When the Spanish first arrived in the Salinas pueblos they built small chapels before beginning construction of the mission churches. No one had found the small chapel built in the 1620s at Abo until Jake Ivey began the Historic Structures Report. Working together we discovered the walls of the early chapel had been expanded to create the nave of the much larger and more complex mission of San Gregorio built in 1629. Only one tall wall remains with its bell tower and buttresses on the west side. There were two conventos at Abo, one built on top of the other and visitors can see remnants of both. Abo sits in the middle of a valley opening to the south from the Manzano Mountains in NM. A stream provided water to the pueblo and its fields, as was the situation at Quarai (see previous post). However, like Quaria, drought and famine forced the abandonment of Abo by 1672 and it was never resettled by the native population.
Painting has taken a back seat in my daily activities lately and I am so looking forward to a NM trip to start painting again. The land there reaches into my being in way difficult to describe. I think that spending some time exploring new and familiar places and visiting with old friends will stimulate my creative muse and get me started with a new group of paintings as well as new ideas on life and living productively.
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