We leave the papyri painters of Egypt behind this week to look at a paper folk art form linked to an ancient civilization of the Americas--the amate paper art of Mexico. "Amate" comes from the Aztec (Nahuatl) word for paper and at the height of the Aztec empire thousands of sheets made from tree bark were used by scribes and priests writing royal and sacred documents. Banned by the Spanish Conquistadors, the recipe for making paper from the softened fiber strips of wild fig trees, nettles, and mulberry bushes was preserved in outlying regions. Amate paper painting came about in the modern era through the cooperation of artisans from two indigenous groups, when pottery painters from the Nahua people on the Pacific coast decided to transfer their colorful designs from breakable clay ware to easily transportable tree bark paper sheets made by artisans of the Otomi people of Central Mexico, whom they met in the folk art markets of Mexico City. This week's pen and ink drawing of the Ascenscion of Jesus, who blesses both humans and beasts as he rises to heaven on a light beam from a rural Mexican landscape, is the work of Cristino Flores Medina, one of the early masters of amate paper art, on view now on the similarly titled page in the Schools of Sacred Art section. (John Kohan)