achiote oil

Achiote oil or annatto comes from a shrub indigenous to South and Central America.  Its scientific name is Bixa Orellana.  It was present in areas as far apart as the Province of Michoacan in Mexico, Honduras, and Peru. Bixa Orellana’s name supposedly comes from the explorer Fransisco Orellana a Spaniard who is credited with the Spanish discovery of the Amazon.  However, it also has many other names associated with it.  The word bixa appears to come from the West Indies.[1]  Meanwhile, other names are also used such as Achiote, the root of which name is unknown, or annatto, among others, which takes its name “from “atta” (British Honduras)”[2].  The plant itself is usually quite spiky.  However, the real importance of this plant comes from its seeds, which can produce red, brown, and yellow colors depending on preparation and type.  This color is central both to its traditional use, and the eventual use of the Spaniards.

Bixa Orellana was used in many areas of Central and South America for dyeing.[3]  Achiote oil was often rubbed into the skin among Mayans for the practical reason of protection from the sun.[4]  However, achiote was also originally used in foods, primarily chocolate, in the Mayan culture which surrounded modern day Mexico and some of Central America.  Chocolate was seen as a sacred food, with symbolic connections to blood, and the achiote oil was used to produce a bloodlike color in it.[5]  Chocolate with achiote oil in it was also believed to have some medicinal properties by those the Spanish explorers came into contact with.  It was believed to help reduce diarrhea, lower fevers, soothe toothaches, and aid those with trouble breathing or urinating.[6]  

When the Spaniards came into contact with Bixa Orellana, they originally found the dye that it produced to be less beautiful than the cochineal which was used in Spanish textile production since it produced a less bright red.[7]  However, they brought achiote oil back to Spain for use in making chocolate drinks which were greatly enjoyed in Spain.[8]  The Spaniards also traded it as dye to other nations such as Holland or China who used it to dye their products.  Furthermore, it was transferred to and cultivated in other places with the correct climate such as some areas in Africa and India.[9] Once the modern period is reached, there are descriptions of large quantities of annatto being traded into England and France in “Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information” from the Royal Gardens, Kew which was printed in London.[10]

This particular image of Bixa Orellana was produced under the direction of Jose Celestino Mutis as a part of a project called la Real Expedición Botánica del Nuevo Reino de Granada (1783-1816).  This project produced sketches of the many different types of plants within the Spanish empire.  The images were often created by means of artists and naturalists working close together and travelling to the land of origin of different plants.  Great expense and often personal danger for the naturalists and artists were required to create these botanical illustrations.[11]   The artist that produced the particular image in question was named Salvador Rizo Blanco, and he played a crucial role in the expedition of Granada as Dianela Bleichmar witnesses to when describing him as “in charge of daily operations and all practical arrangements, from buying provisions to overseeing the functioning of a large team of artists, collectors, support staff, and long-distance contributors”[12].  He also trained many of the painters that would eventually work on this project.[13]

The composition itself, in its original format, is a beautiful image with broad green leaves, and delicate pink flowers, as well as prickly brown pouches that contain the seeds.  The version which the viewer sees on the webpage is a tracing of the image which was reproduced online.  Beyond the beauty of the image, there is a great attention to detail.  Tiny veins can be seen on the leaves, and the smaller parts of the flower are all present and provide an accurate depiction.  Furthermore, little buds which have not yet opened are drawn with little crests and overlaps just as seen with real flower buds in nature.  This attention to exact detail, instead of a general form, provides a sense of part of the purpose of this image.  According to Bleichmar, the exact detail and representation of the plants in this series of illustrations was part of their role as “visualization projects” through which, much like the Relacionas Geograficas which attempted to understand and make knowable these new parts of the empire through maps, these illustrations were intended to help the Spanish empire to know and understand these plants within their empire and thus better utilize and control that which was within their borders.[14]

Thus, this image, as informed by Bleichmar’s argument, gives a strong basis for how the creator of this image thought about Bixa Orellana, as well as what Bixa Orellana may have meant to Spain as a whole.  First of all, there seems to be a concern with accurate representation, which points to the scientific reason for this image.  The images created under Celestino Mutis were part of a greater global dialogue among naturalists through which there was an attempt to make sense of nature within an accepted framework with largely accepted iconography.[15] Thus, from the viewpoint of imperial control over economic matters gained by scientific knowledge, the greater understanding of a plant used both in the production of chocolate and dye could be useful in terms of being aware of the structure of the plant and thus being able to plan more efficient methods of planting and harvesting for one example.  However, as a part of the series of images as a whole, this image also served to help Spain to understand and thus control its empire in a much broader sense.  According to Bleichmar, the Spanish empire had a special understanding of the importance of images besides the global dialogue among naturalists.  This came out of the tradition of such projects as Relacionas Geographicas which obtained maps from different territories in the empire in order to understand these territories and hopefully gain some control over these regions by means of this knowledge.[16] When seen in light of this trend, this particular image of Bixa Orellana and the Mutis project as a whole can be seen as another part within the broader trend of making the unknown known and controllable by means of visualization and by means of the image.

--By Patrick Jennings