Tapada limeña

Francisco Fierro is, without a doubt, the most important artist of Peruvian costumbrismo. Known by the more familiar name of Pancho Fierro, this self-taught painter produced a vast and diverse oeuvre featuring the typical clothing and customs of Lima. The mastery of his work in watercolor and the spontaneous effect he managed to achieve in his paintings ensured his prominent place in the formation of the visual culture of the nineteenth century. During his long career, which began with the dawn of the republic, Fierro witnessed the transformation of Peru as it opened up to international trade, and saw the disappearance of the last vestiges of the customs of viceroyalty society, following the wave of modernization that came with the boom in guano. The themes of his work remained constant throughout this period of profound changes in Peruvian society. Fierro continued to produce his watercolors even when many of the customs depicted had disappeared. Such is the case with his pictures of “tapadas limeñas”. Although this mode of dress had fallen into disuse by the 1840s, Fierro continued to reproduce it in his watercolors until his death in 1879. (NM)