MOTHER'S DAY- OUR LADY IN PERU

On this Mother’s Day we present more art depicting Our Lady of the Rosary.

Many of the most beautiful paintings depicting Our Lady of the Rosary are from South America, mainly PERU.

The practice of praying with a rosary began in twelfth century Europe, when it was said that the Virgin Mary herself had given the first rosary beads to St Dominic of Guzmán with instructions to offer prayers to her. In this painting, St Dominic is identified not only by this event and by the black and white habit of the order he founded, but by the presence of the dog below. According to the Golden Legend, Dominic’s mother, while pregnant with him, had a dream that she would give birth to a dog with a torch in its mouth that would “burn the world.” This dream forecasted Dominic’s founding of an order, the Dominicans, that would preach throughout the world.

In a number of paintings, both European and Spanish Colonial, Dominic is accompanied by St Catherine of Siena, who is identified by the stigmata on her hands received during one of her visionary experiences of God. The object below her in the painting Our Lady of the Rosary with Sts Dominic and Catherine most likely represents a book referencing her writings, including The Dialogue of Divine Providence and many letters and prayers.

This small painting on copper would have been used for private devotions, and can be stylistically dated to the early seventeenth century, reflecting a new use of a plate originally intended for printing. Our Lady of the Rosary with Saints Dominic and Catherine of Siena was painted on an unused plate. The fine and quite small facial features point to the influence of the Mannerist style on artists in the early years of the Viceroyalty of PERU. The painting was originally without the gold embellishment that was added in the eighteenth century, reflecting a change in taste as well as a wish to enhance the value of the work.

We have written in past Blogs about the art from the Cuzco school, the group of European and indigenous painters active in Cuzco, Peru, from the 16th through the 18th century. The term refers not to an easily identifiable style from a single period of history but instead to the artists of multiple ethnicities who worked in various styles throughout the history of the Viceroyalty of Peru in and around Cuzco.

Situated high in the Andes, Cuzco had been the capital of the Inca empire and had become the headquarters for each of the religious orders in the viceroyalty. European artists began working in Cuzco shortly after Spanish colonization of the city in the 1530s. 

They introduced the styles they had learned in their native countries to indigenous artists who had traditionally painted ceramics and murals in a geometrically abstract style.  While much of the art remains, the artists themselves are lost to us.