This mischievous raccoon crouches low, tail standing almost straight in the air, gripping a bright yellow fruit between its front paws. The wide blue eyes and familiar dark mask give it that mischievous, slightly guilty look the animal is known for.
The painting has a satin-like quality that perfectly suits the pose. Soft turquoise green glows across the rounded body, and small yellow matatena shapes, the cross-armed jacks used in the traditional Mexican children's game of the same name, drift over the surface in rhythm rather than a strict grid.
The Nahuatl name for the raccoon, mapachitli, means "one who takes everything in his hands," and it's the direct root of the modern Spanish word mapache.
Among Nahua communities in the Sierra Norte de Puebla, a folk story tells of the raccoon, Mapachin, helping the first people plant corn and returning every year afterward to claim his share of the harvest, a story that lines up neatly with this raccoon's very determined grip on its fruit.
