Mexican Saint Statue
Our Lady of Guadalupe
I bought this statue from a man who was selling them on the street in Ojinaga. He was only in town for a couple of days and then I think he was going back to Michoacan or someplace. These are exquisitely fashioned and hand painted with great care, by a true artisan. I have only a few of these. What I like about this is the very dark complexions they painted on the figures, as if they really take the term "Virgen Morena" seriously!
The Virgin of Guadalupe is the most famous saint in Mexico - the patron saint of Mexico, in fact. Known as the “Virgen Morena” - the brown skin virgin- Guadalupe was supposedly first encountered on the Hill of Tepeyac in what is now Mexico City only a few short years after the Spanish Conquest, by an Aztec Indian, Juan Diego, who was told to go and tell the bishop to build a temple on the spot where he first saw her. It happens that this spot is the same location where the temple of Tonantzin (“Our Lady” in the Aztec dialect, Nahuatl) was located. Tonantzin, on the other hand, was the recreation of an earlier Mother Goddess of the Indians who had been in the Valley of Mexico long before the arrival of the Aztecs.
Recently Juan Diego himself was canonized - and he is now officially a saint as a result of that. I think people will choose to just pray to the Virgencita Santa instead, just like they always did, in terms of how they are going to actually react to this development. This is a lovely statue, anyway, and very authentically Mexican in every way.
To pay by check or money order, print this page our and then send it in with your payment to:
Fausto's Art Gallery
POB 470
Presidio, TX 79845
From Fausto's Art Gallery in Ojinaga, Chihuahua.
Cost: $9.99
$8.00 dollars shipping and handling