Cortés y La Malinche

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The woman seated at the right has been referred to by several names - Malintzin, Doña Marina, La Malinche. Like her name, her legacy is equally mutable. After being enslaved and sent to Tabasco, she was gifted to Hernan Cortés, who is seated at her left. Upon being baptized, she was given the Christian name of Doña Marina. Malintzin is likely a Nahuatl-ized version of her Christian name, with the suffix -tzin added as an honorific. She would become instrumental as Cortés’ translator. As described in Bernal Diaz del Castillo's True History of the Conquest of New Spain, she almost always accompanied Cortés. La Malinche would come to bear one of Cortes’ sons, Martín Cortés, who is said to be one of New Spain’s first mestizos.

There are multiple interpretations of the woman known as Doña Marina. The name La Malinche carries the connotation of betrayal, and she is seen as a traitor to her own people. Colloquially, to call someone malinchista could be interpreted as a questioning of an individual’s “Mexicaness.” La Malinche has also been cast in the maternal role of the mother of the mestizo and modern Mexico. More recently, nuanced views of La Malinche have emerged. Rather than a traitor or mother of a new people, La Malinche was a woman navigating the complicated power struggles of Mexico.

Cortés y La Malinche is located in the Antiguo Colegio de San Ildefonso, in Mexico City. The mural is located on a vault just before a staircase leading outside. The rest of the space is also painted with murals depicting the violence of Spanish colonization and evangelization. However, Cortés y La Malinche takes center stage, their figures looming from the vault above the staircase leading outside. In Orozco’s depiction of the famous pair at the National Preparatory School, La Malinche is seated nude against an ambiguous backdrop. Cortés sits beside her, his skin strikingly white-grey in contrast to the warm browns used to paint La Malinche, as well as the sky. One of Cortés’ hands grips La Malinche’s as they both stare out towards the viewer from the vault over a staircase. His other arm reaches across her, either in an attempt to restrain or shield her. An Indigenous man lies facedown at Cortes’ feet, invoking the violence of the Conquest. This rendition of Cortés and La Malinche is said to represent the emergence of the mestizo, with Cortés symbolizing the Old World man and La Malinche the New World woman. Cortés is depicted as domineering over La Malinche. They both sit in front of a prone Indigenous man, who was no doubt unseated by Cortés and whose foot now rests atop him.

Insight into the work can be found in Orozco’s ideologies. He was known for painting distinctly more cynical interpretations of Mexico’s Revolution, focusing on the lived trauma suffered by the people rather than the optimistic ideologies celebrated by artists like Rivera. Orozco also viewed Indigenous culture on the brink of collapse and therefore criticized the idea of an Indigenous Mexico as the foundation of a national aesthetic. He sought to create a new art for the modern world that did not draw from European, pre-Columbian, or contemporary Indigenous styles, as was being done by his contemporaries. Orozco’s Cortés y La Malinche seems to be centered around the emergence of something new in both content and style. Orozco refrains from using pre-Columbian iconography, and the subject matter can be interpreted as giving rise to a new people with a new history.