Digital Auto De Fe
Team Members
Project Directors
Justin Duncan M.A.
Co-Project Director/Historian
Dave Gibbons
3-D Artist/ Game Designer
With over a decade of Game Industry experience and over a dozen shipped titles, Dave Gibbons has worn many hats throughout his career. Having worked at both larger game development studios, like the Activision-owned Budcat Creations, and game developer Black Lantern, as well as small start-ups, Dave has experience in every aspect of game art and design, as well as leading small teams of Freelance Artists and Developers to deliver excellent games on time and under budget.
Brad Grimm
Unity 3D Developer and Designer
Brad has 15+ Years as a business analyst with prototype and tool development using various database applications and VBA. Over the past 5 years he has become a successful Unity Programmer, having shipped several games over many different platforms using Unity Pro and coding in C#.
Shipped Titles:
Stained Glass – Lightside Games – IOS and Android - 2015
Linda Curcio-Nagy Ph.D
Historical Consultant
Frances Levine Ph.D
Historical Consultant
Gerardo Lara Cisneros
Historical Consultant
Javier Villa-Flores
Historical Consultant
John Chuchiak
Project Director/Historian
John Chuchiak
Project Director/Historian
John F. Chuchiak IV, Ph.D.
Project Director/Historian of the Inquisition in New Spain
Dr. John F. Chuchiak IV
Director of the Honors College
Professor of Colonial Latin American History
Rich and Doris Young Honors College Endowed Professor
Director, Latin American, Caribbean and Hispanic Studies Program
Fulbright Program Advisor
212 University Hall
Honors College
Missouri State University
Springfield, Missouri 65897
(417) 836-4852
(417) 836-6370
(417) 836-6372
E-mail: JohnChuchiak@missouristate.edu
John F. Chuchiak is currently the Director of the Honors College and the Director of the Latin American, Caribbean and Hispanic Studies program at Missouri State University. He is the Professor of Colonial Latin American History, and the holder of the Rich & Doris Young Honors College endowed professorship. He received his bachlelor's degree in History from Virginia Polytechnic and State University and his Master's and Ph.D. from Tulane University's Roger Thayer Stone Center for Latin American Studies where he held the France V. Scholes Fellowship for Colonial Latin American History. Dr. Chuchiak is a specialist on colonial Latin American history with a research emphasis on the history the colonial church in México and a special emphasis on the history of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in New Spain.
He is the author of the recent books: The Inquisition in New Spain, 1536-1820 (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012) and Unlikely Allies: Mayas, Spaniards and Pirates in Colonial Yucatan, 1550-1750 (University of Colorado Press, Forthcoming). He is currently in the process of publishing together with Dr. Luis René Guerrero Galván, Edictos de Fe del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición de la Nueva España: Estudio Preliminar y un Corpus Facsimilar (Mexico City: Instituto de Investigaciones Juridicas, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, 2017), which is a preliminary study and facsimile edition of the entire corpus of the Edicts of Faith produced by the Inquisition in New Spain.
His most recent publications on the Inquisition in New Spain include: “Negotiating Penance: Inquisitors’ Interactions and Negotiations with the accused in Inquisition Trials” in Gretchen Starr-LeBeau & Charles H. Parker (eds.) (Ed.), Judging Faith, Punishing Sin: Inquisitions and Consistories in the Early Modern World New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015, pp. 147-163; “El regreso de los autos de fe: Fray Diego de Landa y la extirpación de idolatrías en Yucatán” in Península: Revista semestral de la Coordinación de Humanidades, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Vol. 1, Núm. 0, 2006, pp. 29–47; “ La inquisición Indiana y la extirpación de idolatrías: El castigo y la Reprensión en el Provisorato de Indios en Yucatán, 1570–1690” in Ana de Zaballa Beascoechea (editor) Nuevas Perspectivas Sobre el Castigo de la Heterodoxia Indígena en la Nueva España, siglos XVI-XVIII, Bilbao: Universidad del Pais Vasco, Spain, 2005, pp. 79–94; as well as “Twilight of the Inquisition: The Rise and Fall of the Holy Office, 1650-1830” in Donald Prudlo (Ed.), Brill Companion to the Religious Inquisitions of the Medieval and Early Modern Periods (ed.). Leiden: Brill Publishers; and “The Devil's Advocates: Procedural Issues and Conflicts of Jurisdiction in the Inquisition's Use of Indigenous Testimonies in Colonial Yucatán, 1570-1770,”. In Chuchiak, J. F., Mark Lentz (Eds.), Spheres of Native Justice: Church, State, and Indigenous Subjects in New Spain (Forthcoming, 2016). He is also the author of more than sixty other peer reviewed book chapters and articles published in a number of edited volumes and anthologies.
Justin Duncan M.A.
Co-Project Director/Historian of the Inquisition's Auto de Fe Ceremonies
EBS Special Education Teacher
Pedagogical Director of the Project
Springfield Public Schools
Justin Duncan received his M.A. in History under the direction of Dr. John F. Chuchiak IV. His M.A. Thesis project "Performing Theaters of Power: The Holy Office of the Inquisition’s General Autos de Fe in Spain and Spanish America and the Visual and Physical Representations of Inquisitorial Power, 1481-1736." (2014) which led to his development of a passion for the study of the ritual and religious use of space in the Spanish Inquisition's public ceremonies and celebrations of the Auto de Fe.
