Herb Box (Yerbera)

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Special Things: Boxes in Spanish America

Opening a box invariably brings about a sense of wonder and discovery—even when we suspect what is inside. Small and portable, beautifully made boxes are designed to enclose special things; their exterior mirrors the precious commodities they contain, which are often kept under lock and key.

Herb Box (Yerbera)

Bolivia, possibly Moxos or Chiquitos, circa 1775-1790
Furnishings; Accessories
Wood and silver
7 1/4 × 8 1/2 × 9 1/4 in. (18.4 × 21.6 × 23.5 cm)
Purchased with funds provided by the Bernard and Edith Lewin Collection of Mexican Art Deaccession Fund (M.2007.30)
Not currently on public view

Provenance

Lord and Lady Hesketh, Easton Neston Estate, Northamptonshire, United Kingdom; Sotheby’s, London, May 17–19, 2005, lot 1557; Simois Gestión de Arte SL, Madrid, 2005; LACMA, 2007.

Label

Known today as herb boxes (yerberas) or coca boxes (coqueras), these shell-shaped containers were part of elite viceregal households in the southern Andes and highland Peru.

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Known today as herb boxes (yerberas) or coca boxes (coqueras), these shell-shaped containers were part of elite viceregal households in the southern Andes and highland Peru. The boxes were designed to store yerba maté leaves to brew tea, and perhaps also coca leaves and other substances, which accounts for their interior partitions. Densely ornamented, these examples were created by Indigenous carvers of the Jesuit missions of Moxos and Chiquitos, in present-day Bolivia.


From exhibition Archive of the World, 2022 (for more information see the catalogue entries by Ilona Katzew and Luis Eduardo Wuffarden in the accompanying publication, cats. nos. 81–82, pp. 316–25)
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Bibliography

  • Katzew, Ilona, ed. Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800: Highlights from LACMA’s Collection. Exh. Cat. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: DelMonico Books/D.A.P., 2022.
  • Katzew, Ilona, ed. Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800: Highlights from LACMA’s Collection. Exh. Cat. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: DelMonico Books/D.A.P., 2022.
  • Ilona Katzew, “Special Things: Boxes in Spanish America,” Unframed, July 20, 2022, https://unframed.lacma.org/2022/07/20/special-things-boxes-spanish-america.

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Exhibition history

  • Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, November 6, 2011 - January 29, 2012
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, June 12, 2022 - October 30, 2022
  • Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, November 6, 2011 - January 29, 2012
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Los Angeles, CA, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, June 12, 2022 - October 30, 2022
  • Archive of the World: Art and Imagination in Spanish America, 1500–1800 Nashville, TN, Frist Art Museum, October 20, 2023 - January 28, 2024
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