The Emergence of Guaraní-Christian Subject Formation in Río de la Plata

As early as 1618, two of the Jesuit missions of Río de la Plata, San Ignacio and Loreto, had functioning workshops for the production of religious art.  By the turn of the eighteenth century, all of the missions were producing paintings and iconic sculpture for parishes, schools, missions, public buildings, viceregal palaces, and Jesuit ranches throughout the region of what is now Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Bolivia, Chile, and Southern Brazil.  Most of these religious objects were produced by the indigenous Guaraní.  While art historians and anthropologists have articulated the importance of indigenous contributions to mission art, sculpture, and architecture, no one has studied the religious and epistemological import of Guaraní-Christian visual culture.  This paper examines the emergence of Guaraní-Christian subject formation as expressed in the sacred iconography and artisanship in the Jesuit missions of Río de la Plata.  Focusing specifically on the ways in which floral motifs and vegetal and animal designs helped articulate Guaraní notions of American nature, culture, and religious identity unaccounted for by Jesuit missionaries, this paper demonstrates how mission Indians also contributed to the construction of Guaraní-Christian subject formation, and fashioned their own expressions of a regional indigenous epistemology and identity.