Posada's calaveras

José Guadalupe Posada *1851, 1913† was a Mexican illustrator in the time of the dictatorship of Porfirio Diaz (1876-1911). After a time he began using calaveras (skulls, by extension--skeletons) as political and social satire. Many of these cartoons were lithographs at first. Later to produce cheaper prints he worked engravings in wood blocks, and zinc plates, and type metal with new inks in relief etchings. Some two thousand survive. Posada died in poverty, and was forgotten.


Posada was known by the then young painters Diego Rivera, and Jose Clemente Orozco. In 1921, the French born, Jean Charlot came to Mexico, the land of his mother's father. He introduced the rest of the world to Posada's works.

Porfirio Diaz

 

 

 1963 commemorative stamp of Posada's Quijote

 Posada's calaveras are now associated with Mexico's Día de los Muertos. He combined in these comic figures a mestizo blend of folkloric, allegorical death. A mocking memento mori that instructs all about the vanity of life. Pre-Columbian Mexico, and Central America portrayed death and skeletons often. The Spanish brought Christianity that shew a suffering God. The 19th century French, which were a model to Mexico, were infatuated with danse macabre. Many prints, Posada made year after year for All Saints, and All Souls, and the popular celebrations of them.

El Jarabe en Ultratumba (The Folk Dance Beyond the Grave), or 

Gran fandango y francachela de todas las calaveras (Happy Dance and Wild Party of all the Skeletons)

published as a broadside ballad/corrido

 La Calavera Catrina, colored, or black and white is from c.1910 zinc etching

The bourgeois females of Mexico emulated French fashion. 'Catrina' is American Spanish for: elegant, over-dressed, dapper, pretty. The most popular of Posada's skeletons are catrinas. They have been made into dolls, and decorations.