Isabro Ortega, Truchas, NM, Woodcarver
Note: Isabro Ortega died in 2018. I decided to publish a story I had done about him and his love of wood carving as a sort of memorial to a very interesting person.
Española artist Benjamin Lopez will miss his close friend Isabro Ortega who died Aug. 14.
“It was hard when I heard of his death,” Lopez said recently when asked what he’ll miss. “There won’t be any more stories, or seeing his smile — he had such a beautiful smile, his kindness. He was kind with everybody. He had a fantastic sense of humor. He knew the history of Truchas in and out; from the grandpas to the grandkids — everybody’s family.”
Lopez met Ortega for the first time about 10 years ago when he was asked to help restore the morada near Ortega’s home.
“The morada had a lot of cracks and old wall paper and needed painting and we took out stuff so you could see the vigas. I worked on that for about a year,” Lopez said.
During that year he became friends with Ortega.
Visiting the Truchas home of wood carver Isabro Ortega is like visiting a shrine to wood carving. “Casa de Las Nubes,” or “House of the Clouds” isn’t much to look at from the outside, but once you pass through the front doors you enter what might be termed a woodcarver’s wonderland.
“When I started there was nothing here. My dad’s sheds were here. They had already fallen down. Daddy died in ’75 and mama died in ’76. It had been by itself for a long time. But I always thought of having a two-story ever since I was a little boy,” Ortega said.
On a visit from Rio Grande SUN Arts in 2004, Ortega was working on some frames in his front yard as a visitor pulled in. His house sits on the edge of the drop off on the western edge of Truchas and the location must be very enviable for its view of the Chimayó and Española valleys. And the setting, sitting high and looking down over the valley seems perfect for a shrine. As he approached the visitor noticed his trademark pencil sitting on his right ear and tucked into his hair. The only time he takes the pencil off, he admits with a chuckle, is when he goes to mass.
“I started June 13, 1984. That’s the day we laid it out and started doing the excavation.” Ortega said when asked when his house was started. In the background you hear some British rock music playing. When the rock music isn’t audible, you’ll often hear Ortega, who is a Penitente hermano singing one of the groups alabados. “I worked for the schools a while, the Los Alamos schools. But I was always working on it on weekends and days off. I was born and raised in Truchas. I was raised in that house that’s falling down. (He pointed to the east towards the house that sits next to his. His deceased parents house.) That was my parents’ house. When mom and dad died they didn’t leave a will but my sisters decided to give it to my brother, Lee, and me. I wanted it because I wanted to build a house here. I grew up here. I played here. I think that why I love it so much.”
From the outside, the house is unassuming, looking like one that is still under construction, which it is, but the fact that it is still under construction doesn’t take away from all the intricate woodwork and carving that Ortega has done to the interior over the years. He says he is almost finished — needing to do stuccoing — but you get the feeling that he will never, truly, be done with this house. When the stuccoing is finished there will always be something new to add or something that isn’t quite right, in his opinion and needs changing. Like in Moby Dick, getting the whale was the story, the intent, but when Captain Ahab finally got the white whale it was almost anticlimactic. It was the heroic chase that intrigued the reader, just as it’s the journey — the carving and the innovation— that intrigued Ortega.
“I wanted to make it look different from everybody else’s house.” Ortega said. And he certainly has achieved that goal.
Lee Valdez taught woodcarving at Northern New Mexico College for 14 years and woodcarving/woodworking at the Poeh Arts Program in Pojoaque for 12 years.
“I first met Isabro about 10 years ago when I visited his residence during the High Road Art Tour,” Valdez said. “The visit was at the invitation of “Kata” Bennett, a student of mine at Northern at the time, who was exhibiting some of her pieces at his home. The introduction to Mister Ortega and to his work left me with an indelible impression of his creativity as well as of his diligence and perseverance.”
One of the first places he would show off when a visitor or guest entered is a bar on the east side of the house. He’d point to the tops of the cabinets and explain that shortly he would be installing Mexican tiles with a vegetable motif to finish them.
