From Puebla to San Carlos: The Journeys of the Olavarrieta Collection (1907-1909)

Research article Intervención ISSN 2448-5934 ENERO-JUNIO 2023 JANUARY-JUNE 2023 From Puebla to San Carlos: The Journeys of the Olavarrieta Collection (1907–1909) Ir a la versión en español OJS DOI: 10.30763/Intervencion.279.v1n27.58.2023 • YEAR 14, ISSUE NO. 27: 126-146 Índice / Contents Submitted: 28.06.2022 • Accepted: 22.02.2023 • Published: 30.09.2023 Rebeca Julieta Barquera Guzmán Instituto de Investigaciones Bibliográficas (iib), Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (unam), Mexico | orcid: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4163-6518 Translated by Carmen M. Plascencia ABSTRACT In 1907, artist Gerardo Murillo, Dr. Atl, made an inventory of a 295 piece collection donated to the state by Alejandro Ruiz Olavarrieta, a businessman and politician from Puebla. This research proposes an approach to this compilation from the analysis and systematization of said relationship, through the titles and attributions established by the artist, as well as from the public exhibition organized two years later at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes (enba, for its acronym in Spanish, National School of Fine Arts). This exercise will allow some questions to be asked about the process of conforming and conserving the Academy’s collections, and the tracking of some of its pieces today. KEYWORDS collecting, cultural heritage, museums, conservation history, modern art Photography: Blanca Cárdenas, 2019; courtesy: Nara Palace Site Historical Park, Heijokyu Izanaikan Guidance Center, Showroom 3. A t 10 in the morning on Tuesday, February 5, 1909, the exhibition of the Olavarrieta Collection opened in one of the galleries of the Academia de San Carlos (Academy of San Carlos). Justo Sierra, Minister of Instrucción Pública (Public Instruction), and the Undersecretary Ezequiel Chávez were received at the Academy by the architect Antonio Rivas Mercado, its director, and by the artist Gerardo Murillo, Dr. Atl, who designed it. He From Puebla to San Carlos: The Journeys of the Olavarrieta Collection (1907–1909) CONVOCATORIA 2023 CALL FOR PAPERS 2023 126 Research article Intervención ISSN 2448-5934 ENERO-JUNIO 2023 JANUARY-JUNE 2023 OJS Índice / Contents Photography: Blanca Cárdenas, 2019; courtesy: Nara Palace Site Historical Park, Heijokyu Izanaikan Guidance Center, Showroom 3. would give these authorities a tour of the exhibition, highlighting the importance of some of the pieces in the collection, which from then on would form part of the pictorial heritage of what was then called Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes (enba, for its acronym in Spanish, National School of Fine Arts) located in the historic center of Mexico City (Se inauguró la exposición […], 1909, p. 1). The collection was bequeathed to the federal government in 1907 by Puebla’s businessman Alejandro Ruiz Olavarrieta, and Gerardo Murillo carried out its inventory, classification, appraisal, restoration and exhibition. It consisted of 295 paintings of European and Mexican origin and 200 pieces of ceramics (Notas de la semana, 1909, p. 8). In this article, the Olavarrieta Collection will be analyzed based on Murillo´s inventory for the enba and its exhibition in 1909. This two-sided analysis will allow us to ask some questions about the process of formation and conservation of the collections of the former Academy in Mexican modernism, specifically in the first decade of the 20th century, which today are part of the public collections of the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (inba, National Institute of Fine Arts) and of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (unam, National Autonomous University of Mexico). ALEJANDRO RUIZ OLAVARRIETA’S PRIVATE MUSEUM The corridors of Alejandro Ruiz Olavarrieta´s home in the city of Puebla de los Ángeles were visited by many people. Those who knew “that private museum consider it one of the most valuable treasures in Puebla”1 (Un museo particular en Puebla, 1905, p. 3). Its spaces were full of objects: “paintings, statues, artifacts, fabrics, jewelry, decorations, tableware, books, medals and much more of what can be imagined to have great artistic value and indisputable antiquity… [such as]… dishes gifted by Emperor Francisco José to the defenders of Maximilian; Sèvres vases; Chinese and Japanese jars, …[or]… canvases of indisputable merit” (Un museo particular en Puebla, 1905, p. 3). Alejandro Ruiz Olavarrieta was part of Puebla’s bourgeoisie and a symbolically important figure in society since he had been a substitute deputy for the city of Puebla in Congress, along with José Luis Bello (1861), secretary of the board to organize hospitals in Puebla (1862). Ruiz Olavarrieta also headed the committee to create the Programa de Educación e Instrucción Primaria para las Escuelas de Enseñanza Gratuita (Primary Education and Instruc- 1 Editorial translation. All quotes are translations from the original texts in Spanish. From Puebla to San Carlos: The Journeys of the Olavarrieta Collection (1907–1909) CONVOCATORIA 2023 CALL FOR PAPERS 2023 127 Research article Intervención ISSN 2448-5934 ENERO-JUNIO 2023 JANUARY-JUNE 2023 OJS Índice / Contents Photography: Blanca Cárdenas, 2019; courtesy: Nara Palace Site Historical Park, Heijokyu Izanaikan Guidance Center, Showroom 3. tion Program for the Free Teaching Schools, 1868). Years later, he also participated in the xvi Meeting of the International Congress of Americanists (1895), in the sixth session with the memory: Diser tación sobre el origen de los pobladores de América (Dissertation on the origin of the settlers of America) (Ruiz, 1897, pp. 278-280), which deals with the origin of the inhabitants of Mexico and their relationship with one of the 10 tribes of Israel, which gave him entry to a circle of intellectuals who were still explaining the origin of man in biblical interpretations, a very fashionable position in Puebla at that time (Sexta sesión […], 1895, p. 2). In 1896 Ruiz Olavarrieta was commissioned to give a speech at the banquet in honor of Porfirio Díaz, with the inauguration of two statues made by Jesús Contreras: Nicolás Bravo and Ignacio Zaragoza. In his greeting to the president, Ruiz Olavarrieta exclaimed: “The most glorious and recent pages of our history have been written in Puebla and, especially, by the patriotism of its children, and in them, you are the caudillo who, before the sublime ideal of freedom and the Republic, postponed everything for the salvation of the homeland” (Fiestas de Puebla, 1896, p. 2). It can be noted that this businessman was a politician allied to the Porfirian regime and, at the same time, very active in the Puebla Catholic community.2 However, Ruiz Olavarrieta seems best known for creating Monte de Piedad Vidal-Ruiz, although it was the idea of his sister, María Gertrudis Benigna Ruiz Olavarrieta. She wanted to use the inheritance her husband, José Manuel Vidal, left her to create a private charity in Puebla. Unfortunately, she was unable to do so, and the money (...truncated)