The Mexican Auto de Fe of 1601 Project was initially Justin's brainchild born out of his own research obsession to try and understand more about the public performance of the auto de fe which developed during his M.A. research.
Currently in the development stages for a creation of a curriculum and teaching tool project in the Digital Humanities on the auto de fe, he is in the process of developing several teaching tools which will aid in the creation of the virtual reality platform using Unity3D gaming design for a re-creation of Mexico City in 1601.
It is Justin's belief that by creating an accurate virtual recreation of the capital city of the Kingdom of New Spain, the project and the planned curricular units on the history of the Spanish Inquisition in Mexico, will open up a whole new world of virtual historical simulations that can be used in the classroom and in future historical research.
Antonio Rodríguez Alcalá, Ph.D.
Co-Project Director/Architect & Architectural Historian
Professor of Architecture
Escuela de Arquitectura
Universidad Anahuac-Mayab
Mérida, Yucatán, México
Dr. Antonio Rodríguez Alcalá has his master’s degree in architecture from the Autonomous University of Yucatán and his doctorate in architecture with honors from the National Autonomous University of Mexico in 2012. He has collaborated on research projects and works of historical and architectural restoration and conservation of the built cultural heritage of Yucatan and other States throughout Mexico for numerous years. He served as head of projects of restoration for the Secretariat of Public Works for the State Government of Yucatán from 2005-2007. To name a few of his major projects, he coordinated the restoration of several major pieces of historical architecture in the state, including: the former sanatorium of Rendon Peniche (1919), the ex-central railway station of the city of Mérida (late 19th century), and the late Temple of Santo Domingo in Uayma (ca. 1642), among others.
Among his professional honors he has received the honors award in the design contest of the 10th ENEA (National Meeting of Architecture Students) and the Alberto J. Pani award granted by the National Autonomous University of Mexico, as well as an honorable mention in the 5th Biannual Competition of Yucatecan Architecture in 2005 for the category of monuments restoration for the project entitled "The Temple of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción of Sanahcat, Yucatán"; as well as an Honorable Mention for the "Jorge Ignacio Rubio Mañé" prize at the 2nd Annual Competition for Historical Essays held by the Board of the Peninsular History Society (PROHISPEN). He has also won the Award of the Mexican Academy of Sciences for the best Doctoral thesis in the Humanities for the year 2012, as well as an Honorable mention for the 2013 "Francisco de la Maza" Doctoral Thesis Award, from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), and the silver medal award from the 10th Biannual Architectural award in Yucatan for the same doctoral thesis; as well as the Honorable mention for the 18th Biannual National Award in Mexican architecture and the silver medal "Alfonso Caso" from the National Autonomous University of Mexico in 2014.
He has collaborated in publishing and research projects both nationally and internationally, including the Atlas of Yucatan research publication project, and the history of Mexican architecture and urban planning project, and on the project if the architectural biography of the Peon Contreras Theater; as well as several regional projects for restoration and original design of solar sun-dials in colonial Yucatan. He is also the author of books, book chapters and articles in various peer reviewed academic journals, as well as peer-reviewed chapters in numerous edited volumes, as well as other articles and publications in various newspapers. Currently he is co-directing two international research projects in cooperation between the Anahuac Mayab University and Missouri State University on the Virtual Recreation of the 17th Century Palace of the Mexican Inquisition and the Virtual Recreation of the Cathedral of San Ildefonso de Mérida, Yucatán project with Dr. John F. Chuchiak IV (Missouri State University).
He also founded in 2003 an architectural firm [Architecture, Restoration and Environments (ARA)], focused on offering comprehensive solutions for projects in the areas of design, management and the construction of various genres of architecture, with special emphasis on the restoration of Cultural Heritage sites and buildings and their implementation and use for new operational requirements, thereby satisfying the specific needs of the firm’s customers. The highlights of this work include various projects of restoration of religious buildings, and renovations of historical architectural structures like 17th to 18th century Mexican haciendas and their repurposing for their eventual use as hotels, housing structures and offices and museums, among other types of projects.
Academically he has also occupied teaching positions in conjunction with his activities as an architect and in parallel to his professional career, teaching at the Autonomous State University of Yucatán courses on 2D and 3D Digital Animation to undergraduate, certificate and master's degree level students. A member of the permanent faculty at the Anáhuac-Mayab University since 2011, he has taught these same courses as well as other advanced senior level project workshops, courses on the theory of architecture, and specific courses on architectural restoration and many other workshops on recycling projects in the school of architecture as well courses on digital media and analog and digital photography in the programs of the departments of Communication and Design.
