Watercolour

This watercolour, made by an unknown artist from the Philippines, is among the earliest objects to enter the V&A’s collection. One of eight by the same hand, the works directly correspond to another set (528 to 535), which were made at a similar time.

The artworks relate to a genre called tipos del país (‘types of the country’), popularised in nineteenth-century Manila. These small watercolours, depicting local people in ‘typical’ dress, were fashionable souvenirs for foreign traders in the latter part of the Spanish colonial period (1565–1898). Conventionally painted on white paper, this example reveals an unusual technique, with vivid colours on a prepared red ground.