mexicosmurals: 2021

Wednesday, February 17, 2021

Oaxaca. Santo Domingo Yanhuitlan: St Christopher mural

For the final post in our ongoing series on the art of the great Dominican priory of Yanhuitlan, we focus in this post on a striking fresco of St. Christopher standing above the above the stairway in the convento—the only intact mural to survive there. This is an unusual location for this subject as St Christopher is more commonly found in the church by or above the north doorway.

Carrying the Christ Child on his shoulder, the bearded saint strides from the stormy torrent, observed by a diminutive friar holding out a lantern—a portrait, according to local lore, of Fray Bernardino de Minaya, the pioneering Oaxacan missionary. Notwithstanding its awkward bodily proportions and the rigid folds of the saint’s drapery and pantaloons, the mural projects an iconic force.

image by the author

Mexican Murals

For most people, Mexican murals bring to mind the large scale, revolutionary murals decorating the walls of many public buildings, painted by Rivera, Orozco, Siqueiros, their followers and successors.

In contrast, this new blog will focus on a much earlier era of mural painting, one that flourished during the 16th century in the conventos and churches of Mexico, as part of the “spiritual conquest” of Mexico undertaken by the missionary Orders, primarily the Franciscans, Dominicans and Augustinians.

Some of these early colonial murals have already been described in our other blog, which we are re-posting in this blog . Many others will follow, and as with our other blog, we plan to highlight murals of special historic, cultural or artistic interest.

We will also feature selected larger oil paintings of special interest from time to time