Humanities
Historical Research Team
(Dr. John F. Chuchiak IV, Director)
Linda Curcio-Nagy Ph.D
Historical Consultant on Public Spectacle in New Spain & the Auto de Fe
Associate Professor of History
Department of History
University of Nevada-Reno
Mack Social Sciences, MSS 103
(775) 784-4079
E-Mail: lindacurcio@unr.edu
Dr. Curcio-Nagy began learning Spanish in the fourth grade and has been studying, traveling, working, and living in Latin America ever since that time. She received her BA in International Affairs and Latin American Studies at George Washington University and studied in Spain and Colombia as part of her undergraduate training. She holds a MA degree in Hispanic Literature for which she specialized in Latin American poetry and prose. After a stint working at the International Monetary Fund, Dr. Curcio-Nagy headed to New Orleans to begin doctoral work at Tulane University’s prestigious Roger Thayer Stone Center for Latin American Studies. While at Tulane, she directed the Center’s Summer in Mexico Program and its Latin American Curriculum Resource Center. Dr. Curcio-Nagy’s research focuses on the cultural and religious history of colonial Mexico (particularly that of the 16th and 17th centuries). She has published many articles as well as the award-winning Great Festivals of Colonial Mexico City: Performing Power and Identity with the University of New Mexico Press in 2004 and, with William H. Beezley, Latin American Popular Culture: An Introduction with Scholarly Resources in 2000.
Dr. Curcio-Nagy is currently finishing a book manuscript entitled Grave Sins of Sensuality in Colonial Mexico. A new project analyzing masculinity and magic during the 17th century is well under way. Dr. Curcio-Nagy teaches a wide variety of courses on ancient, colonial, and modern Latin America. She won UNR’s Alan Bible Teaching Award and the Edward Liewen Prize for Teaching from the Rocky Mountain Council for Latin American Studies. She received the Tibbitts Teaching in Excellence Prize in 2015.
Frances Levine Ph.D
Historical and Museum Consultant, Specialist on the Sephardic Diaspora, Jewish History, and the Inquisition in New Mexico
Dr. Frances Levine became the President and CEO of the Missouri Historical Society and Missouri History Museum in the spring of 2014. She is a new resident of St. Louis, but quickly learning to love what makes this city great: its important historical location at the confluence of two major rivers, it parks and historic architecture, its vibrant cultural life. She has joined the Board of Forest Park Forever and the Regional Chamber of Commerce.
She was the director of the New Mexico History Museum from 2002 until spring 2014. There she oversaw the development and construction of the newest museum in the Museum of New Mexico system, the New Mexico History Museum. That campus includes the Palace of the Governors, the Fray Angélico Chavéz History Library and Photo Archives, The Palace Print Shop, and the Native American Portal Artisans Program.
A native of Connecticut, Frances received her B.A. in Anthropology from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Anthropology from Southern Methodist University, Dallas. She was the Assistant Dean of Academic Affairs for Arts and Sciences at Santa Fe Community College (in Santa Fe, New Mexico). At the college she taught classes in New Mexico history and the ethnohistory of the Pueblo and Hispanic communities of the Southwest. In 2009 she attended the prestigious Getty Museum Leadership Institute. She is a member of the American Alliance of Museums, the American Society for Ethnohistory, and the Santa Fe Trail Association. She has served as an evaluator for the American Alliance of Museums Accreditation review process for museums in the US and Mexico.
Dr. Levine is the author, co-editor or contributor to several award-winning books including Our Prayers Are in This Place: Pecos Pueblo Identity over the Centuries (1999, UNM Press), Through the Lens: Creating Santa Fe (2008 MNM Press, with MaryAnne Redding and Krista Elrick), and Telling New Mexico: A New History (2009 MNM Press, with Marta Weigle and Louise Stiver) as well as a chapter in All Trails Lead to Santa Fe (2010 with Gerald Gonzalez, Sunstone Press), and the recently published Frontier Battles and Massacres: Historical and Archaeological Perspectives. (With Ron Wetherington, editors). University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 2014).
An avid historian of the Jewish diaspora, and with a keen research interest in the persecution of the Jewish community in New Spain, she is currently in the process of publishing a book about Doña Teresa Aguilera y Roche, the wife of an early governor of New Mexico who was later tried by the Inquisition. Doña Teresa was the wife of the governor Don Bernardo López de Mendizábal in Santa Fe between 1659 and 1662. In 1662, she and her husband were arrested by Inquisition officials in Santa Fe and later sent to the Inquisition Palace in New Spain and tried on charges of being a Jew. Although she never was, as Frances argues, it was the way the enemies of her husband used the power of the church to prosecute her.
Her experience in studying the crytpo-Jewish and Jewish community in the 17th century far reaches of New Spain and her specific work on the story of one woman who faced religious intolerance and persecution are an invaluable resource for the project's focus on illustrating the Auto de Fe of 1601 through the eyes of one of its main protagonists: Doña Mariana Núñez de Carvajal, one of the last members of the famous Carvajal family in New Spain to fall victim to the Holy Office.
Gerardo Lara Cisneros, Ph.D.
Historical Consultant on the Inquisition and Ecclesiastical Courts' Public Celebrations of the Auto fe Fe in New Spain
Dr. Gerardo Lara Cisneros
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas
Circuito Mario de la Cueva s/n,
Ciudad Universitaria,
Coyoacán, 04510, México, D. F.
E-mail: glc@unam.mx.
