Juan Patricio Morlete Ruiz (San Miguel de Allende, 1713–1770, Mexico City) was an 18th-century Mexican painter, a mestizo according to the system of racial classification. He is most well known for his casta paintings.
Born in 1713 in San Miguel de Allende, he was a contemporary of Miguel Cabrera. Both artists were important to Casta painting and are accredited with many iconic elements of Casta painting that influenced the genre for decades after them. Like many artists in Colonial New Spain, he was a member of painting academy that was established in the mid-eighteenth century. This status gave Morlete a place among the Spanish elite in Mexico. It is evident from documents at the time that both the Viceroy Carlos Francisco De Croix and Viceroy Antonio María de Bucareli y Ursúa commissioned work from him.
