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Nuestra Señora de Belén
José Campeche y Jordán (born San Juan, Puerto Rico 1751-died San Juan, Puerto Rico 1809)
late 18th century
- Medium
- oil on copper
- Classification
- Paintings
- Dimensions
- 9 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. (24.2 x 19.2 cm.)
- Museum
- Smithsonian Institution, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Painting and Sculpture
- Credit line
- Smithsonian American Art Museum, Teodoro Vidal Collection
- Rights
- CC0 (Smithsonian Open Access), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Teens profiles and older: its subject is for older viewers (war, death, the Passion, drink or the like). How works are placed
View at the Smithsonian Institution
About this work
The iconography of the Virgin nursing the infant Jesus identifies Mary with the Church. In the same manner that Mary cares for the Christ child, so the Church nurtures its children. Images of the Virgin nursing were popular in the High Middle Ages, particularly in Spain in Catalonia and Valencia. When José Campeche was active in Puerto Rico, Catalonians were bringing to the island artistic influences from the mother country. (Yvonne Lange, “Santos: The Household Wooden Saints of Puerto Rico,” PhD diss., 1975)