Dr. Gerardo Lara Cisneros is a professor of the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters and research scholar the Historical Institute of the National Autonomous University of Mexico. He is a research specialist on the Inquisition and the Ecclesiastical Courts of New Spain. Among his many research emphases is a focus on the celebration of the public autos de fe of both the Inquisition and the Episcopal courts of the Provisorato de Indios of the Archdiocese of New Spain. He has researched in-depth the role of the these ecclesiastical courts in the processing and punishment of New Spain’s indigenous peoples.
He is the author of several books relating to the Inquisition and ecclesiastical courts including most recently: ¿Ignorancia invencible? Superstición e idolatría ante el Provisorato de Indios y Chinos del Arzobispado de México en el siglo XVIII, México, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México: Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, 2014; as well as El cristianismo en el espejo indígena. Religiosidad en el Occidente de Sierra Gorda. Siglo XVIII, 3ª Ed., Salta, Argentina, Purmamarka Ediciones, 2013.
Among his more recent publications pertinent to the history of the auto de fe and the Inquisition in New Spain are: Gerardo Lara Cisneros, “Los autos de fe para indios en el Arzobispado de México. Siglo XVIII (1714-1755)” en Rafael Castañeda García y Rosa Alicia Pérez Luque (Coordinadores), Entre la solemnidad y el regocijo. Fiestas, devociones y religiosidad en Nueva España y el mundo hispánico (2015); and “El discurso anti-supersticioso y contra la adivinación indígena en Hispanoamérica colonial, siglos XVI-XVII”, Nuevo Mundo Mundos Nuevos, Debates, 2012; as well as “Religiosidad indígena en contextos urbanos. Nueva España, siglo XVIII”, en Felipe Castro (Coordinación), Los indios y las ciudades de Nueva España, México, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México: Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, 2010: p. 279-302; “La justicia eclesiástica ordinaria y los indios en la Nueva España borbónica: balance historiográfico y prospección”, Los indios ante los foros de justicia religiosa en la Hispanoamérica virreinal, de Jorge E. Traslosheros y Ana de Zaballa, México, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, UNAM, 2010. (Serie Historia General, 25); and “El Auto de fe para Indios del Arzobispado de México en 1723”, en Jornadas de Estudios Indígenas y Coloniales, Jujuy, Argentina, Universidad Nacional de Jujuy, 2009; and “La religión de los indios en los Concilios provinciales novohispanos”, en María del Pilar Martínez López-Cano y Francisco Javier Cervantes Bello (coordinadores), Los concilios provinciales en Nueva España. Reflexiones e influencias, México, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México – Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, 2005: p. 203-222; and finally “Herejía indígena y represión eclesiástica en Nueva España. Siglo XVIII”, en Ana de Zaballa Beascoechea (Coord.), Nuevas perspectivas sobre el castigo de la heterodoxia indígena en la Nueva España: siglos XVI-XVIII, Bilbao, Universidad del País Vasco, España, 2005 (Serie de Historia Medieval y Moderna) p. 13-35.
Javier Villa-Flores, Ph.D.
Historical Consultant on the Inquisition and Blasphemers Processed in the Auto de Fe
Dr. Javier Villa-Flores
Associate Professor
Director of Graduate Studies
Latin American and Latino Studies (MC 219)/
Department of History
University of Illinois at Chicago
1009 University Hall
601 South Morgan Street
Chicago, Illinois 60607-7115
E-Mail: javier@uic.edu
Dr. Javier Villa-Flores received his doctorate in Latin American history from the University of California, San Diego, and an undergraduate degree in sociology from the University of Guadalajara in Mexico. His work revolves around issues of religion, colonialism, performance studies, and the social history of language in colonial Mexico. His first book Carlo Ginzburg: The Historian as Theoretician (University of Guadalajara, 1995) offered an epistemological discussion of the historian's craft focusing on Carlo Ginzburg's work. His second book, Dangerous Speech: A Social History of Blasphemy in Colonial Mexico (University of Arizona Press, 2006) analyzes the representation, prosecution and punishment of blasphemous speech in New Spain from 1520 to 1700. He is also the author of several articles, book chapters, reviews, and encyclopedia articles.
Among his most recent publications are: "Wandering Swindlers: Imposture, Style, and the Inquisition's Pedagogy of Fear in Peripheral New Spain", Colonial Latin American Review 17:2 (2008), 251-272; "Religion, Politics, and Salvation: Latin American Millenarian Movements", special issue on "Religion and Politics", edited by Duane Corpis and Rachel Scharfman, Radical History Review 99 (Fall, 2007), 242-251; "Talking Through the Chest: Ventriloquism and Divination among African Slave Women in Colonial Mexico", Colonial Latin American Review 14:2, 299-321.; and "Voices from a Living Hell: Life, Death, and Salvation in a colonial Mexican Obraje", in Martin Nesvig, ed. Local Religion in Colonial Mexico (New Mexico University Press, 2006).
