The valley of Malinalco, Mexico, long renowned for its monolithic Aztec temples, is a microcosm of the historical changes that occurred in the centuries preceding and following the Spanish conquest in the sixteenth century. In particular, the garden frescoes uncovered in 1974 at the Augustinian monastery of Malinalco document the collision of the European search for Utopia with the reality of colonial life.
In this study, Jeanette F. Peterson examines the murals within the dual heritage of pre-Hispanic and European muralism to reveal how the wall paintings promoted the political and religious agendas of the Spanish conquerors while preserving a record of pre-Columbian rituals and imagery. She finds that the utopian themes portrayed at Malinalco and other Augustinian monasteries were integrated into a religious and political ideology that, in part, camouflaged the harsh realities of colonial policies toward the native population.
That the murals were ultimately whitewashed at the end of the sixteenth century suggests that the "spiritual conquest" failed. Peterson argues that the incorporation of native features ultimately worked to undermine the orthodoxy of the Christian message. She places the murals' imagery within the pre-Columbian tlacuilo (scribe-painter) tradition, traces a "Sahagún connection" between the Malinalco muralists and the native artists working at the Franciscan school of Tlatelolco, and explores mural painting as an artistic response to acculturation.
The book is beautifully illustrated with 137 black-and-white figures, including photographs and line drawings. For everyone interested in the encounter between European and Native American cultures, it will be essential reading.

The Paradise Garden Murals of Malinalco: Utopia and Empire in Sixteenth-Century Mexico

Arts & Photography

Peterson, Jeanette Favrot

History & Criticism

University of Texas Press

The Virgin of Guadalupe is famously migratory, traversing continents and crossing and recrossing oceans. Guadalupe’s earliest cult originated in medieval Iberia, where Our Lady of Guadalupe from Extremadura, Spain, played a significant role in the reconquista and garnered royal backing. The Spanish Guadalupe accompanied the conquistadors as part of the spiritual arsenal used to Christianize the Americas, where new images of the Virgin acted as catalysts to implant her devotion within multiethnic constituencies.
This masterful study by Jeanette Favrot Peterson traces the transmission of Guadalupe as la Virgen de ida y vuelta from Spain to the Americas and back again, analyzing how the Spanish and Mexican titular images, and a selection of the copies they inspired, operated within the overlapping spheres of religion and politics. Peterson explores two central paradoxes: that only through a material object can a divine and invisible presence be authenticated and that Guadalupe’s images were made to work for enacting revolutionary change while preserving the colonial status quo. She examines the artists who created images of Guadalupe, their patrons, and the diverse viewing audiences for whom those images were intended. This exegesis reveals that visual evidence functioned on a par with written texts (treatises, chronicles, and sermons of ecclesiastical officialdom) in measuring popular beliefs and political strategies.

Visualizing Guadalupe: From Black Madonna to Queen of the Americas (Joe R. and Teresa Lozano Long Series in Latin American and Latino Art and Culture)

Religion & Spirituality

Mingei International documentary publication. This exhibition included ancient and contemporary Mesoamerican sculptures in stone, ceramic, jade and wood. On loan from thirty-one museums and private collections, these objects express man's symbolic use of natural forms. 
Guest-curated by Jeanette Favrot Peterson, Ph.D., Latin American Art historian. 
This exhibition included ancient and contemporary Mesoamerican sculptures in stone, ceramic, jade and wood. On loan from thirty-one museums and private collections, these objects express man's symbolic use of natural forms. 
Includes essay by Jeanette Favrot Peterson "Flora and Fauan as Metaphor in Precolumbian Mesoamerica."

Precolumbian Flora and Fauna: Continuity of Plant and Animal Themes in Mesoamerican Art

Green, Judith Strupp

Mingei Intl Museum of World

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