In Mexican Jungle, Surreal Art Garden Las Pozas Teresa de Miguel - The Associated Press
go to original April 4, 2014

Monty Don visits Las Pozas, Edward James' surreal garden in Xilitla, Mexico. (D. Mudster)

XILITLA, Mexico - At the end of a long, dirt road in Mexico's northeast jungle, two spiral staircases appear, leading nowhere amid an ornate concrete structure. Giant concrete fleur-de-lis flank a path, and tall bamboo-shaped columns surround a house with no walls. Oversize plaster orchids are in permanent bloom, while a natural waterfall ceaselessly flows down a mountain.

This is Las Pozas, a dreamy, little-known garden of surreal art, where sculptures evoke the ruins of ancient Greece but are overrun by exotic jungle plants. It was created by the late Edward James, a British multimillionaire and arts patron who favored surrealists like Rene Magritte and Salvador Dali.

"Mr. Edward wanted to bewilder," said Carlos Barbosa, a park guide. He thought of the park "as a joke to a future civilization."

And visitors are bewildered by Las Pozas, located on a 100-acre (40-hectare) hillside where the Sierra Madre mountains and coastal plains of the northeast state of San Luis Potosi meet.

"I had seen videos and documents but I didn't expect it to be so impressive," said Vida Arellano, a tourist from the northern state of Chihuahua. "Once you are here, you are enveloped by nature, the sculptures, the architecture ... it transports you to a different mental state."

Las Pozas means the pools.

Read the rest at ABC News

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