Curator bridges love of food, culture in 'New World Cuisine' exhibit

 

(Santa Fe New Mexican) A 14th-generation New Mexican on her father’s side, a food lover and historian, Nicolasa Chávez has combined her interests and background in a new exhibit at the Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe. New World Cuisine: The Histories of Chocolate, Mate y Más, opened Dec. 9, 2012, after five years of planning and research on early cultural mixing through food. Chávez, who has been working at the museum for just over five years as the curator of U.S. Latino/Hispano/Spanish Colonial collections, said the idea for the exhibit came to her shortly after she accepted the job.

Originally, she planned to focus on chocolate and mate drinks, but her ideas eventually expanded to include wine, early agricultural techniques and artistic exchanges between the Americas, Spain and Europe. “In food history, there is a term called Columbian Exchange,” Chávez said. “It’s one of the biggest revolutions in food history aside from learning how to apply fire to cook food or process food in different ways. Prior to the Columbian Exchange, a lot of foods were unknown throughout the world. The tomato, the potato, you know, the things we take for granted every day and everywhere you travel, you couldn’t find them.” Continued