El sueño de la Malinche or The Dream of Malinche is one of Mexican painter Antonio M. Ruíz's better known works. Painted in 1939, his subject, La Malinche was the mistress of Hernán Cortés as well as his translator and guide during Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. She is a symbol of the indigenous people but also of the betrayal of her people, and a key contributor to the conquistadors were defeat of the native indigenous people. In the painting, La Malinche lies sleeping on a modern bed, with a cracked and distressed wall behind her and a blanket drawn up around her. On the blanket lies a Mexican landscape with a colonial church as the highest point and residential areas spreading down the hills. Edward Lucie-Smith's view of the implication of this painting is that "Mexico's Indian past still slumbers beneath the trappings of the European present." The enormity and complexity of the story contained in Ruíz’s jewel-like painting is symbolic of the many allegories associated with La Malinche. Ruíz transforms Malinche’s body into a site of contestation and colonization, equated with the site of Cholula, entirely decimated by Cortés, and perhaps with Mexico itself, invaded by Spain, while she sleeps. The glowing beauty of this work with a dark connotation underscores the complex relationship contemporary Mexico still has with Malinche.

El sueño de la Malinche (Malinche’s dream) by Antonio Ruíz (Mexican) - Oil paint on masonite / 1939 - Denver Art Museum (Colorado) #womeninart #art #oilpainting #AntonioRuíz #MexicanArtist #artwork #dream #DenverArtMuseum #MexicanArt #womensart #Malinche #HerStory #fineart #ElCorzo #ContemporaryArt