Ángel María Martín López
TELEPHONE:
ADDRESS:
Calle los dos Caminos, 6 – 05160 Narrillos de San Leonardo
ACTIVITY
Ángel María’s activity centres on the building of roof and ceiling structures with interlaced strapwork, with a particular focus on harmonious integration of ten-point star-wheel strapwork in octagonal ceiling frameworks and rounded domes. He also makes wooden beam and panel ceilings and interlaced lath-work integrated… into load-bearing structures.
The structure of such woodwork is prebuilt in a carpentry shop for installation in situ, using such traditional techniques as twin hip rafters allowing sections to be fitted independently, nail-less joints between the top panel and the slopes, interlaced strapwork jointed with mortices and tenons, ornamental backboards joining the parts of the structure and also varying it, wall plates receiving and distributing loads, corner crossbars in octagonal roofs for bracing the wall plate, and friezes which also seal the ceiling and cover the stays for neutralising thrust.
In marking out interlaced motifs and in structural calculations for timber members or angles between pieces and gradients, he employs the techniques of traditional Mudéjar carpentry, chiefly involving the use of squares for either ornamental strapwork or frameworks.
In building muqarnas vaulting, he again refers to historical treatises when making templates for cutting the linked pieces forming stalactites, recesses or cornices.
So the process of building a roof structure starts with a design and calculations and a full-size plan for every item, with the timber being squared, cut, set out and marked with strapwork motifs, etc. Once the main components (rafters, collar beams, hip beams, base plates, struts, corbels, sills, etc.) have been cut, planed and grooved, the strapwork is integrated into the structure by means of boring the relevant mortises and, where applicable, cutting slats and crossbars. The back panelling requires prior preparation of ornamental planks, trim, star-shaped grooving and hexagonal tiles, with the surfaces being chamfered and painted in the case of polychrome work. On polychrome ceilings, painting is done either freehand or with stencils.
The wood he works with is almost entirely pre-cut and planed pine, though in some cases he uses laminated fir for large timbers.
In the early stages of work, as is usual these days, mechanical tools are used (a band saw, thicknesser, milling machine, etc.), but given the specialist and extraordinary nature of some roof frames, manual tools are often employed to ensure the necessary control over finishes and precision in joints (handsaws, marking gauges, planes, mortise chisels, shaping chisels, gouges and mallets).
The measuring and marking implements that Ángel María uses are squares for either ornamental strapwork or frameworks, made specifically for each ceiling.
The use of computer programs as the tool of our times in developing projects is undoubtedly the latest update to the traditional techniques of Mudéjar carpentry, and indeed helps the craft to be practised efficiently and competitively.
TRAINING
In 2000 Ángel María started learning about Mudéjar carpentry in particular through the commentaries of Enrique Nuere Matauco on the medieval treatises of Diego López de Arenas and Fray Andrés de San Miguel.
Through restoring roof structures and building new roofs, he consolidated and developed his… knowledge of the craft to the point of making it his speciality.
TEACHING
In 2015 he began teaching and disseminating traditional carpentry with the creation of the Ávila Mudéjar Carpentry Visitor Centre (CICMA), with the aim of making traditional structural carpentry techniques better known. This led him to set up a school with a programme of regular courses… involving the construction of replicas of the most notable roof structures in the province for the study of the various aspects of this traditional woodwork.
Thus for CICMA’s inaugural year, in autumn 2015 he reproduced the 15th-century collar-beam roof of the Church of San Pedro del Arroyo and the octagonal roof frame with interlaced strapwork elaborated from an eight-point star in the nave of the 16th-century church of Langa. The two replicas were the first exhibits in CICMA’s visitable collection and have also been shown at various venues for the dissemination of the craft of Mudéjar carpentry. Thus in 2016 the CICMA collection was displayed in a wide-ranging exhibition at the Ávila Episcopio synod hall, together with talks on Mudéjar carpentry to groups of school pupils. Some weeks later the Madrid University College of Architecture hosted the same exhibition within its Building Techniques Conference, at which the work of the Visitor Centre was presented along with the rich heritage of woodwork in the La Moraña district of Ávila province.
In 2016-17 he gave five courses, the first three within an “Essential techniques of Mudéjar carpentry” series, with the building of a section of the beam and panel ceiling under the choir loft of the church of Narros del Castillo and a roof structure for use in a course on five-section roofs. In the second series, “Rudiments and techniques of strapwork carpentry”, he has given two courses; for the first one in 2017 he reproduced the corner crosspiece of the church of Rágama, and for the second, in 2018, he remade the octagonal roof structure with strapwork and ten-point stars in the church of Villamayor. The third course, in preparation, is to be a first specialist treatment of the future development of wholly regular hemispherical wooden strapwork domes.
Training and outreach now take up much of his time. In 2016 and 2017 he gave courses on strapwork carpentry and structures at the Extremadura Craft Association. He was part of the “Plan Mudéjar” team in 2016-17 commissioned by the Castilla y León Government and tasked with drawing up a catalogue of wooden ceilings under choir lofts and galleries in the churches of Ávila province. He was invited to woodwork presentations at the “Lignorum 2017” event and to the Heritage, Tourism and Development workshops sponsored by the Salamanca Provincial Council regarding the roof of the church of Cantaracillo.
SELECTED WORK
– In 2005 he designed and built a polychrome strapwork ceiling with 16 and 8-point stars in a private house
– In 2006-07 he entirely rebuilt the roof structure of the Chapel of Nuestra Señora de las Angustias and its sacristy in Cuevas del Valle (Ávila… province)
– In 2009 he reworked and rebuilt the ceiling under the choir loft of the church of Pedro Rodríguez (Ávila province)
– In 2011 he built an octagonal roof structure with interlaced strapwork and 8-point stars on wooden pillars and struts
– In 2012 the Town Council of Narros del Castillo accepted his proposal for the construction of a wooden collar-beam roof structure with interlaced strapwork for the future La Cilla cultural centre. He designed the wooden bearing structure and roof framework and built it in 2013.
– In 2014 he extended the above project by making and installing muqarnas stalactites in the top panel along with a front door with strapwork for La Cilla
– In 2015, albeit outside his field of work, he took on the personal challenge of making in his workshop and then installing a staircase designed by the architect José Ignacio Linazasoro for Hotel El Encanto in Ávila
– In 2017 he built two roof structures: a smooth collar-beam hip roof in Ávila, and a square-plan collar-beam roof with twin hip rafters backed by interlaced planks and trim in Granada