Right around the corner from the bar is his food pantry. If there is one place in the house that really shows off Ortega’s skills, and his fascination — some might say obsession — with carving, it’s the pantry. You can easily imagine the pantry being taken out of its location in Ortega’s house in Truchas and being installed at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.
The door is painted and carved as many pantry doors are, but to truly appreciate the Sistine Chapel feel of the pantry you need to open that door and step inside.
Shelves are painted and carved. Even the bottom of the shelves are carved. The ceiling — which is what prompts the Sistine Chapel reference — has a circular feel to it with its lattice work and circular skylight. You look up and get lost in its complexity.
Lopez likened Ortega’s need to carve the bottom of shelves to a technique used by jewelry artists.
“The same concept as jewelry when they decorate the back of a bracelet or something. You can’t see it but when you do see it, it affects you,” Lopez said, and then moved on to the question of Ortega’s spirituality.
“Oh yes, he was very spiritual. He’s the kind of person who showed his spirituality by action. (when he says action, his voice raises to emphasize his seriousness). A lot of people are goody two shoes on Sundays, the first ones at mass, pero, during the week you can’t talk to them. He wasn’t like that. The way he was, he showed it. He lived his spirituality and people felt it. He treated people with respect. We (as a society) are losing respect now.”
During the SUN’s 2004 visit, Ortega talked about one visitor he had to the house.
“This guy that was here said, have you ever heard of something being too ornate?” Ortega laughs. ‘I said, I’ve never heard of that.’”
And after you look inside the pantry you realize what a funny question that would have seemed to Ortega. Too ornate? Not on your life. The more carving the better. If it’s uncarved, it’s unfinished.
“He asked, why would you want to carve where you are never going to see. (like asking why the Sistine chapel was painted on the ceiling and not just on the walls where people didn’t have to look up to see the artwork. If you have to ask that question, an explanation is not going to offer insight)” Ortega said. “It’s got to be carved. She wants to be carved. (he says and he lovingly runs his hand over the surface of a newly carved border in the bar area. Look how happy she is after she’s been carved. When she was a plain wood she wasn’t happy. (It’s like he’s talking about a lover.) I love carving. My sister sometimes tells me, ‘What are you doing here on a Friday night, I’d be at the casino looking for a girl.’ I said, ‘I don’t want to look for a girl, my girlfriend is right here.’” And he pats the carved border again as if reassuring his “girlfriend” of his unfailing faithfulness.
“There are nights when you wouldn’t believe how long I carved,” he said gesturing to the pantry. “This past summer I was telling my sister, I usually carve, especially in the summertime, I’ll carve ‘til 11 or 12 at night. In the wintertime not so much because it gets so cold. Maybe to eight o’clock. But in the summertime, midnight is typical. One night I was carving just listening to music — she had brought me a CD, a special edition of the Rolling Stones — so I was listening to that and carving, carving, carving, and then all of a sudden I thought to myself, I wonder how come I got tired so early and when I went upstairs and looked at the clock it was four o’clock in the morning. You start carving and just lose yourself.”
When the fellow asked, “Why do you carve under the shelves?” you really can’t explain to such a person why you are compelled to do just that. Just because it’s there. Like the mountain climber said about Mount Everest. After talking with Ortega, it should be fairly self-explanatory. The reason is that it’s not been carved and needs to be. Simple.
“An estimate, the food pantry took me about three or four months.” Ortega explained. “That was the carving. And then there were these little spindles that needed to be added. And then the painting. And I want to add a little nicho there (he points to a place on the wall near the doorway) where I want to carve and put a little San Pasqual, the patron saint of cooks.”
You think about a cabinet or pantry whose doors are usually closed, but when they are open, they are open to the world, and if they are ‘unfinished’, uncarved, then the job seems unfinished, at least by Ortega’s standards. But everybody has unfinished shelves inside their cabinets. Here, you open the door and you enter a wonderland. It stops you in your tracks. The complexity and intricate details astound you.
“Plain” is essentially a four-letter word to Ortega, and certainly something he strived to avoid.
And to illustrate this point — his disdain for plain — Ortega related a story about his chicken coop.
