Los inicios de la litografía en México: el periodo oscuro (1827-1837)

Abstract

Through painstaking research involving lithographic prints, newspapers and other primary sources in archives and public and private collections, Arturo Aguilar brings to light the panorama of the first years of the lithograph in Mexico which, in this author's definition, extends from 1827 (the year in which Claudio Linati left the country) until 1837, when the technique came into its first flowering with the appearance of publications, such as Mosaico Mexicano, edited by Ignacio Cumplido, that made ample use of the work of lithographers. Dissenting from the traditionally held notion that during this period nothing, or next to nothing, was achieved in the field of lithography, Arturo Aguilar reviews the first works by Mexican artists during this so-called “dark age”. It was in workshops like those of Rocha and Fournier that Mexican artists began to discover their potential in this new technique.