Salvadoran Art and Culture

The mini-stories in BiLingo Kidz are embedded with culture.  The first stories are of María Esther, a 10 year old Salvadoran. 

Post colonial cities in Latin America have a church in the center of the city with a park in front.  The first painting in BiLingo Kidz is of Esther playing at the plaza central, the park in front of the the central cathedral in San Salvador, the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Holy Savior (Catedral Metropolitana de San Salvador).

The facade of the cathedral has tiles painted by Fernando Llort and team.  The tiles depict the life of the Salvadoran people.  The following is a quote from Fernando Llort taken from his website:  "The Catholic Church from El Salvador asked me to design the facade for the Cathedral.  This has been one of the most inspiring artistic moments of my life, cause it meant to meant I was putting my art on a very important symbol of my country, with a huge historical value.  It was a work that took us (me and a group of artisans) around 1 year to finish." 

Fernando Llort is a theologian, artist and teacher.  He moved from the city of San Salvador to a small town in northern El Salvador, La Palma.  It was here that Fernando began his artistic endeavors in earnest and taught the people of La Palma to adapt his style of art and make a living from their art as in the cross below. 

As mentioned above, Llort shared his passion with the people of La Palma.  I would suggest to teachers that you show example of Llort's artwork passed on to the Salvaoran people through painted crosses they created.  The crosses depict their lives and spirituality.  Students could draw and color their own symbols in the shape of a cross to experience the art form more fully.