Carmen Lomas Garza: Lotería―Primera Tabla (1972)

One of my favorite works by Carmen Lomas Garza is her print titled Lotería―Primera Tabla (1972). Through this particular work, Carmen Lomas Garza utilizes some of her community experiences as the basis for her own series of lotería tablas. The artist completely reimagines the concept of lotería by intertwining pre-Columbian and colonial work. In doing so, Garza underlines the importance of giving colonization a candid portrayal―one that not only includes the presence of the Spanish, but also one that alludes to indigenous, precontact paintings. The latter is demonstrated through the speech scroll in one of the blocks. The speech scroll is depicted as an action that is coming out of a Spanish man’s mouth in order to illustrate that the man speaks in general. However, the most significant aspect from this particular block is the fact that this image draws a parallel to speech scrolls embedded within indigenous societies. 

To continue on, I gravitated towards this image due to the vivacity of the lotería tabla. The tabla’s color richness was not only rooted in the choice of colors, but also, the clarity of the illustrations. Personally, the most captivating aspect of the print is the artist’s portrayals of both worlds, with the inclusion of the monitos, or little figures, her mother once received. Beyond the fact that Garza was able to contextualize and historicize pre-Columbian and colonial worlds through art, I enjoyed the fact that the artist also incorporated bits of her childhood. The monitos depicted in the tablas underline the parallels between Garza’s community experiences and those of the audience―experiences that demonstrate prevalent commonalities within the Chicano/a and Latino/a community.