Embroidered coverlet (Colcha)

Doña Rosa Solís y Menéndez

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This bedcover was made in 1786 by Rosa Solís y Menéndez, who belonged to a prominent creole family from the Yucatan peninsula. Embroidered in bright-colored silk on a textured cotton ground, its lively imagery celebrates love and marriage. The elegantly dressed couple in the center of the coverlet probably represent Doña Rosa and her Spanish-born husband, Gabriel Milanés, whom she married in 1778. The background pattern of flowering vines upheld by trellises is a traditional symbol of marriage.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art