International Creche Festival

Festival Internacional de Nacimientos

Mary Ann and I were in the Mexico City airport one December and she called to me “George, come over here and take a look at these nativity sets.”   I went and found a beautiful display of about 30 nativity sets from several parts of Mexico.  Each depicted the nativity in the culture of their community, the same story but presented differently according to their local traditions.  “Wow,” I thought, “If this is from but one part of Mexico what does the rest of Mexico have?  What does Central and South America have?  What does the world have?”  And therein was born the concept of developing an international exposition of nativity sets from cultures around the world.

The goal was not to show Christianity as depicted in these various countries but to show how diverse cultures can tell the same story and still be true to their own traditional art forms.  I wanted this to be a lesson in the appreciation of cultural diversity.