Luis René Guerrero Galvan, Ph.D
Legal Historian and Juridical Consultant on Inquisitorial Law and Legal Proceedings
Dr. Luis René Guerrero Galvan
Professor and Researcher
Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
E-Mail:
Dr. Luis Rene is a Lawyer by training from the Faculty of Law at the Autonomous University of Zacatecas where he received his legal degree. He later pursued a Master’s and Doctoral degree in the history of Inquisitorial law and jurisprudence from the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
Luis René is a founding member of the National Society of Researchers of the Eighteenth century ; a Fellow of the Illustrious and National Bar Association of Mexico ; and President of the Mexican Academy of History of Law at the Academic Unit of Law at the Autonomous University of Zacatecas; as well as President of the Center for Legal and Social Studies and is recognized by the Mexican National Research System as one of the leading scholars of Inquisition legal history. He currently works as a researcher at the Institute of Legal Research of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
He is the autor of the following books: Procesos inquisitoriales por el pecado de solicitación en Zacatecas (siglo XVIII) (2003) and La práctica inquisitorial americana. Esbozo comparativo del delito de hechicería en los tres tribunales indianos: México, Lima y Cartagena, siglo XVII (2007) both of which were published by the Tribunal Superior de Justicia of the State of Zacatecas. He is also the autor of the book De acciones y transgresiones. Los comisarios del Santo Oficio y la aplicación de la justicia inquisitorial en Zacatecas siglo XVIII, published by the Autonomous University of Zacatecas in 2010. He has also recently published another book, Inquisición y derecho. Nuevas versiones de las transgresiones inquisitoriales en el nuevo mundo. Del antiguo régimen a los albores de la modernidad (IIJ-UNAM. 2014), and is the author of dozens of other articles. He is also the editor y director of the legal journal Vínculo Jurídico.
Currently he is in the process of publishing together with Dr. John F. Chuchiak, Edictos de Fe del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición de la Nueva España: Estudio Preliminar y un Corpus en Facsimile (Mexico City: Instituto de Investigaciones Juridicas, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, 2015), which is a facsimile edition and preliminary study of the entire corpus of the Edicts of Faith produced by the Inquisition in New Spain.
David Tavarez, Ph.D.
Historical & Anthropological Consultant on the Ecclesiastical Courts and the Indigenous Peoples of New Spain
Dr. David Tavarez
Associate Professor of Anthropology and Chair of Anthropology
Vassar College
Blodgett Hall 319
PHONE (845) 437-5508
BOX 430
E-Mail: tavarez@vassar.edu
WEBSITE http://faculty.vassar.edu/tavarez/
David Tavárez, currently the chair of the Anthropology Department, received a combined Ph.D. in Anthropology and History from the University of Chicago in 2000. He is an ethnohistorian and a linguistic anthropologist whose research focuses on Mesoamerican calendars and ritual practices, Nahua and Zapotec religion and society, indigenous intellectuals, indigenous responses to colonial evangelization, and indigenous historical consciousness and agency. He is the author of The Invisible War: Indigenous Devotions, Discipline, and Dissent in Colonial Mexico (Stanford University Press, 2011; paperback, 2013; Spanish-language edition, 2012), a co-editor (with Susan Schroeder, Anne Cruz, and Cristián Roa) of Chimalpahin’s Conquest: A Nahua Historian’s Rewriting of Francisco López de Gómara’s La conquista de México (Stanford University Press, 2010; Spanish-language edition, 2012), and a co-author (with Louise Burkhart and Elizabeth Boone) of Painted Words: Nahua Catholicism, Politics, and Memory in the Atzaqualco Pictorial Catechism (Dumbarton Oaks, 2016). He has also published more than sixteen peer-reviewed articles and nineteen book chapters which deal with the Inquisition and Ecclesiastical courts treatment of the indigenous peoples of Mexico.
He currently serves as Councilor for the American Society for Ethnohistory and is the chair of the Mexican Studies Committee at the Conference for Latin American History. His research has been supported by grants and fellowships from NEH, NSF, FAMSI, RISM, the John Carter Brown Library, and the Mellon and Hewlett Foundations. His course offerings include a popular introduction to linguistics and anthropology, language and culture, language and gender, Mesoamerican and Andean topics, ethnohistory, Native American religions, and indigenous literatures.
Architectural Research & Design Team
(Dr. Antonio Rodríguez Alcalá-Director)
Ines Ortiz Bobadilla, Ph.D.
Historical and Architectural Consultant, Specialist on Colonial Viceregal Architecture and Design in New Spain
Dr. Inés Ortiz Bobadilla
Departmento de Ciencias y Artes de Diseño
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco
E-Mail:iroleo@prodigy.net.mx
Dr. Ines Ortiz Bobadilla is an architect by training with a degree in Architecture from the National Autonomous University of Mexico. She also has both her Master’s degree and Doctoral degree in Architectural History and Design from the same institution. She is currently a professor of Architectural history in the Department of the Sciences and Arts of Design at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco in Mexico City.
Dr. Ines Ortiz Bobadilla is an expert on the architectural history of colonial New Spain. Her research interests and specialty focuses on the development, construction techniques and architectural history of viceregal colonial architecture in New Spain. She is also a research specialist in the theoretical processes and historical development of urbanism in Mexico City and has specific research experience in the cultural preservation and architectural history of the palace of the Inquisition and the buildings and urban development of the central traza or grid plan of Mexico City.
An architect by training and an architectural historian and designer by profession, her use of auto cad and other architectural software in the historical study of the built environment of the capital city of New Spain are an invaluable addition to our research team.
