Gardner’s Art Through the Ages, 12e

Chapter 14From Alaska to the Andes:

Native Arts of the Americas Before 1300

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The Americas

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Mesoamerica

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Andean Region of South America

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North America 5

Figure 14-1 Colossal head, Olmec, La Venta, Mexico, 900–400 BCE. Basalt, 9’4” high. Museo-Parque La Venta, Villahermosa.

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This is one out of four basalt heads. Each weighs about 10 tons and stands about 6 to 10 feet high. The identities are uncertain, but the features and headgear suggest that it is a ruler and not a deity. The size of the heads and expression evoke great power.

Figure 14-2 Ceremonial ax in the form of a jaguar-human, Olmec, from La Venta, Mexico, 900–400 BCE. Jade, 11 1/2” high. British Museum, London.

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Carved in jade because jade was prized by the Mesoamerican people. Many times the jade was carved into ax-shaped polished called celts which was buried as votive offerings. Subjects that were included were crying babies and figures combining human and animal features and postures. The human-animal representations refer that religious practitioners underwent dangerous transformation for the good of the community.

Figure 14-3 Seated figure with raised arms, from Colima, Mexico, ca. 200 BCE–250 CE. Clay with orange and red slip, 1’ 1” high. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles.

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West Mexico is best known for its tradition of clay sculptures. The sculptures are in tombs consisting of shafts as deep as 50 feet. These sculptures give glimpses of what daily life may have been. Scholars are unsure if this figure is a religious practitioner with a horn on his forehead or a political leader wearing a shell ornament, or a person doing both roles.

Figure 14-4 Aerial view of Teotihuacán (from the north), Valley of Mexico, Mexico. Pyramid of the Moon (foreground), Pyramid of the Sun (top left), and the Citadel (background), all connected by the Avenue of the Dead; main structures ca. 50–200 CE; site ca. 100 BCE–750 CE.

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A large, densely populated metropolis built for Mesoamerica. The major monuments were constructed between 50 and 250 CE. It covers 9 square miles and is laid out in a grid pattern. The Aztecs gave the name to Teotihuacán which means “the place of the gods”. Some of the hieroglyphics still remained undeciphered and the language spoken remains unknown. The main north-south axis is called the Avenue of the Dead and connects with Pyramid of the Moon complex with the Citadel and its Temple of Quetzalcoatl. The imposing mass and scale of the monumental structures surpass all other Mesoamerican sites. The Pyramid of the Sun may have been constructed to honor a sacred spring within the now-dry cave. The Pyramid of the Moon was rebuilt at least five times in their early history.

Figure 14-5 Detail of Temple of Quetzalcóatl, the Citadel, Teotihuacán, Valley of Mexico, Mexico, third century CE.

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At the South end of the citadel, it encloses a small pyramidal shrine to Quetzalcoatl, “feathered serpent”. Underneath a tomb was found which was looted with antiquity, possibly the tomb of a ruler. Surrounding everything are remnants of sacrificial victims. This is the first unambiguous representation of the feathered serpent in Mesoamerica. There must have been contact with the Mexican coasts for the representation of water.

Figure 14-8 Ballcourt (view looking north), Middle Plaza, Copán, Maya, Copán Valley, Honduras, 738 CE.

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The Mesoamerican Ball Game began at least 3,400 years ago and the Olmec were avid players. An I- or T-shaped in plan, flanked by two parallel sloping or straight walls, sometimes wide enough to support small structures on top. Most ball courts were adjacent to the important civic structures of Mesoamerican cities. It was also a competitive spectator sport, not only for entertainment. The ball game and aftermath were a metaphor for the cycle of life, death, and regeneration.

Figure 14-9 Temple I (Temple of the Giant Jaguar), Maya, Tikal, Petén, Guatemala, ca. 732 CE.

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The larger pyramid, Temple I (Temple of the Giant Jaguar), is one of the two monuments in the Great Plaza of Tikal. It is about 150 feet tall and it is a temple-mausoleum of a great Tikal ruler, Hasaw Chan K’awil. It is made up of nine sharply inclining platforms, a reference to the nine levels of the Underworld. The temple has a sculpted roof comb, a vertical architectural projection that once bore the ruler’s giant portrait modeled in stucco.

Figure 14-10 Ballplayer, Maya, from Jaina Island, Mexico, 700–900 CE. Painted clay, 6 1/4” high. National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City.

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Ball players can either be women weaving, older men, dwarves, supernatural beings, amorous couples, and attired rulers and warriors. Hollow figures were also used as whistles. The Maya used “Maya blue” because it has been proven to be basically indestructible. The figures were made to accompany the dead on their journey to the Underworld.

