c. 1700

Virgin and Child

Mexican, c. 1675 - 1728

Juan Rodríguez Juárez was the last in a large family of painters, and this private devotional image demonstrates his mastery of painting on copper and the luminescent tones that this material can create. Although compositions on copper were common in colonial Mexico, this work stands out because its reverse contains a long inscription that indicates it was originally used as a printing plate for a children’s grammar textbook.