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I’ve spent some time reflecting on that remarkable set of 37 watercolors attributed to Pancho Fierro, and I want to share with you what strikes me most deeply — the way those small, seemingly simple images open a window into a Lima of the mid-19th century, full of life, contradictions, and human stories.

What I find most enchanting is how, in these modest sheets of watercolor, Fierro (or his circle) manages to balance intimacy and social observance. There is no grandiosity, no sweeping epic scenes rather, the charm lies in the everyday: people walking, conversing, carrying loads, mounted on animals, dressed and posed just so. And in that everyday, a deeper narrative is unfolding: the pulse of a city in formation, the stratifications of race and status, the delicate dance of visibility and disguise.

Take, for instance, how certain female figures appear wearing the “saya y manto” that characteristic cloak and skirt combination that for centuries defined the Tapada limeña. The manto would cover head and face, leaving only a single eye visible, lending an air of both anonymity and intrigue. That very custom was laden with symbolism: it allowed women a kind of veil-born presence in public space, a refusal to be fully legible while still asserting their presence.
In these watercolors, such attire becomes more than fashion it becomes a cipher of social codes, gender performance, and subtle resistance.

In Lima at that time, the city was pulsating with economic and cultural shifts. The mid-19th century in Peru was shaped by the so-called Guano Era the export of guano (bird droppings used as fertilizer) brought in wealth and fueled ambitious urban projects in the capital.
The city’s elites invested in infrastructure, urban embellishment, public squares and façades inspired by European models. In that transforming city, appearance, costume, visual display carried heavy weight they were tools of identity, aspiration, and social signaling.

So when I look at a watercolor of a man riding a donkey, a whip raised, another donkey carrying grass, I see far more than a pastoral vignette. I see the interplay of labor and mobility, of social distance and everyday agency. The very proportions of the figures, their posture, the subtle gestures a whip raised all hint at authority, control, and the rhythms of transport and trade in a growing city. And beside the mount is a beast laden with fodder an image that evokes how human and animal labor were interwoven into Lima’s daily life.

There’s also beauty in how these watercolors treat light, color, and space. Fierro’s palette is modest, soft pastel tones, gentle washes, careful delineation. Shadows are minimal, perspective is flattened, but the result is delicate, almost lyrical. The compositions feel open, as if each figure breathes room to exist. And yet, the arrangement of figures often suggests social grouping, confrontation, or distance. The contrast between how individuals are posed some confidently, some more reserved invites us to read their internal world.

I can’t help thinking that these works are visual anthropology with a painter’s soul. They are records and meditations: on race (Fierro himself was Afro-Peruvian), on class, on the rhythms of a city striving to define itself between tradition and modernity. They are affectionate a loving eye cast on one’s own city but also astute, never naive.

What fills me with admiration is the courage of such an artist working without the spectacle of large history paintings, choosing instead to look squarely at quotidian life, and trusting that the everyday has weight, texture, and meaning.

When I close my eyes, I see Lima’s streets in those years: women veiled and walking with discretion, men on horseback or leading beasts, vendors balancing baskets, the tension between public prominence and hidden identities. And these 37 watercolors become a small, radiant constellation in which each point each figure gives off a subtle glow.