“One day I had a building inspector stop at the house and tell me I didn’t have a building permit for my guest house,” Ortega said and laughed. “I asked him what he was talking about and he pointed to my recently completed chicken coop. I told him it was a chicken coop and not a guest house.”
The inspector basically called Ortega a liar since he had looked inside the coop and seen all the ornate carving. Ortega explained, as best he could, that the carving was just the manner in which he worked, be it his home or a chicken coop. After much discussion the inspector left, leaving Ortega to wonder if he had convinced the man or not. But it did give him another story to relate to his friends, which he relished.
Ortega said that his mother wanted him to be a priest. She must have noticed some priestly qualities even at an early age. And although he didn’t enter the priesthood, you, too, notice some of those qualities. The tireless devotion to his project. The monk-like manner in which he goes about his work. You can easily envision him as one of those illustrators of the middle-ages’ illuminated manuscripts who worked for years on one single project.
After leaving the pantry Ortega pointed to a section of ceiling that has a few carved frames with willow branches inside. He plans on doing the whole section of ceiling in that portion of the house with this willow treatment. It adds a texture to the ceiling that is fascinating. And it also points out to you that even though the texture of the willow ceiling is different than that of a totally carved ceiling, texture is of utmost importance to Ortega. It is evident everywhere you venture in his house. The texture adds a complexity that most houses don’t have even if they strive for it.
He then led the way down a few steps to what might be called a sunken living room. He intended to have a moss and rock garden, with a flagstone walk that lead to his reading nook. It’s probably the one area in the house that isn’t completely dominated by carving or woodwork.
As you tour the house the image of a small privately run museum pops into your head. A small museum like those started by folks who were fascinated with tractors, or windmills, or tools, but here you have a “museum” that features woodcarving, with a large dollop of eccentricity thrown in for good measure. A monument to a man putting a sharp edge to a piece of wood to insure that the piece of wood won’t live out its life being plain.
In 2014, Ortega branched out from carving mainly on his home to smaller artwork.
Lopez had urged him to try to carve saints and Ortega took Lopez’s suggestion to heart.
“I made a lot of stuff for the art tour; stuff like this (he holds up his first bulto, and a frame) usually sells, and I did sell, but not like I had anticipated,” Ortega explained. “I made some palmas, and I didn’t sell any. They are for the Matachines. Ray Montez from the gallery up the road, Montez Gallery, he’s there during the summer time. He painted them. We did them together. I did the carving and he did the painting. I sold one to my sister but that doesn’t count.”
Ortega added that he thought people came more to tour the house than to buy his artwork, which makes sense. The house has become a legend on the High Road Tour and even if people are coming to the Tour to purchase artwork, when they come to “Casa de Las Nubes,” they are so fascinated with Ortega’s first love that they might simply ignore his smaller pieces.
“I was surprised because usually people that tour the house want to buy a piece of my work, even if it’s a small frame or cross,” Ortega said.
Explaining how he became enamored with wood, and especially his woodcarving, Ortega said, “I think it was before that. I went to El Rito and I studied stenography and I became a court reporter. But I didn’t like it. I liked studying for it, but once I went to work in Santa Fe I didn’t like it. (and meeting and talking with Isabro, you instinctively know this about him even before he reveals this to you.) First of all I had to wear a tie. (that should have been a tip-off right there!) And problem number two: I was inside all day and I wasn’t used to being inside. So I quite and became a laborer for a home builder. Then I worked on that road to Nambe Dam. Then I met this guy who asked if I thought I could use a table saw and I said, sure. So he said he had a job for me where he would give me ‘cuts’ and I would cut them on the table saw and throw the cut pieces up to him where he was working, thus saving him the time of going up and down to do the cuts himself.”
If there is an inscription on Ortega’s headstone, he could have written it himself when he said,
“I think I was always in love with wood. Mom always said, anything you do, do with your heart. I wake up to carve. I see a piece of wood and I want to carve it. I don’t like to see it plain. I was telling a friend that if I stopped woodcarving I’d probably die. I’ve gotta carve. I’ve gotta carve every day.”
Ortega was one-of-a-kind and in the words of both Lopez and Valdez, “Will be missed.”
Española artist Benjamin Lopez will miss his close friend Isabro Ortega who died Aug. 14.