She is the author of the book Arquitectura mudéjar en México: elementos estructurales y compositivos aplicados en la época virreinal (2013); and is also the author of a number of important historical studies of the architecture of colonial Mexico City and other regions of the viceroyalty. For just a few of her more recent publications see “Arquitectura del siglo XVI en Puebla: Elementos mudéjares encontrados en la ruta de fray Alonso Ponce” in Diseño y Sociedad 33-34, Otoño 2012-Primavera 2013, pp. 20-39; as well as “Presencia de la arquitectura mudéjar en el Estado de México y en Morelos,” in Investigación y Diseño, 2013; and “Derivaciones de la arquitectura mudéjar en Yucatán” in Investigación y diseño 08, 2013.
In memory of Dr. Ines Ortiz Bobadilla, the earliest Historical Architectural Consultant on the Project
Ines Ortiz Bobadilla
(2017†)
Dulce Alejandra Martínez Roldán, B.S.
Architect/Historical Architectural Design
Student of Architecture
Universidad Anahuac-Mayab
Mérida, Yucatán, México
Dulce is currently a senior studying architecture at the Universidad Anahuac-Mayab, in Mérida, Yucatán, México. For the last two years, she has conducted a research project on the virtual reconstruction of the various historical stages of the development of the palace of the Mexican Inquisition during the 16th – 18th centuries. The general objective of her project was to aid the research group in the digitall reconstruction and recreate both the historical and architectonic use of this building. The specific objectives of her work on the project are to A) to demonstrate the evolution of the Mexican Inquisition Palace from the 1570s through the 1820s, B) to analyze how the expansion of the palace took place, and theoretically reconstruct the Palace utilizing historical, cartographic, and archival materials combined with a structural and architectural analysis of these changes C) to identify the various stages of the processes of renovation of the Inquisition Palace in New Spain. She utilizes historical archive materials which offered new evidence of the uses that the building has had and the various changes that the space has undergone in its function and use. Along with this historical material, the comparison of the present and the older blueprints of the building, and a photogrammetric reconstruction aided in this overall reconstruction of the stages of development and usage of this built space environment. The ultimate results have offered an exhaustive overhaul of the Inquisition Palace´s traditional architectural history through documentary investigation and a semiotic analysis which both allow us to better understand the architectural deficiencies of the structure and rescue the history of the Palace as one of the most important urban and architectural heritage sites in Mexico City.
Historical Development of the Construction Stages of the Palace of the Mexican Inquisition
(16th through later 17th centuries)
Argelia Segovia Liga, M.A.
Historical Illustrator and Concept Designer
Argelia Segovia Liga, Ph.D.
Adjunct Instructor of History
Missouri State University
Springfield, Missouri, 65802
E-Mail: ArgeliaSegovia@missouristate.edu
Argelia Segovia Liga received her doctoral degree in History and Heritage of Indigenous Peoples, in the Faculty of History and Archaeology at Leiden University, the Netherlands. She is an ethnohistorian and historian of indigenous cultures in Mexico. She is currently an Instructor of History at Missouri State University where she received her M.A. in History at Missouri State University. She received her bachelor’s degree in History from the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City.
She has authored a number of articles, and published a series of her line drawings on indigenous cultural history and on the Inquisition in numerous publications. Some of her recent articles include “The Civil War, Mexico and French Imperialism,” in Encyclopedia of The United Status in World History, M.E. Sharpe Publishers; as well as “Indigenous Cultures: Women in Maya Culture and Society” In Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History, Oxford University Press, 2008; and “Estela 1 de Calakmul. Breve acercamiento a la imagen”, in Revista Estudios de Cultura Maya, Vol. 24, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, UNAM, México, 2007,pp. 23-57.
She has also served as the designer and illustrator for a number of academic publications, and she has agreed to serve as a conceptual illustrator and designer for the initial storyboard line art for the Auto de Fe project. Her character illustrations and line drawings are included in the initial concept document attached to the NEH grant application.
Initial design in 3-D Max of Art Assets
for the Tribunal of the Holy Office
María del Carmen Rodríguez Viesca, B.S.
Architect/Historical Architectural Design
Student of Architecture
Universidad Anahuac-Mayab
Mérida, Yucatán, México
Mari is currently a junior studying architecture at the Universidad Anahuac-Mayab, in Mérida, Yucatán, México. Her research project focused on the virtual reconstruction of the material assets used in the Mexican Inquisition’s Palace during the 17th century. She was in charge of the in-depth study of the physical assets once extant in the three main audience chambers used for the trial proceedings of the Mexican Inquisition. The specific methodology of her project included: A) the integration of all the assets into the built architectural space of the Inquisition Palace, B) the analysis of the use of the assets in the ceremonies and juridical proceedings which occurred in the Inquisition Palace. During the summer of 2018, Mari created the 3D reconstruction of models of the basic physical assets and the materials based on both archival sources, and asset typological analysis from museum materials that contain collections of the material culture of 17th century Mexico. Her research and creations allow us to as accurately as possible know what these historical assets may have looked like and to examine how they were used. Recreating the inside of the audience chambers and placing all the objects they used in the place that the historical archives indicate, was a key piece in the digital recreation of the atmosphere of the 17th-century, transporting us to the past and allowing us to gain a detailed visual understanding of the imposing power of the Inquisition.
