Illustration for a Story (Ilustración para un Cuento) from 25 Prints of José Guadalupe Posada
José Guadalupe Posada
Mexican, 1852–1913
published 1942
An engraved illustration by José Guadalupe Posada that stages a dramatic, popular-story scene of a hooded, deathlike figure lunging across a bed to seize a terrified young woman, mixing narrative drama with social and moral overtones.
You are struck by the sweeping black mass of the shrouded cloak cutting a sharp diagonal across the frame, the high-contrast lines and repeating bedposts giving the small room a claustrophobic, theatrical urgency.
Posada’s compact, widely circulated prints fused folk storytelling, satire, and macabre imagery into a vernacular visual language that helped define modern Mexican graphic culture and the iconic depiction of death in 20th-century art.
Medium
Engraving from a portfolio of seventeen engravings and eight etchings
Dimensions
composition: 4 5/16 x 6 5/16" (10.9 x 16.1 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Inter-American Fund
Accession
772.1942.11
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