“It was hard when I heard of his death,” Lopez said recently when asked what he’ll miss. “There won’t be any more stories, or seeing his smile — he had such a beautiful smile, his kindness. He was kind with everybody. He had a fantastic sense of humor. He knew the history of Truchas in and out; from the grandpas to the grandkids — everybody’s family.”
Lopez met Ortega for the first time about 10 years ago when he was asked to help restore the morada near Ortega’s home.
“The morada had a lot of cracks and old wall paper and needed painting and we took out stuff so you could see the vigas. I worked on that for about a year,” Lopez said.
During that year he became friends with Ortega.
Visiting the Truchas home of wood carver Isabro Ortega is like visiting a shrine to wood carving. “Casa de Las Nubes,” or “House of the Clouds” isn’t much to look at from the outside, but once you pass through the front doors you enter what might be termed a woodcarver’s wonderland.
“When I started there was nothing here. My dad’s sheds were here. They had already fallen down. Daddy died in ’75 and mama died in ’76. It had been by itself for a long time. But I always thought of having a two-story ever since I was a little boy,” Ortega said.
On a visit from Rio Grande SUN Arts in 2004, Ortega was working on some frames in his front yard as a visitor pulled in. His house sits on the edge of the drop off on the western edge of Truchas and the location must be very enviable for its view of the Chimayó and Española valleys. And the setting, sitting high and looking down over the valley seems perfect for a shrine. As he approached the visitor noticed his trademark pencil sitting on his right ear and tucked into his hair. The only time he takes the pencil off, he admits with a chuckle, is when he goes to mass.
“I started June 13, 1984. That’s the day we laid it out and started doing the excavation.” Ortega said when asked when his house was started. In the background you hear some British rock music playing. When the rock music isn’t audible, you’ll often hear Ortega, who is a Penitente hermano singing one of the groups alabados. “I worked for the schools a while, the Los Alamos schools. But I was always working on it on weekends and days off. I was born and raised in Truchas. I was raised in that house that’s falling down. (He pointed to the east towards the house that sits next to his. His deceased parents house.) That was my parents’ house. When mom and dad died they didn’t leave a will but my sisters decided to give it to my brother, Lee, and me. I wanted it because I wanted to build a house here. I grew up here. I played here. I think that why I love it so much.”
From the outside, the house is unassuming, looking like one that is still under construction, which it is, but the fact that it is still under construction doesn’t take away from all the intricate woodwork and carving that Ortega has done to the interior over the years. He says he is almost finished — needing to do stuccoing — but you get the feeling that he will never, truly, be done with this house. When the stuccoing is finished there will always be something new to add or something that isn’t quite right, in his opinion and needs changing. Like in Moby Dick, getting the whale was the story, the intent, but when Captain Ahab finally got the white whale it was almost anticlimactic. It was the heroic chase that intrigued the reader, just as it’s the journey — the carving and the innovation— that intrigued Ortega.
“I wanted to make it look different from everybody else’s house.” Ortega said. And he certainly has achieved that goal.
Lee Valdez taught woodcarving at Northern New Mexico College for 14 years and woodcarving/woodworking at the Poeh Arts Program in Pojoaque for 12 years.
“I first met Isabro about 10 years ago when I visited his residence during the High Road Art Tour,” Valdez said. “The visit was at the invitation of “Kata” Bennett, a student of mine at Northern at the time, who was exhibiting some of her pieces at his home. The introduction to Mister Ortega and to his work left me with an indelible impression of his creativity as well as of his diligence and perseverance.”
One of the first places he would show off when a visitor or guest entered is a bar on the east side of the house. He’d point to the tops of the cabinets and explain that shortly he would be installing Mexican tiles with a vegetable motif to finish them.
Right around the corner from the bar is his food pantry. If there is one place in the house that really shows off Ortega’s skills, and his fascination — some might say obsession — with carving, it’s the pantry. You can easily imagine the pantry being taken out of its location in Ortega’s house in Truchas and being installed at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.
The door is painted and carved as many pantry doors are, but to truly appreciate the Sistine Chapel feel of the pantry you need to open that door and step inside.