Placement of Art Assets in the Re-Created
VR Sala y Archivo del Secreto of the Mexican Holy Office, 17th Century
Historical Costuming & Historical Asset Research & Design Team
(Mtra. Martha Inés Sandoval Villegas, Director)
Sarah Powell, B.F.A. Student
Historical Illustrator and Character Concept Designer
Art & Design Student
Missouri State University
Sarah Powell is currently an Art & Design student at Missouri State University, who is working on the concept art for various characters in the Digital Auto de Fe of 1601 Project.
Digital Historical Character Design Team
Ledis Molina
Digital Character Designer
Computer Animation – B.F.A
Missouri State University
Ledis Molina is a native Spanish speaker from El Salvador and a current undergraduate international senior student under the program of Computer Animation at Missouri State University. She is currently preparing for her senior exhibition show with an expected graduation date in December 2018. Her interest areas in animations are modeling, texturing, and character animation. She has an extended knowledge of Maya and Adobe CC programs such as After Effects, Photoshop, and Premiere Pro. She has experience using Motion Capture suits and Motion Builder in combination with Maya as well as experience with Substance Painter and Mudbox.
She is the creator of several characters in the Virtual Reality World of the Digital Auto de Fe of 1601 Project, including the Vicreoy Don Gaspar de Zuñiga y Acevedo.
Martha Inés Sandoval Villegas, M.A.
Art Historical Costume & Clothing Consultant & Designer, Specialist on the Clothing, Costume and Fashion of 17th & 18th Centuries in New Spain
Martha Inés Sandoval Villegas, M.A.
Affiliated Researcher and Faculty Member
Facultad Filosofía y Letras e Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas
Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
E-Mail: sanvimarines@gmail.com
A doctoral candidate in Art History, Martha Ines Santos Villegas has a bachelor’s degree in Fashion Design and Marketing from the Universidad Casa Blanca, in Sinaloa, Mexico; and a Master’s and Doctoral degree in Art History and Historical Costume Design from the Institute of Arts and Design at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
Her research specialty and interests focus on the historical costumes and clothing of the 17th and 18th centuries in New Spain. She is an expert not only on clothing, but also a specialist on the jewelry, shoes and other apparel and personal decorations used by the inhabitants in New Spain of both genders in the 17th and 18th century.
Martha frequently gives courses on the history of clothing and costume design. She has also been the historical costume consultant for several period television programs and films in Mexico, and she is often sought out by producers and television directors for her work on costumes, textiles and designs from the vice regal period.
Among her most recent publications relating to historical costumes and fashion and the inquisition in particular see “De cultura material y prohibición inquisitorial: relojes, mancuernillas, hebillas, botones y cajas de rapé. Objetos comunes y con imágenes religiosas”, en Nelly Sigaut y Thomas Calvo (eds.) Cultura y arte de gobernar, memorias del I coloquio del Grupo de Religión y Cultura. Zamora, El colegio de Michoacán, 2015; as well as “¡Que vivan los novios” la fiesta de legitimación de los matrimonios ante la sociedad”, en Enrique Flores Cano y Bárbara Santana (coords.), La fiesta en México. México, Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Arte-Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2015.
She is also the author of numerous other articles and book chapters on the historical development of costume and fashion in New Spain. For just a few of her more recent works see “La devoción y culto de los indios a la Señora del Tepeyac, una república elegida por la reina del cielo” en Guadalupe Arte y Liturgia, la sillería de coro de la colegiata. México, El Colegio de Michoacán y Museo de la Basílica de Guadalupe, 2006., Tomo I, pp.152-177; “El huipil precortesiano y novohispano: transmutaciones simbólicas y estilísticas de una prenda indígena” en Concepción de la Peña, et. al. (ed), Memorias del Congreso Internacional Imagen y Apariencia. Murcia, Universidad de Murcia, 2009; as well as “La indumentaria en dos cuadros de celebración guadalupana: división jerárquica y estamental en un espacio común”, en Tres siglos en el Tepeyac, el antiguo templo y morada de Guadalupe (1709-2009) [Cat. exp.]. México, Museo de la Basílica de Guadalupe, 2009, p. 134-175; and “Un desposorio de indios y una prenda nacional: la Dama con rebozo, española de indias, representación del criollismo novohispano”, en Concepción de la Peña Velasco y Mará Albaladejo Martínez (eds.), Apariencias de Persuasión. Construyendo significados en el arte. Murcia, Universidad de Murcia, Editum, Fundación Séneca, 2012.Pp. 462.497; and “Indecencia Vanidad y derroche en algunos trajes novohispanos de fines del siglo XVII: conceptualización del mal a través de la indumentaria”, en Erik Velásquez García (ed.), Estética del mal, memorias del coloquio Internacional de Historia del Arte. México, UNAM: Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas, 2013.
Don Gaspar de Zúñiga y Acevedo, Count of Monterrey
(Viceroy of New Spain)
November 5, 1595 – October 26, 1603
Dave Gibbons
3-D Artist/ Game Designer
With over a decade of Game Industry experience and over a dozen shipped titles, Dave Gibbons has worn many hats throughout his career. Having worked at both larger game development studios, like the Activision-owned Budcat Creations, and game developer Black Lantern, as well as small start-ups, Dave has experience in every aspect of game art and design, as well as leading small teams of Freelance Artists and Developers to deliver excellent games on time and under budget.