Figure 14-11 Presentation of captives to Lord Chan Muwan, Maya, Room 2, Structure 1, Bonampak, Mexico, ca. 790 CE. Mural, approx. 17’ X 15’; watercolor copy by Antonio Tejeda. Peabody Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge.

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This is an image, from the Bonampak painters, of warriors surrounding captives on a terraced platform. The figures are naturalistic, overlap, twist, and turn. The technique to paint the walls is a cross between fresco and tempera. There is extreme detail that record events. This scene depicts the presentation of prisoners to Lord Chan Muwan. There are three main zones, an upper, middle, and lower.

Figure 14-12 Shield Jaguar and Lady Xoc, Maya, Lintel 24, Temple 23, Yaxchilán, Mexico, ca. 725 CE. Limestone, 3’ 7” X 2’ 6 1/2”. British Museum, London.

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This depicts the ruler Itzamna Balam II and his principle wife Lady Xoc. Lady Xoc is outfitted in elaborate garments, headdress, and jewels. She is piercing her tongue in the celebration of the birth of a son to one of the ruler’s other wives. Also, during these ceremonies they were intended to produce hallucinations. Shield Jaguar provides illumination with a blazing torch.

Figure 14-13 Enthroned Maya lord and courtiers, cylinder vase (rollout view), Maya, from Motul de San José region, Guatemala, 672–830 CE. Ceramic with red, rose, orange, white, and black on cream slip, approx. 8” high. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collections, Washington, D.C.

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This is a rollout view of a typical vase design showing a scene where an enthroned lord sits surrounded by by courtiers and attendants. Gestures and talk are incorporated in the scene. The red frame suggests an architectural setting to provide a glimpse of the event through the open doorways of the palace. The hieroglyphics describe the vessel and names of the artists, which were all male. These vases may have been used for drinking and for food for noble Mayan, but ultimately went to the tomb to travel with the dead to the Underworld. They were most likely commissioned by the deceased before he died or by survivors that sent it as a funerary offering.

Figure 14-14 The Caracol (foreground) and the Castillo (background), Maya, Chichén Itzá, Yucatán, Mexico, ca. 800–900 CE.

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A cylindrical tower that rests on a broad terrace. The building recalls the cross-section of a conch shell which was an attributed of the feathered serpent. The windows were probably used for astronomical observation which gives this building its second name the Observatory.

Figure 14-14 The Castillo Overall view

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The Castillo is a temple dedicated to Kukulkan as the signature form of sacred architecture throughout Mesoamerica.

Figure 14-18 Raimondi Stele, Chavín, from main temple, Chavín de Huántar, Peru, first millennium BCE. Incised green diorite, 6’ high. Instituto Nacional de Cultura, Lima, Peru.

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The stele represents a figure called the “staff god.” His headdress is the upper two-thirds of the slab which means there is very elaborate design of the headdress and all the jewels. When upside down, the god’s face turns into two faces which is a core aspect of Andean Religion. This Chavin iconography spread throughout the Andean region in forms of gold work, textiles, and ceramics. Many of the ceramic vessels that were found on the north coast of Peru had similar motifs to those found on Chavin stone carvings.

Figure 14-19 Embroidered funerary mantle, Paracas, from southern coast of Peru, first century CE. Plain weave camelid fiber with stem-stitch embroidery embroidered with camelid wool, 4’ 7 7/8” X 7’ 10 7/8”. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (William A. Paine Fund).

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This textile was used to wrap the bodies of the dead in multiple layers and the dry climate preserved these textiles. The figure on this textile has prominent eyes, flowing hair, and has an airy, hovering movement. The floating beings are either holding batons and fans or knives and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Although the figure is repeated throughout each textile, there is noticeable variation such as position.

Figure 14-21 Hummingbird, Nasca Plain, Nasca, Peru, ca. 500 CE. Dark layer of pebbles scraped aside to reveal lighter clay and calcite beneath; 27’ wide, 200’ wingspan, and 459’ length.

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A hummingbird, several hundred feet long, on the Nasca Plain is just one of the three dozen images of birds, fish, and plants. The Nasca Lines were produced when the artists selectively removed the dark top layer of stone to expose the clay and calcite underneath. There are many different theories of why these lines were created such as marking pilgrimage routes or as a traversable map. These lines also seemed to be associated with water supply and irrigation.

Figure 14-22 Vessel in the shape of a portrait head, Moche, from north coast Peru, fifth to sixth century CE. Painted clay, 12 1/2” high. Museu Arqueológico Rafael Larco Herrera, Lima.

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The painted clay vessel of the Moche illustrate architecture, metallurgy, weaving, the brewing of chicha, human deformities and diseases, and sexual acts. Usually flat-bottomed stirrup-spouted jars, decorated with a bichrome slip. This is a portrait vessel portraying possibly a warrior, ruler, or a royal retainer whose image was buried to accompany his dead master. The vessel portrait is very realistic of the physiognomy.

