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Felipe Linares Mendoza Master cartonero · Mexico City
Palette

The process

From paper to impossible

Paper, paste, volume and paint.

Cartonería is a craft of layers and patience; each creature is built from the inside out, without a mold, with pure paper.

See the stepsExplore the works
Felipe Linares Mendoza, in a green cap, paints a cartonería sphere with a brush.
Felipe Linares Mendoza painting · Still from “Alebrijes: A Linares Family Tradition”, Museum of International Folk Art, 02:55

From paper to creature

How a piece is built

The Linares family works in the Merced Balbuena area, east of downtown Mexico City, near the Sonora market, where the houses are also workshops. Each member has their own. On these tables, jars of paint, brushes, half-dried pieces and finished figures awaiting their recipients live side by side.

The six stations that follow describe the cartonería process as Felipe Linares Mendoza and his sons tell it and as the stills from the programs that have visited the workshop show it, from the 1975 documentary to recent reports. The images document the craft in general: they do not show the continuous making of a single piece. Each still is credited with its program, producer, year and timestamp.

  1. Materials

    Newspaper, manila paper, tissue paper, kraft paper, flour-and-water paste, wire or reed for the frame, brushes and acrylic paints. It all fits on a worktable. The workshop’s rule, as Leonardo Linares Vargas explains it, is that anything that is paper is allowed and anything that is not paper is not: no polystyrene, no plastics, no fabrics, no glass eyes. The material is humble on purpose; the hands supply the extraordinary.

    Jars of colored acrylic paint on the table of Leonardo Linares’s workshop.
    Still from “Leonardo Linares, el heredero de los alebrijes”, Distrito Arte, 00:42

  2. Structure

    Each creature begins as a light frame of reed or wire that fixes the posture and supports whatever protrudes: wings, antlers, claws, tails. It is the most important decision of the piece, although no one sees it afterwards. Monumental pieces carry a tied reed armature, like the Judas figures of Holy Week.

    Two cartoneros assemble the reed armature of a Judas figure in Pedro Linares’s workshop, in 1975.
    Still from “Pedro Linares: Artesano Cartonero”, Judith Bronowski, 1975, 15:50

  3. Volume

    Over the frame, layers of paper are applied with paste. There is no mold: “it is raised with paper, pure paper,” says Felipe Linares Mendoza. Each layer dries before the next, sometimes for days. With the hands and simple tools the snout, eyes and claws are refined until the surface is continuous and, in Felipe’s pieces, polished like a sculpture.

    Layers of newspaper pasted over the armature of a monumental piece.
    Still from “#CreadoresMexicanos: Familia Linares”, El Tizoncito, 05:05

  4. Whitening

    Before painting, the dry piece is covered with a coat of white that unifies the paper and leaves a clean ground for color. It is the task with which the sons began to help: Felipe Linares Vargas remembers his father asking exactly that: “help me whiten, help me decorate”.

    A cartonería figure covered in white, before color, in the workshop.
    Still from “Los originales Alebrijes, familia Linares”, Plus Ultra MX, 03:15

  5. Painting

    Over the white ground, first a base color; then the large fields that distinguish each part of the body; finally, feathers, scales, frets, crests and eyes painted one by one. It is the longest stage and the one that gives each piece its character. It is also where the family recognizes the hand of Felipe Linares Mendoza: meticulous in detail, with a skill of the wrist that his son Leonardo says he has still not surpassed.

    A hand paints the eye of a still-white alebrije with a fine brush, in 1975.
    Still from “Pedro Linares: Artesano Cartonero”, Judith Bronowski, 1975, 11:30

  6. Finished work

    A final varnish fixes the color and gives the surface its shine; according to Leonardo, the workshop prepares its own with a formula of its own. The creature, complete, leaves the workshop with all its extensions intact: nothing is trimmed to fit in a box. A small alebrije takes fifteen to twenty days; a large one, a month or more.

    Winged skeleton on an alebrije, finished and with reins, on a table.
    Photograph provided by the Linares family; photographer to be confirmed

How long does a piece take? Each layer of paper dries before the next, sometimes for days. A small alebrije takes fifteen to twenty days; large pieces need weeks of drying and painting.

In detail

Close-ups of the painting

Crops from photographs of works from the family workshop, without artificial enlargement.

  • Green claws covered in scales painted one by one; ivory nails.
    Scales and nailsGreen claws covered in scales painted one by one; ivory nails.
  • Red bat wings with veins traced in white over the dry paint.
    Wing veinsRed bat wings with veins traced in white over the dry paint.
  • Curved tusks modeled in paper and a long vermilion tongue.
    Tusks and tongueCurved tusks modeled in paper and a long vermilion tongue.
  • Dots of two sizes giving texture to a smooth volume.
    Dots on greenDots of two sizes giving texture to a smooth volume.
  • A bird’s head on a frog’s body; the neck scaled in blue and gold.
    Eye and beakA bird’s head on a frog’s body; the neck scaled in blue and gold.
  • Black rosettes on orange along the whole body.
    Jaguar spotsBlack rosettes on orange along the whole body.
  • The tiger’s tail ends in a yellow-eyed serpent head.
    Serpent tailThe tiger’s tail ends in a yellow-eyed serpent head.
  • A skull with monarch-butterfly wings in orange, black and violet.
    Monarch wingsA skull with monarch-butterfly wings in orange, black and violet.

Workshop photographs

Among jars, brushes and half-dried pieces

The photographs document the craft in general; they do not show the continuous making of a single piece.

  • Felipe Linares Mendoza and Felipe Linares Vargas work at the same workshop table.

    Still from “Alebrijes: A Linares Family Tradition”, Museum of International Folk Art, 05:55

  • A white dragon head held in the hands; Pedro Linares in the background, in 1975.

    Still from “Pedro Linares: Artesano Cartonero”, Judith Bronowski, 1975, 12:10

  • A young man in a red shirt models a cartonería figure in Pedro Linares’s workshop, in 1975.

    A son of Pedro Linares in the workshop; the documentary does not name him and the family has not confirmed his identity · Still from “Pedro Linares: Artesano Cartonero”, Judith Bronowski, 1975, 09:00

  • A cartonería Judas figure in front of the church, before the burning, in 1975.

    Still from “Pedro Linares: Artesano Cartonero”, Judith Bronowski, 1975, 19:00

  • Black-headed, antlered alebrije on the workshop table, with paint jars and brushes behind.

    Felipe Linares Vargas’s workshop · photograph provided by the family

  • Overhead view of the alebrije in the workshop: red wings spread and spotted body.

    Felipe Linares Vargas’s workshop · photograph provided by the family

  • Skeleton with butterfly wings riding an orange creature, in progress among cups and brushes.

    Felipe Linares Vargas’s workshop · photograph provided by the family

  • Side view of the antlered jaguar alebrije: coiled tail, wing and green legs.

    Felipe Linares Vargas’s workshop · photograph provided by the family

  • Catrina with feathered headdress on a red base, surrounded by finished and in-progress pieces.

    Felipe Linares Vargas’s workshop · photograph provided by the family

  • Felipe Linares Vargas looks closely at an alebrije head in progress: grey horns and a mane of orange strips.

    Felipe Linares Vargas with a head in progress · still provided by the family

  • Alebrije with a goat head and striped horns, against the light in the workshop; its shadow falls on the wall.

    Horned alebrije against the light · still provided by the family