Shelves are painted and carved. Even the bottom of the shelves are carved. The ceiling — which is what prompts the Sistine Chapel reference — has a circular feel to it with its lattice work and circular skylight. You look up and get lost in its complexity.
Lopez likened Ortega’s need to carve the bottom of shelves to a technique used by jewelry artists.
“The same concept as jewelry when they decorate the back of a bracelet or something. You can’t see it but when you do see it, it affects you,” Lopez said, and then moved on to the question of Ortega’s spirituality.
“Oh yes, he was very spiritual. He’s the kind of person who showed his spirituality by action. (when he says action, his voice raises to emphasize his seriousness). A lot of people are goody two shoes on Sundays, the first ones at mass, pero, during the week you can’t talk to them. He wasn’t like that. The way he was, he showed it. He lived his spirituality and people felt it. He treated people with respect. We (as a society) are losing respect now.”
During the SUN’s 2004 visit, Ortega talked about one visitor he had to the house.
“This guy that was here said, have you ever heard of something being too ornate?” Ortega laughs. ‘I said, I’ve never heard of that.’”
And after you look inside the pantry you realize what a funny question that would have seemed to Ortega. Too ornate? Not on your life. The more carving the better. If it’s uncarved, it’s unfinished.
“He asked, why would you want to carve where you are never going to see. (like asking why the Sistine chapel was painted on the ceiling and not just on the walls where people didn’t have to look up to see the artwork. If you have to ask that question, an explanation is not going to offer insight)” Ortega said. “It’s got to be carved. She wants to be carved. (he says and he lovingly runs his hand over the surface of a newly carved border in the bar area. Look how happy she is after she’s been carved. When she was a plain wood she wasn’t happy. (It’s like he’s talking about a lover.) I love carving. My sister sometimes tells me, ‘What are you doing here on a Friday night, I’d be at the casino looking for a girl.’ I said, ‘I don’t want to look for a girl, my girlfriend is right here.’” And he pats the carved border again as if reassuring his “girlfriend” of his unfailing faithfulness.
“There are nights when you wouldn’t believe how long I carved,” he said gesturing to the pantry. “This past summer I was telling my sister, I usually carve, especially in the summertime, I’ll carve ‘til 11 or 12 at night. In the wintertime not so much because it gets so cold. Maybe to eight o’clock. But in the summertime, midnight is typical. One night I was carving just listening to music — she had brought me a CD, a special edition of the Rolling Stones — so I was listening to that and carving, carving, carving, and then all of a sudden I thought to myself, I wonder how come I got tired so early and when I went upstairs and looked at the clock it was four o’clock in the morning. You start carving and just lose yourself.”
When the fellow asked, “Why do you carve under the shelves?” you really can’t explain to such a person why you are compelled to do just that. Just because it’s there. Like the mountain climber said about Mount Everest. After talking with Ortega, it should be fairly self-explanatory. The reason is that it’s not been carved and needs to be. Simple.
“An estimate, the food pantry took me about three or four months.” Ortega explained. “That was the carving. And then there were these little spindles that needed to be added. And then the painting. And I want to add a little nicho there (he points to a place on the wall near the doorway) where I want to carve and put a little San Pasqual, the patron saint of cooks.”
You think about a cabinet or pantry whose doors are usually closed, but when they are open, they are open to the world, and if they are ‘unfinished’, uncarved, then the job seems unfinished, at least by Ortega’s standards. But everybody has unfinished shelves inside their cabinets. Here, you open the door and you enter a wonderland. It stops you in your tracks. The complexity and intricate details astound you.
“Plain” is essentially a four-letter word to Ortega, and certainly something he strived to avoid.
And to illustrate this point — his disdain for plain — Ortega related a story about his chicken coop.
“One day I had a building inspector stop at the house and tell me I didn’t have a building permit for my guest house,” Ortega said and laughed. “I asked him what he was talking about and he pointed to my recently completed chicken coop. I told him it was a chicken coop and not a guest house.”