Figure 14-23 Ear ornament, from a tomb at Sipán, Moche, Peru, ca. 300 CE. Gold and turquoise, approx. 4 4/5”. Bruning Archeological Museum, Lambayeque.

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Found in a Sipán tomb, this ear ornament shows a warrior priest clad like the Lord of Sipán. Surrounding him are what appear to be two retainers. Very frontal, he carries a war club, a shield, and wears a necklace of owl-head beads. The helmet is a replica to the one buried with the Sipán lord and the war club and shield match the finds in the Warrior Priest’s tomb.

Figure 14-24 Gateway of the Sun, Tiwanaku, Bolivia, ca. 375–700 CE. Stone, 9’ 10” high.

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Tiwanaku was an important ceremonial center and there were grand buildings created by using sandstone, andesite, and diorite. The gate has a relief sculpture on the top. The central figure is a version of the Chavin staff god dominating all the other figures. With rays projecting from his head, he is possibly a sky and weather deity rather than a sun deity. Sky and earth beings converge on the gate which was used as the doorway to a sacred area. The reliefs were at one time painted, the figures eyes were inlaid with turquoise, and the surface was covered with gold.

Figure 14-25 Lima Tapestry (tunic), Wari, from Peru, ca. 500–800 CE. 3’ 3 3/8” x 2’ 11 3/8”. National Museum of Archeology, Anthropology, and History of Peru, Lima.

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Wari designs were woven directly into the fabric, creating a technique known as tapestry. The weft threads were packed densely over warp threads with more than 200 weft threads per inch. The figures here are unrecognizable because of being so closely connected and abstract. In this tunic, each figures in compressed or expanded in a different way ad are placed in vertical rows. Tunics such as these were probably used as prestige garments for the elite.

Figure 14-27 Pipe, Adena, from a mound in Ohio, ca. 500–1 BCE. Stone, 8” high. Ohio Historical Society, Columbus.

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From the Adena culture of Ohio, a pipe is created in the shape of a man. The pipe is related in form and dress as to some of the Mesoamerican sculptures. Usually the Adena would bury their elite in earthen mounds and would most likely place a pipe like this one in the graves. Smoking was an important social and religious ritual and the pipes were treasured status symbols. The naturalistic features and an alert facial expression combine to suggest movement in the figure.

Figure 14-28 Serpent Mound, Mississippian, Ohio, ca. 1070 CE. 1200’ long, 20’ wide, 5’ high.

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The Mississippian Adenas constructed effigy mounds in the shapes of animals or birds. Measuring nearly a quarter mile, this Serpent Mound causes much controversy. Serpent Mound contained no evidence of any burial or temple sites, yet serpents were important in Mississippian iconography. Snakes were associated with the earth and fertility of crops, yet another meaning for Serpent Mound was proposed recently. It is believed that it may have been constructed to record the occurrence of Hailey’s Comet in 1066.

Figure 14-29 Incised shell gorget, Mississippian, from Sumner County, Tennessee, ca. 1250–1300 CE. 4” wide. Museum of the American Indian, New York.

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The shell gorget, a neck pendant, was a popular item in Mississippian culture and this one depicts a running warrior. Wearing an elaborate headdress, he carries a mace and a severed human head in this hands. These gorgets were mostly found in burial and temple mounds and were gifts to the dead.

Figure 14-30 Bowl with two cranes and geometric forms, Mimbres, from New Mexico, ca. 1250 CE. Ceramic, black-on-white, diameter approx. 1’ 1/2”. Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago (Hugh L. and Mary T. Adams Fund).

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The Mimbres were known for their black-on-white ceramic painted bowls. The abstract border design and the birds create a dynamic tension. The designs emphasize linear rhythms within a clearly defined border. The artists used the coiling method since the potter’s wheel had not been introduced yet. There are some beliefs that the potters may have been women. Usually these bowls were used by piercing a hole in the bottom to let the spirits of the deceased join their ancestors in the sky.

Figure 14-31 Cliff Palace, Anasazi, Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado, ca. 1150–1300 CE.

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Wedged into a sheltered ledge above the valley floor, the Anasazi moved up here during a drought. With almost 200 rectangular rooms, the community was made of mostly carefully laid stone and timber. The Anasazi chose this place to take advantage of the sun heat in the winter and the shade during the summer. The two dozen large circular semi subterranean structures, kivas, were chambers that were the spiritual centers of Native Southwest life, male council houses, and where private rituals and preparation for public ceremonies take place.

Figure 14-31 Alternate View Closer view of palace complex

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