In collaboration with Patricio Villareal, and a cooperative of Mixtec weavers and dyers from the Oaxacan town of Pinotepa de Don Luis
A species of snail called Plicopurpura pansa still survives on the Mexican coasts of the Pacific Ocean. For thousands of years, it has provided various civilizations with a very unique purple dye from its inner shell. Known since ancient times as «Tirio purple», this dye is now found only in the rocky areas of the Mixtec coast of Oaxaca and is on the verge of extinction. For centuries, the Mixtec dyers of the community of Pinotepa de Don Luis in Oaxaca have preserved both the technique of milking the purple snail and the life of the mollusk itself. Unlike other cultures, the delicate Mixtec milking technique keeps the snail alive: the dye is transferred by dyers to skeins of natural cotton thread and then woven by the Mixtec weaving community into their traditional garments. Unfortunately, certain extraction processes-initiated decades ago (and still in effect today) have put the biocultural tradition that the Ñuu Savi dyers have preserved generation after generation at alarming risk.
Tixinda (2025) is conceived as an interdisciplinary artistic project (both performative and video) that investigates how the disappearance of a natural color that has for so long conditioned a form of human cultural existence affects perception. It is a work about the agency of color, how it adheres to different surfaces, creating a fluidity in time and history.
Melanie Smith. Dibujo para Tixinda I, 2024.Watercolor on paper, 35 x 50 cm
Exhibition view of «El tiempo se siente menos si nos quedamos quietos» by Melanie Smith at Museo de Arte de Zapopan, Guadalajara, México, 2025. Courtesy of Museo de Arte de Zapopan (MAZ). Photo: Lazarillo.
Melanie Smith. Dibujo para Tixinda XI, 2024.Watercolor on paper, 35 x 50 cm / Melanie Smith. Dibujo para Tixinda X, 2024.Watercolor on paper, 35 x 50 cm
Exhibition view of «El tiempo se siente menos si nos quedamos quietos» by Melanie Smith at Museo de Arte de Zapopan, Guadalajara, México, 2025. Courtesy of Museo de Arte de Zapopan (MAZ). Photo: Lazarillo.
Melanie Smith. Dibujo para Tixinda IV, 2024.Watercolor on paper, 35 x 50 cm
Exhibition view of «El tiempo se siente menos si nos quedamos quietos» by Melanie Smith at Museo de Arte de Zapopan, Guadalajara, México, 2025. Courtesy of Museo de Arte de Zapopan (MAZ). Photo: Lazarillo.