Cristo Crucificado
This vibrant, humanized depiction of Christ’s crucifixion is one of a number of santos produced in New Mexico during the 18th and 19th centuries, where such works helped isolated Catholic settlers to establish a more personal relationship with God.
The piece was sculpted by José Aragón, one of the most important New Mexican santeros, or artist of the saints, during the first half of the 1800s. Not to be confused with José Rafael Aragón, another prolific santero, José Aragón’s exact identity and hometown are unclear. His works can nevertheless be attributed to the artist, because unlike many of his contemporaries, he personally signed the pieces he produced.
Aragón or one of his assistants carved this crucifix out of native softwood using axes, adzes, knives, and sandstone, and then the artist added the finishing touches in paint made from native plants and minerals.
This piece demonstrates features characteristic of Aragón’s artistic style, including straightened legs, well-carved hands, almond-shaped eyes, prominent cheekbones, and a near smile on a delicate oval face. However, the upturned head is particularly unique. Aragón also often employed yellow, green, black, and red, as in the loincloth on this piece. The bow on Christ’s left side is of particular note, as well, because this feature has broken off over the years in many of Aragón’s other surviving works.
Aragón worked for approximately forty years during the “Golden Age” of New Mexican santos, before local priests’ preferences for more European-style religious art and an influx of mass-produced crucifixes stymied the production of such regional works after the Mexican-American War. Although the origins of the santo art movement are still unclear, today scholars recognize it as a folk-art style unique from the rest of the Spanish-Mexican cultural sphere and as one of the only Christian art movements that originated in what would become the United States.
This crucifix was acquired with funds provided by an anonymous benefactor and the Mr. and Mrs. Terrence Dillon Endowment. In prayerful memory of the Nicholas Scherer and John Austgen families, early settlers of northwest Indiana, whose religious needs were faithfully served by the Holy Cross Religious of Notre Dame, to whom the families are eternally grateful.