Black Christ
The subject of the Black Christ in Mexican retablo paintings is full of oddities. There are three questions that occur to me when I view the subject, which are: 1) “Is that Christ black?” This would not seem odd if it had a relation to any African culture, but it does seem curious from a South American culture. 2) “Is he being crucified on stage?” The subject seems to be set on a stage, with curtains drawn back to reveal the crucifixion. 3) “Why are those flowers unusually large?” The flowers that are present on either side of the figure seem disproportionate to the figure itself.The answer to the first question is that the Spanish missionaries struck upon the depiction of the black Christ to appeal to the native Mexicans. The darker skin was more like their own, and some of their own divinities were depicted as being black, and so they could more easily relate to the Christ when he was colored black. As to the answer to the other questions, this strange appearance results from the fact that the subject of the paintings is actually a depiction of an altar. Therefore the table top comes across as a stage setting, and the flowers are in proportion to a small figure of the crucifixion, and not in proportion to an actual human.
Regardless of these explanations, the visual appearance of the retablo subject still seems enigmatic for these reasons. So, much like my interest in “Librata,” another retablo subject that I had earlier painted, my interest was generated by the curiosities inherent in their popular depictions.