04/15/2026
A reinterpretation of the coat of arms of the Solar de las Calderas de Pinillos.
The original emblem once stood above the entrance of the Casa de las Calderas in Pinillos, in La Rioja. Today, that same stone survives in a house in Torrecilla de Cameros — a quiet displacement of memory across time and landscape.
The lineage of this house is traditionally linked to the Solar de Tejada, one of the oldest known lineages in Spain. It is said to descend from Martín Sáenz de Tejada, one of the thirteen sons of Sancho Fernández de Tejada. From this lineage emerged different branches, among them the one that would establish the Casa de las Calderas.
In time, this lineage reached Peru through Juan José and Juan Alejo Martínez de Pinillos. Juan José was the father of Natividad Martínez de Pinillos de Eléspuru, my fourth great-grandmother.
Over generations, the Calderas of Pinillos became part of the rural nobility of La Rioja, their identity shaped not only by land and lineage, but also by symbols — like the calderas themselves — carrying memory across centuries.
This piece is not a reconstruction, but a reinterpretation. A way of bringing that ancestral image into the present, allowing it to exist again not as a fixed relic, but as something living.
It emerged during one of those quiet afternoons of drawing, shared in the company of my friend, artist Yulia Katkova
genealogy
