Poet and sculptor · 1737-1819
Poet and sculptor
María Joaquina Viera y Clavijo was born in Puerto de la Cruz on 27 March 1737. She died in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria on 25 September 1819. A poet and sculptor, she is considered one of the earliest women authors of Canarian letters because of the scope, variety and reach of her verse.
She grew up in a well-off family and was able to receive an education unusual for women of her period. In La Laguna she cared for her parents and took part in an enlightened environment close to her brother José de Viera y Clavijo. From 1784 she lived in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, where she accompanied her siblings and remained until her death.
Her poetry deals with religious, customary, historical and political subjects. She also wrote satirical and socially critical verse, including Vejamen a las presumidas modistas, and composed texts for specific occasions and circulation among friends. She did not publish a book during her lifetime: her poems survived in family papers and manuscript copies, and the 2003 edition Poesía brought together a substantial part of the corpus.
Besides writing, she learned sculpture from José Rodríguez de la Oliva and worked in his workshop. Sources document this practice, but no surviving sculptures can now be attributed to her with certainty. This material limit does not lessen the interest of artistic activity exceptional for a Canarian woman of the 18th century, in dialogue with her verse and the enlightened circles of Tenerife and Gran Canaria.
