A small rock in the Atlantic: 09/01/2011

Friday 14 January 2011

Los Llanos's Ethnographic museum(MAB) - permenent exhibition

Prehispanic huts, Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Prehispanic huts

The people who lived on La Palma before the Spanish arrived in 1493 called the island Benahoare, and themselves Benahorita, and they're the subject of the permanent exhibition upstairs at the ethnographic museum in Los Llanos.

The Benahorita lived in caves and wore animal skins, but they weren't stupid. They farmed, and they had quite a bit of technology considering there's no metal ores on the island. Their ceramics are lovely.

Prehispanic ceramics, Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Prehispanic ceramics

The exhibition includes recreations of the sort of huts and caves they lived in, the the way they buried their dead. (Caution - there are some real human skeletons. I don't mind but some people might.) Display cases and panels tell you all about their ceramics, and the ingenious things they made out of stone, bones, shells, leather and wood. More display panels cover the ancient Benohora kingdoms, archaeological sites, and the geology of La Palma.

All in all, it's pretty good, and it's free.

The museum opens from Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am – 2 pm and 5 pm – 8 pm

Cave home

Labels: Benaoristas, Los Llanos, museum

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Los Llanos's Ethnographic Museum, MAB

Exterior of the Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Exterior of the Ethnographic Museum

This morning I finally got to see the ethnographic museum in Los Llanos. It's been open for four years, so I wasn't exactly jumping the gun.

The building's at the top end of Los Llanos, and the outside is an example of what you can do with concrete when you stop thinking about shoe boxes. I'm sure only smart-mouthed philistines find themselves thinking of gasometers. It's just that I used to take a bus past a gasometer just the same size and shape.

And they're digging up the grounds at the moment. I expect that's temporary.

Statue of the shepherd's leap, Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Statue of the shepherd's leap over the entrance

Entrance is free, and once you get inside, it's really nice. Be sure to look up as you go through the main door - there's a statue of a man doing the traditional Shepherd's Leap.

Downstairs is where they hold the temporary exhibitions. Today there were two of them. One side held a fascinating exhibition on the island's fungi, by Cecilia Hosinsky, which will be there until the 28th of January.

Fungi in chestnut woods, Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Fungi in chestnut woods

The other side held an exhibition of statues, inspired by the Prehispanic rock carvings and statues of the island. Today was the last day, so I was lucky to catch it.

Statues inspired by Prehispanic art, Ethnographic Museum, Los Llanos

Statues inspired by Prehispanic art

I'll cover the permanent exhibit in another post soon.

The museum opens from Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am - 2 pm and 5 pm - 8 pm. It's officially called the "Museo archeologico benahoarita", or MAB.

By the time you get there, the statue of me doing yoga will have gone.