parrot bracelet

A figural parrot in sterling silver — a creature woven into Mexican folk imagery long before the Taxco revival — reflects the design sensibility that defined the Matl workshop's characteristic output. Matilde Poulat drew her vocabulary from the whimsical subjects of Mexican folk art, deliberately setting aside European conventions in favor of the imagery of the pueblos: birds, flowers, tiny bells. The parrot belongs naturally in that lineage, a product of the post-Revolution search for a distinctly Mexican aesthetic that Poulat embraced from the beginning.

Morrill documents that Poulat found inspiration in the Mixtec gold jewelry discovered at Monte Albán in 1932, and her folk-derived motifs reflect the broader cultural moment she inhabited. The repoussé technique practiced in the Matl taller gave even small wearable objects a sculptural presence. The "Matl" mark was introduced in 1934; Poulat's own production carries it unaccompanied, while work continued by her nephew Ricardo Salas after her death in 1960 identifies itself as "Matl Salas."

A parrot bracelet in sterling offers a direct path into the folk-art strand that runs through Poulat's output.