Dowry chest

This ark-shaped dowry chest is typical of lacquer work from Olinalá, a remote town in the Mexican region known as the Montaña. The colorful decoration is executed using two different techniques, known as rayado (etched) and dorado (painted; literally, gilded). In the former, the hand-rubbed reddish base layer known as tlapetzole is covered with a contrasting layer of green lacquer into which designs are cut. Resulting negative spaces are scratched away to reveal the red underlayer. The technique, in which mineral pigments are bound with oil pressed from chia seed, is of pre-Hispanic origin. Brightly colored drinking cups made from lacquered gourds (xicalli) were treasured by both Aztec and Spanish colonial elites. By the 18th century, Olinaltecan laqueros had expanded their production to include dowry chests, sewing boxes, serving trays and other objects.

Olinalá dowry chests such as this one figure prominently in the postrevolutionary construction of an ethnicized Mexican identity by leading artists and intellectuals of the 1920s and 30s. The cultural distinctiveness of the remote town, manifest in the lacquerware produced there continuously since pre-Hispanic times, came to be seen as emblematic of an innate, timeless mexicanidad. Nationalists as well as collectors regarded Olinaltecan lacquerware as historically transcendent art form and idealized it as both authentically indigenous and Mexican.