Tenochtitlan, Digital Recreation | Digest Architectural

Diario we walk and live what was the great Tenochtitlanbut there is a lot and at the same time very little. Transiting the beam channel, walking through Tlatelolco, visiting the Zocalo iron are probably everyday activities for city and city; They are also part of the Hot Spots that tourists travel. But it did not always look like this, clearly, modernity was seizing the slow and deep spaces, but it is not current or has to do with globalization to one hundred percent; but the civilizations that lived in the territory were invaded by the Spanish Empire.

The CDMX is shocking, but in ancient times it was fascinating.Thomas Kole.

This was a radical change for the sociocultural environment, including architecture, gastronomy, lifestyle and more. However, historians, anthropologists and passionate of our territory have given themselves the task of collecting information to give a more accurate and broad panorama of what was pre -Columbian life, among them Thomas Kole, an artist who made a detailed recreation of Tenochtitlan in 3D. He, in turn, worked closely with Rodrigo Ortega, who has dedicated himself to the translation of the Nahuatl language, who provided him with part of the tools to have Tenochtitlan portrait, The digital work that brings us the skin.

We talked with both to better understand the panorama of the technological piece that allows us go into Tenochtitlan, as well as in their culture and way of life, either to understand us as a later society or simply to «travel to the past» through current resources.

The inspiration of Thomas Kole

The artist is originally from the Netherlands and, although Mexico had never visited, he was a curious of cultures, including the natives of Latin America. Imagine then, what caused in his being to know that, within the great Mexican capital, the ruins of what was one of the largest civilizations in the world. That is to say, Under Mexico City is Tenochtitlanor a good part of it. «I heard for the first time lA word tenochtitlan just a few years ago. My knowledge about the pre -Hispanic 'new' was very scarce, it is an issue that does not receive much attention in Europe. Reading about the city, its size and organization was against all my expectations. When I went out to look for images of TenochtitlanI felt disappointed. My imagination is not so great, so I need more than a map, a book or a picture to transport myself to the past. It was then that I decided to do it myself. Of course, I did not expect to work on it for so long and certainly did not expect popularity, ”the artist tells us.

But, of course, I needed to come into contact with people who were immersed in the history of Mexico, not only with Mexicans or city, but with experts. Thus arrived in Rodrigo Ortega, the translator who was part of the Kole road. “I came into contact with Thomas through an art study where I work by doing texts and translations for painters Chicome Itzcuintli and Aaron Quiáhuitl. The Tenochtitlan site logo «That is the glyph of the name of the city,» was designed by them. When they told me that Thomas was looking for someone to translate Nahuatl, I was very excited to collaborate with him, ”says Rodrigo Ortega. Also, Thomas Kole said that when the project began, “it had a vague vision of what the final result should be. One part of that was that it should be translated into Nahuatl. There were some warnings, one of them was that Nahuatl is not a language, but a collection of variants. So when we come into contact with Rodrigo, we opted for only one, a central one, which would be Something close to the Nahuatl spoken in Tenochtitlán. Due to his knowledge of the subject, I also conferred the translations into Spanish. ” It should be noted that, about 10 % of visitors to the site, they do click In the Nahuatl version of the site, which means they feel curious.

The most difficult for the project

Well, start, The fact that Tenochtitlan is an alien concept for Kole becomes a limiting; However, he points out two specific things as the most complicated in the project: motivation and research. “Many occasions I was about to leave the project, I arrived at dead ends. After weeks of working on a specific thing I had to throw it because it looked bad for me. At first I decided to save a folder with screenshots to follow the progress and this helped me stay motivated. The research was also incredibly complicated, because when you make a complete reconstruction like this, you cannot leave blank spaces. Everything must be completed. As such, you must ask questions that no one else has asked before. I had to do everything possible to make the best possible assumptions in cases where there was no information available. Fortunately, I was able to consult with many people, each of whom could contribute their own experience. ”

In this case, Rodrigo Ortega's support was crucial for his knowledge about it. “The information is inaccurate. I am not an anthropologist or historian. I have dedicated myself to translation from and from the Nahuatl language in its variant in central Mexico, after almost ten years of study in classes, courses, workshops and seminars. Mesoamerica has been interested since I have memory (living in Mexico City, it is inevitable to visit Teotihuacan, Tula or the same Temple) and through formal and non -formal education I have been able to delve into this exciting issue. ”