Puebla Kitchen

Mexican art has recived some of its most abundant contributions from the Puebla area, which has produced many original, typically Mexican works that have reaffirmed the nation's identity. These two unsigned works, which bear witness to the continuity of the neo-Hispanic tradition as passed on by the artists' guilds, constitute anonymous exemplars of two minor genres that were profusely cultivated in the region in the mid-XlXth century, both within Puebla academic circles and among artists on the fringes of the latter -namely, the portrait of typical lower-class types and of members of the rising classes –mainly by self-taught artists with little or no formal artistic training- and the still-life or stilleven, in continuation of the age-old European tradition, but now taking on a distinctive local character, due to the inclusion of the many typical fruits and local dishes that abounded in the area. In the work entitled Puebla Kitchen, which is typical of the latter genre, we can see pulque, avocadoes, tortillas, chiles en nogada (a colorful Mexican dish featuring chili peppers filled with chopped walnuts and pomegranate seeds), meat in local sauces, chicken in mole (a thick local sauce containing chili peppers and chocolate, among other things) and hot cocoa, displayed on a humble wooden table. The naive portrait of the native Puebla woman (a figure that crops up again and again in XIX th century Mexican literature), wearing the typical local attire that is characteristic of the Puebla women, or chinas" so often depicted in Romantic XlXth -cencury Mexican literatura, and holding a bouquet of roses in her right hand, is clearly the work of an artist who is not much skilled at portraying the human figure in proper proportion or depicting features faithfully. However, the sumptuous and peculiar range of colors and the fact that the subject -whose blending of traditional dress with an opulent pearl necklace, filigree earrings, gold rings and fine lace, and brandishing of a book in her left hand to show her learning, indicate that she is one of the riouveaux riches who were keen to have their portrait painted for posterity— constitutes an example of a new genre peculiar to the ambiance —namely the portrayal of members of the "new Puebla middle classes", in a semi-Academic style that bears witness to the link bervveen Viceregal art and Modern Mexican painting, and forms part of the young nations search for a national identity. On the other hand, compared to the abundance of works influenced by the “Golden age” of the Baroque, which had reached its high point in the Flemish, Spanish and Italian schools, using occult symbolic repertoires that were often linked to biblical exegesis, the still life portraying tables set with food was somewhat new to México, a Par-removed from such mystical interpretations, the paintings of Puebla kitchens, best typified by the set tables and cupboards depicted by Agustín Arrieta, commonly deal with such banal copies as the opulence of the commissioners or buyers household, offering us important clues to the lifestyles of the new Mexican middle classes after Independence, or regaling the senses with the colors, flavors, textures and forms of the delicious Puebla cuisine. These pieces passed from the National Center for the Conservation and Registration of Mexico´s Artistic Heritage to the MUNAL, as part of the latter´s founding endowment, in 1982.