Art is the Solution

Virgen Negra Source: Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico Puerto Rican artist Marta Pérez is known for her lavish, allegorical paintings. Her work draws on the bright and vibrant motifs of Caribbean culture and on her own cultural heritage (Pérez has connections to Basque, Jewish, Greek, and Irish culture). Virgen Negra —which loosely translates to Black Madonna—is perhaps my favorite Pérez painting. As the title suggests, the painting depicts the Virgin Mary with the Christ Child on her lap. The mother and son are surrounded by a bizarre landscape of ghostly blue trees, purple fish, and a magenta sky. The pose of the Madonna and Child suggests that Pérez may be referencing the Black Madonna of Montserrat, one of the most important spiritual icons in Spain. Such a reference suggests that Pérez is exploring the way European Christianity has come to function in the Caribbean. Her landscape is an allegorical representation of the multicultural world created by the transcontinental exchange of...

La Virgen del Café Source: Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico Today, I want to skip forward a hundred years or so to talk about a more modern piece of art: La Virgen del Café , a painting by Puerto Rican artist Marta Pérez. I saw this painting recently at the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico, and I found it to be very charming, so I want to take a few minutes to talk about it today. La Virgen del Café translates to the Madonna of Coffee . Depictions of the Virgin Mary are quite common in the history of Latin American art, and religious painting in particular is a cornerstone of Puerto Rican art; however, Pérez’s work puts a new perspective on this legacy. As the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico explains, “Exuberant colors, an agglomeration of elements, and female figures with mythical and angelic appearances are characteristic of her work.” As the Museum’s description suggests, La Virgen del Café represents a reimagining of Puerto Rico’s legacy of religious painting. The painting contrasts sta...