Beneva is now one of the most famous industrial plant of mezcal. The only 3 industrial plants of Oaxaca produce the majority of the mezcal of the State, even if there are over 400 producers registered.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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Maestra Berta is one of the most famous figures of the mezcal world, holding her own sense of feminism and traditional knowledge. She is renown for the quality of her mezcal that she produces in a shared palenque. She is pointing at the moon, an important natural strength that influences the cycles of growth of the agaves and her practices of mezcal production.

© Frédérique Gélinas - Image from the Under Mezcal Influence photography project
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While women were historically isolated from the production of mezcal, the actual narrative opens a door for some of them to get involve and be recognized as maestras mezcaleras. Such is the case for this young woman laying on a flower bed near the agave field. After years of dryness in the Oaxaca's Valley region, the vegetation is fully blooming after this year's rains.

Under Mezcal Influence by Frédérique Gélinas

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