From "Byobu" to "Biombo": the transformation of the Japanese folding screen in colonial Mexico

• Autores: Sofía Sanabrais
• Localización: Art history: journal of the Association of Art Historians, ISSN 0141-6790, Vol. 38, Nº. 4, 2015 (Ejemplar dedicado a: Objects in motion in the early modern world / coord. por Daniela Bleichmar, Meredith Martin), págs. 778-791
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This essay considers the introduction of the Japanese folding screen (byobu) to Mexico in te seventeenth century and its translation into a local artistic idiom. The "byobu" and its Mexican counterpart known as the "biombo" were indispensable in both interior and exterior spaces. Folding screens were quintessential examples of Japanese art and thus were often included among the diplomatic gifts from Japanese emperors to foreign rulers, moving across vast geographical spaces. In the service of the samurai or the New Spanish elite, painted, movable screens were used as political signifiers to demonstrate the wealth and good taste of their owners. Many of the "biombos" made in Mexico City were transported back to Spain as visual reminders of the New World. The translation of the "byobu" to the "boimbo" and the cross-cultural references of the folding screen are examined in this essay.