With a new collection of paintings and prints, Mexican artist Jainite Silvestre delves into femininity and Mexican identity in her new exhibition, Divina. In this show, she explores and reinterprets sacred feminine images throughout the history of Mexico, from the pre-Hispanic goddess Coatlicue to the Virgin of Guadalupe.
Mainly known for her black and white prints, Silvestre gives her art a new twist in this collection of colorful paintings on paper. This is the largest suite of paintings the artist has showcased to date; marking a unique show in her 15-year career as an artist and printmaker. The distinctive palette of the Virgin Of Guadalupe –yellow, green, pink, red, and blue– is the foundation of the chromatic explorations in these works. The show also includes prints.
Silvestre is not new to painting. When she started art school in Mexico, she intended to specialize in this medium, but then she chose printmaking, because it best suited her artistic goals. However, she has never stopped painting. In her opinion, this discipline has always enriched her drawing skills, as it helps her to explore other expression means.
For Divina, she found inspiration in the book “Tonantzin Guadalupe”, by Miguel León Portilla, a crucial study to understand the history of the cult of the Guadalupana. Silvestre mentions that besides religion, this Virgin is at the core of Mexican’s identities, such as the Chicano culture. “These iconographies are now transcending borders between countries”, she points out and adds [in Mexico] “Not only we have a cult of the Virgin, but also of the mother”. In this exhibition, she aims to depict women as Virgins, as mothers, and as creators.Women have always been a central theme in her work. In a previous collection, she drew volcanoes as natural containers of female energy. This time she explores a more spiritual side of femininity, touching on the topics of divinity and sacrality, with a special focus on the pre-Hispanic goddess Coatlicue. “I always try to include her. I think she has been denied [sic] in History, because she has been considered as monstrous by some”. Through this series, she reflects on the history of these sacred images. “This is what I’m bringing now; a woman as a Virgin, but not just a Virgin on a pedestal, but a Virgin with the shape of a pre-Hispanic ceramic piece, of an ancient figure”, she says.
“Nature was a woman. The Sun was a woman” ... “They had big breasts, legs, and hips; because they had to be fertile to give birth to everything and everyone”
She reminds us that in ancient times, goddesses ruled the world: “Nature was a woman. The Sun was a woman”. She explains that her virgins are more like those ancient depictions: “big, imposing, heavy; shapeless, not stylized”, away from the current canons of feminine beauty. “They had big breasts, legs, and hips; because they had to be fertile to give birth to everything and everyone”, she says.
Silvestre stresses out that all of the works in this show are equally important, since each one of them has a story to tell. To the artist, it was worth mentioning that the Divina exhibition dates coincide with the Mexican Independence Month.