A contemporary of thinkers such as the poetess Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, the writer and scientist Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora, and the also famous painter Cristóbal de Villalpando, Juan Correa was born into a founding era in  
the history of vice-royal Mexico, in which the presence of Africans and their interbreeding with other groups notably increased; an era, in short, in which the social and economic dynamics were complex.