Dave was the initial character designer of the first digital characters for the Digital Auto de Fe of 1601 Project, including the two main characters, Doña Mariana Núñez de Carvajal and the Inquisitor of New Spain, Don Alonso de Peralta y Robles
Doña Mariana Núñez de Carvajal
(Relaxed in Person
in the Auto de Fe of 1601)
Don Alonso de Peralta y Robles
(Inquisitor of New Spain)
(1595-1610)
Michaela Šimonová, M.A.
Digital Character Designer
Doctoral Candidate
Religious Studies Department
Comenius University of Bratislava, Slovak Republic
Michaela is the designer of the digital character, Juan de Mozambique, the African slave of the Chief Jailor of the Holy Office of the Inquisition, Gaspar de los Reyes, both of whom were tried and processed as penitents in the Auto de fe of 1601.
She is also currently undertaking the concept art and design for several other characters for the Digital Auto de Fe of 1601 Project, including several other penitents, and officials of the Holy Office.
Concept Art for the initial facial design of the African Slave, Juan Mozambique, assistant of the Chief Jailor of the Mexican Inquisition, tried for illegally taking secret notes to the prisoners and processed in the auto de fe of 1601
Graphic & Digital Art Design Team
Vonda Yarberry, M.F.A.
Electronic Arts Consultant & Adviser
Vonda Yarberry (Electronic Arts Consultant & Adviser), currently a Professor of Art and Design and Area Coordinator of the Animation program at Missouri State University. She has an M.F.A. in Art from Rutgers University and teaches animation and electronic arts courses. Her specialty is in the realm of installation, animation and performance or screen-based work. The position of the viewer in the physical or conceptual realm has always been at the heart of her work, and her skills and experience are essential in centering the digital auto de fe project in line with the final outcomes of the POV viewer usability.
Bryan (Colby) Jennings, M.F.A.
Electronic Arts Consultant & Adviser
Bryan (Colby) Jennings (Electronic Arts Consultant & Adviser) currently an Assistant Professor in the Art & Design department at Missouri State University, he has an M.F.A. from Washington State University and teaches courses in the areas of Computer Animation, Electronic Arts, and Digital Arts. His research specialty is digital and time-based arts. He has participated in the Human Emotion Project, in Amsterdam, Netherlands and in Mexico City, Mexico and his work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally. His art and design skills will be invaluable for the project.
Brad Grimm
Unity 3D Developer and Designer
Brad has 15+ Years as a business analyst with prototype and tool development using various database applications and VBA. Over the past 5 years he has become a successful Unity Programmer, having shipped several games over many different platforms using Unity Pro and coding in C#.
Shipped Titles:
Stained Glass – Lightside Games – IOS and Android - 2015
Héctor Parra Lozano
3D Artist
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Héctor is a 3D Artist focused on texturing and directing teams, he received his bachelor’s degree in Digital Design and Animation from the Anáhuac Mayab University in the summer of 2019. He has worked as director and producer on several student projects throughout his career that include animated film shorts and the development of small video games.
Ángela Sofía Tovar Urbano
3D Artist
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Ángela is currently a senior studying Digital Animation on the Anáhuac Mayab University, specialized in 3D modeling. She has worked on several student projects throughout her career that include modeling, texturing, rigging and the development of videogames.
Mario A. Vallarta Domínguez
3D Artist
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Mario is a 3D Artist focused on modeling and animation, he received his bachelor’s degree in Digital Design and Animation from the Anáhuac Mayab University in the summer of 2019. He has worked on several student projects throughout his career that include animated film shorts and the development of video games.
Edson G. Garrido Vargas
3D Artist
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Edson is both a 2D and 3D Artist focused on character design, storyboards and 3D character modeling, he received his bachelor’s degree in Digital Design and Animation from the Anáhuac Mayab University in the summer of 2019. He has worked on several student projects throughout his career that include animated film shorts and the development of video games.
Julio César Cadena de la Cruz
3D Artist
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Julio is currently a senior studying Digital Design and Animation on the Anáhuac Mayab University, specialized in 3D modeling. He has worked on several student projects throughout his career that include animated film shorts and the development of video games
Pierlorenzo Vittorio Ballicu
Architecture Student
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Pierlorenzo is an Italian student of the Mexican University Anáhuac Mayab in the Architecture Faculty since 2015 planning his graduation in 2020.
One of his many passions is War History, studing events that changed the course of history, also Architectural preservation of historical buildings, finding new ways to bring at the wild audiences information. Planning to get a degree in Preservation and restoration now is working in various Investigations programs in the Faculty.
Paola Cíntora Bueno
Architecture Student
Universidad Anáhuac Mayab
Paola Cíntora is currently a senior studying architecture at the Universidad Anahuac-Mayab, in Mérida, Yucatán, México. Her interests in the field are 3D modeling of architectural projects and furniture. Thus, her contribution to the virtual reconstruction of spaces in this specific investigation. The realization of research for a deep comprehension of historical elements to recreate accurately the “Acto de Fe” in Maní are also fundamental for the development of the project.