Zuly Palomino Jimenez and her family create retablos, a traditional art form from the Ayacucho region in southern Peru. Inside these colorful boxes are small, brightly painted sculptures of cultural, mythological or religious scenes. All are made from potato pulp.
According to the Indigo Arts Gallery, the word “retablo” is derived from the Latin phrase retro tabula, which means “behind the table (altar).” That is where devotional images were typically placed.
Here is a conversation with Palomino Jimenez. The full interview can be found here.
Zuly Palomino Jimenez says retablos have plenty of historical significance. Her grandfather was the grandmaster of the art form in Peru, and she learned from him and her mother.
“The Catholic priest used to come to Indigenous people to teach the Catholic religion, and usually there were little Catholic saints inside the retablo, like a little church,” she says. “We kept that tradition.”
The figures Palomino Jimenez and her family create have different themes, honoring carnivals and festivals from different areas of Peru.
“My mom was the first woman from Peru to make this art,” she says. “She learned from her father and my grandfather was the maestro retablista. This art is a reflection of life from past times.
“What happened before and what’s happening now.”
Palomino Jimenez said her grandfather’s work “shows a lot of like political themes” and shows a lot of troubles that have occurred through the years in Peru.
An estimated 69,000 people died during a decades-long conflict between the Peruvian government and the Shining Path, a Maoist guerilla group. The Ayacucho region, where the Jimenez family is from, was at the center of the violence.
“It really was very sad because it also because ... a lot of people who disappeared, and the mother of the family is going to the police looking for them,” she says, noting that hundreds of bodies would be found.
“My mother (Eleudora Jimenez) said it’s beautiful to work with and my father (Fidel Palomino Licas) said ‘No, it’s good because you can travel to the different countries.’”
The principal material used to make retablos is from the potato. There are more than 400 kinds of potatoes in Peru.
The artists boil the potatoes and then mash them.
“We start to mix with plaster bodies, and you can start doing the figures ... piece by piece,” Palomino Jimenez says. “We let (them get) drier by the sun and they get stronger maybe in three days.”
Palomino Jimenez says her family uses cedar to make the boxes that house the retablos. Her grandfather and mother each have their own style of painting flowers on the artwork, but she prefers animals.
“Well, I love animals a lot,” she said. “So I decided to choose animals — and other people sometimes. “Because I think you can learn more (from) animals than from the people sometimes.”
The family does workshops in Providence.
“I would love to share this art with the community,” Palomino Jimenez says. “People seem to enjoy this art and work with this art.”
Palomino says she was taught how to create retablos by her mother and she wants to keep the tradition alive.
“I’m born to this art family and also it’s in my blood. So I love making this art.”