The inspector basically called Ortega a liar since he had looked inside the coop and seen all the ornate carving. Ortega explained, as best he could, that the carving was just the manner in which he worked, be it his home or a chicken coop. After much discussion the inspector left, leaving Ortega to wonder if he had convinced the man or not. But it did give him another story to relate to his friends, which he relished.
Ortega said that his mother wanted him to be a priest. She must have noticed some priestly qualities even at an early age. And although he didn’t enter the priesthood, you, too, notice some of those qualities. The tireless devotion to his project. The monk-like manner in which he goes about his work. You can easily envision him as one of those illustrators of the middle-ages’ illuminated manuscripts who worked for years on one single project.
After leaving the pantry Ortega pointed to a section of ceiling that has a few carved frames with willow branches inside. He plans on doing the whole section of ceiling in that portion of the house with this willow treatment. It adds a texture to the ceiling that is fascinating. And it also points out to you that even though the texture of the willow ceiling is different than that of a totally carved ceiling, texture is of utmost importance to Ortega. It is evident everywhere you venture in his house. The texture adds a complexity that most houses don’t have even if they strive for it.
He then led the way down a few steps to what might be called a sunken living room. He intended to have a moss and rock garden, with a flagstone walk that lead to his reading nook. It’s probably the one area in the house that isn’t completely dominated by carving or woodwork.
As you tour the house the image of a small privately run museum pops into your head. A small museum like those started by folks who were fascinated with tractors, or windmills, or tools, but here you have a “museum” that features woodcarving, with a large dollop of eccentricity thrown in for good measure. A monument to a man putting a sharp edge to a piece of wood to insure that the piece of wood won’t live out its life being plain.
In 2014, Ortega branched out from carving mainly on his home to smaller artwork.
Lopez had urged him to try to carve saints and Ortega took Lopez’s suggestion to heart.
“I made a lot of stuff for the art tour; stuff like this (he holds up his first bulto, and a frame) usually sells, and I did sell, but not like I had anticipated,” Ortega explained. “I made some palmas, and I didn’t sell any. They are for the Matachines. Ray Montez from the gallery up the road, Montez Gallery, he’s there during the summer time. He painted them. We did them together. I did the carving and he did the painting. I sold one to my sister but that doesn’t count.”
Ortega added that he thought people came more to tour the house than to buy his artwork, which makes sense. The house has become a legend on the High Road Tour and even if people are coming to the Tour to purchase artwork, when they come to “Casa de Las Nubes,” they are so fascinated with Ortega’s first love that they might simply ignore his smaller pieces.
“I was surprised because usually people that tour the house want to buy a piece of my work, even if it’s a small frame or cross,” Ortega said.
Explaining how he became enamored with wood, and especially his woodcarving, Ortega said, “I think it was before that. I went to El Rito and I studied stenography and I became a court reporter. But I didn’t like it. I liked studying for it, but once I went to work in Santa Fe I didn’t like it. (and meeting and talking with Isabro, you instinctively know this about him even before he reveals this to you.) First of all I had to wear a tie. (that should have been a tip-off right there!) And problem number two: I was inside all day and I wasn’t used to being inside. So I quite and became a laborer for a home builder. Then I worked on that road to Nambe Dam. Then I met this guy who asked if I thought I could use a table saw and I said, sure. So he said he had a job for me where he would give me ‘cuts’ and I would cut them on the table saw and throw the cut pieces up to him where he was working, thus saving him the time of going up and down to do the cuts himself.”
If there is an inscription on Ortega’s headstone, he could have written it himself when he said,
“I think I was always in love with wood. Mom always said, anything you do, do with your heart. I wake up to carve. I see a piece of wood and I want to carve it. I don’t like to see it plain. I was telling a friend that if I stopped woodcarving I’d probably die. I’ve gotta carve. I’ve gotta carve every day.”
Ortega was one-of-a-kind and in the words of both Lopez and Valdez, “Will be missed.”
Exterior of Ortega's home in Truchas, NM
Ortega holds a Cordova-style carving
Ortega holds two palmas, which are used by matachine dancers
Carving on cabinets
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Door to food pantry (left) and food pantry interior (right)
Food pantry ceiling
Willows used for a ceiling (above) and elaborate ceiling detal (below)
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