Various types of visual arts developed in the geographical area now known as Mexico. The development of these arts roughly follows the history of Mexico, divided into the prehispanic Mesoamerican era, the colonial period, with the period after Mexican War of Independence, the development Mexican national identity through art in the nineteenth century, and the florescence of modern Mexican art after the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920).
Painting by Luis Coto at the National Museum of Art in Mexico City of The Collegiate Church of Guadalupe
Painting cave in Yucatán
A Maya mural at Bonampak, 8th century AD.
Female figurines from the Tlatilco culture, 1250 to 800 BCE.
Casta is a term meaning lineage or race in Spanish and Portuguese. The term has historically been used as a racial and social identifier for mixed-race offspring in the colonial Spanish Empire in the Americas. The Spanish crown created a basic legal division between Hispanic society and Indigenous peoples, mainly living in indigenous communities. In the Hispanic sector were Spaniards, Black Africans, and mixed-race castas.
Las castas. Casta painting showing 16 racial groupings. Anonymous, 18th century, oil on canvas, 148×104 cm, Museo Nacional del Virreinato, Tepotzotlán, Mexico
Spanish (español) father, Mestiza (mixed Spanish-Indian) mother, and their Castiza daughter. Miguel Cabrera
From Spaniard and Castiza, Spaniard, anonymous (1799), Biblioteca Museu Víctor Balaguer
José Joaquín Magón, IV. Spaniard + Negra = Mulata. "The pride and sharp wits of the Mulata are instilled in her white father and black mother"