The sea – omnipresent and majestic – is the uniting element of the nine Islands of the Azores born violently from its deep abyss as if it were a mystery.
Volcanism marked the islands with spectacular landscapes, and in its people, their way of life. From the fear of the violence of the eruptions and the earthquakes habits and customs were born: Promises, pilgrimages and festivities that have been preserved to the present day which, erasing individual borders, enhance the strength of the communities and consolidate the popular religiosity.
The insular land, born black and harsh, became green over the millennia. Green of life, green of hope, of the dream of those who work it and make it fruitful.
But, “it is the ocean that brings the Islands in its hand” and tempers the soul and the longing of its people. It is the swaying of its waves that churns feelings, beliefs, knowledge and experiences that make up the identity and culture of the Azores. Being a support of this culture, Handicrafts represent one of the purest expressions of the way of life of this people, who revives and asserts itself through it. Handicrafts that enrich the expression of the popular art, reflecting the sea, the land and the soul in the pieces crafted using the raw materials offered by nature, which man so wisely knew how to prepare.
It was with the wood from endemic species like cedar, beech and the cornel cherry tree that the first settlers exceeded the needs of survival, and it is in wood that the most diverse motifs continue to be carved, in traditional furniture, sarongs and in the altarpieces of churches.
The abundance of raw materials obtained and produced locally led to the development of weaving and ceramics industries, which acquired great importance, especially in the economy of the islands of São Jorge and Santa Maria, respectively. The most notable weaving products are the profusely ornamented and polychrome bedspreads, woven with cotton or linen and interwoven with wool.
The quality and abundance of clay in the island of Santa Maria allowed its use on various islands of the archipelago, mainly for the production of utilitarian objects of everyday rural life and in construction work. The production of decorative elements, including tiles, is associated with the painted faience factories that have developed on the islands of São Miguel and Terceira.
Works in basketry made from wicker or elaborately braided hats in wheat straw or corn leaf are testimonies of activities that characterized the daily work on lands where the sea coexists with the countryside. The use of dry leaves and corn beards gave rise to the typical shale dolls, formerly used as entertainment for children and an emblematic symbol of the regional handicraft.
“Rendas de gancho” (hook laces) and the artistic crochet of the islands of Pico and Faial are a prestige to the Azorean handicrafts, bearing a certificate of quality and with honours at exhibitions and museums. In a land of sailors and fishermen, the inexistence of lace could not be possible, as tradition dictates. The Crown in crafted silver and the Flag of the Holy Spirit – in red silk damask with the golden embroidery of the crown or a dove, in the centre – are material supports of the symbolic content of the most important religious festivity of the Azores – the Festivities of the Divine Holy Spirit.
Still on the cult of the Holy Spirit, on the island of São Jorge the gastronomic ritual has interesting peculiarities: the eve cake, distributed to the population on the Monday and Tuesday of Pentecost, marked with artistic stamps (“chavões”) carved in cedar wood from the bush, presenting as decorative motifs, crowns and doves of the Holy Spirit, flowers and the Cross of the Order of Christ.
At the mercy of the tides, the laborious hands of artisans will continue to imprint ideas, gestures, practices and experiences of the Azorean culture on handcrafted pieces, useful or artistic, bearing the weight of an inheritance from earlier times.
