Calafia - Legacy

Legacy

Spanish novelist Vicente Blasco Ibáñez wrote a book entitled La reina Calafia (Queen Calafia) in 1924. A 1926 portrayal of Queen Calafia and her Amazons is found in a mural in the Room of the Dons at the Mark Hopkins Hotel in San Francisco. It was created for the opening of the hotel in 1926 by Maynard Dixon and Frank Von Sloun, and has been called "the first embodiment of Queen Califia" though criticized as showing her "haughty and aloof". In 1937, Lucille Lloyd unveiled her triptych mural "Origin and Development of the Name of the State of California", also known as "California Allegory", which was displayed at the State Building in Los Angeles until 1975 when the building was demolished for safety reasons. The paintings were archived, and in 1991 they were restored and mounted in the California Room of the state capitol, room 4203, renamed the John L. Burton Hearing Room. The regal central figure shows Califia dressed in proto-Mexican finery, holding a spear in her left hand and examining a gyroscope in her right.

In November 1975, the Plaza de Toros Calafia was completed, a bullfighting arena in the city of Mexicali, the capital of the Mexican state of Baja California. The arena is also known as la reina Calafia (Queen Calafia). At an outdoor park in Escondido, California, the sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle built her multiple-piece "Queen Califias Magic Circle", dedicated in October 2003 after her death. The central character of Queen Califia is presented wearing gold glass armor atop a stylized giant bird. The final work on the sculpture garden was overseen by de Saint Phalle's granddaughter and by her assistants and technical advisers.

In 2004, the African American Historical and Cultural Society Museum in San Francisco assembled a Queen Califia exhibit, curated by John William Templeton, featuring works by artists such as TheArthur Wright and James Gayles; artistic interpretations of Calafia. The show displayed a 1936 treatment of Lucille Lloyd's "California Allegory" triptych, with Queen Califia as the central figure. Templeton said that "Califia is a part of California history, and she also reinforces the fact that when Cortes named this place California, he had 300 black people with him." Templeton pointed out that Columbus had a black navigator and that Africans were seen by Europeans as being culturally advanced in the 1400s. William E. Hoskins, director of the museum, said that very few people know the story of Queen Califia. He said, "One of the things we're trying to do is let people have the additional insight and appreciation for the contributions of African Americans to this wonderful country and more specifically to the state of California", adding that "the Queen Califia exhibit is particularly poignant."