July 7, 6:45 PM
Pre-Columbian Society of Washington DC July Lecture
"Evaluating Maya Expansionary and Integrative Strategies: What Can Be Learned from the Copan
Polity's Interactions with Its Non-Maya Neighbors?”
Erlend Johnson, PhD candidate and Dumbarton Oaks Summer Fellow
Maya scholarship on the ancient lowland Maya has tended to develop black-box models describing the Classic period "polity". This presentation attempts to open this black-box in order investigate the dynamic processes by which lowland Maya polities functioned. It focuses on one aspect of Maya statecraft: the integrative strategies employed by Maya rulers as they expanded their polities. The Classic period Maya polity of Copan provides an ideal place to study these processes because of its position at the edge of the Maya world. The Copan polity was surrounded by non-Maya neighbors with distinct cultures and political structures; evidence for both material links and structural transformations instigated by the Copan polity are more visible there than at contemporary sites in the Maya heartland. This presentation examines both the timing and degree of political changes during the Classic period (AD 100-900) in the Cucuyagua and Sensenti valleys located 25 km and 50 km southeast of Copan, respectively. Results from survey and excavation data suggest that a Maya lowland style political hierarchy was adopted in the Cucuyagua valley by the Late Classic period (AD 600-900), suggesting that it was integrated into the Copan polity. Evidence of a fragmentary, heterarchical political system in the Sensenti valley during the Late Classic period suggests that this area remained outside of Copan’s political hegemony.
Erlend Johnson is a doctoral candidate at Tulane University and is affiliated with the Mesoamerican Research Institute. Erlend’s research, which is directed by Marcello Canuto, focuses on the integrative strategies employed by the rulers of Maya polities as they expanded into and absorbed surrounding populations. Research for his dissertation has occurred in the Cucuyagua and Sensenti valleys located southeast of the Classic Maya polity of Copan. Erlend has participated in research projects in the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and Louisiana in addition to current and past research in Honduras. He received an MPhil in Archaeology at the University of Leiden in 2009 and his BA at Kenyon College in 2007. Erlend currently is a Summer Fellow in Pre-Columbian Studies at Dumbarton Oaks.
Sumner School
Lecture Hall, 1st Floor
17th & M Streets, N.W.
Washington DC
MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS
BY STATE AND COUNTRY
ARIZONA
"Hohokam; The Land and the People"
Pueblo Grande Museum
Permanent Exhibit
Phoenix, Arizona
https://www.phoenix.gov/parks/arts-culture-history/pueblo-grande/exhibits/main-gallery
ARKANSAS
"We Walk in Two Worlds"
Historic Arkansas Museum
Permanent Exhibit
Little Rock, Arkansas
tells the story of Arkansas’s first people, the Caddo, Osage and Quapaw Indian tribes from early times to today. The exhibit is told through objects and research. Approximately 158 objects, such as pottery, clothing and weapons, will be on exhibit. The exhibit has six thematic areas that are arranged chronologically. Along with objects and a historical timeline are passages of relevant research from archeologists, historians and ethnographers.
Throughout the exhibit, is the dominant presence of the Native American voice, from each of Arkansas’s three prominent tribes. During the two years of exhibit development, many tribalmembers were interviewed and it is this voice that informs, educates and guides visitors through the exhibit.Historic Arkansas Museum chief curator and deputy director Swannee Bennett said, “What makes this exhibit unique is that it is a story of the Arkansas Native American told in large part with an Indian voice.”
This new permanent exhibit enables the museum to tell the bigger story of Arkansas’s frontier history. “We Walk in Two Worlds is a milestone as the State of Arkansas officially partners with the Caddo, Osage and Quapaw Nations and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian to tell this story of struggle and endurance.” said museum director Bill Worthen.
http://www.historicarkansas.org/exhibits/we-walk-in-two-worlds
CALIFORNIA
May 21, 2016-Ongoing
Los Angeles Museum of Art Exhibit
"Revealing Creation: The Science and Art of Ancient Maya Ceramics"
Drawing on collaborative research by LACMA’s Conservation Center and the Art of the Ancient Americas Program, Revealing Creation: The Science and Art of Ancient Maya Ceramicsintegrates new insight gained from technical analysis of ancient Maya ceramic vessels with knowledge from Maya culture. This exhibition considers ancient Maya ceramic production as both art and science and highlights how artisans worked to emulate acts of primordial creation through their labor of shaping, painting, and firing clay.
The new imaging produced by LACMA’s research reveals vessel composition, pigment chemistry, and modern modifications. Select images are juxtaposed with the objects in the gallery, inviting visitors to view inside these vessels as a way to come closer to the hands—and worlds—of these remarkable artists.
http://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/revealing-creation
“Visible Vault: Archaeological Treasures From Ancient Latin America”
Los Angeles Museum of Natural History
Permanent Exhibit
When the Spanish arrived in the New World during the late 15th century, vibrant Native American civilizations were flourishing throughout North, Central, and South America. Huge empires — the Aztec based in the Valley of Mexico and the Inca from the highlands of Peru — had transformed ancient America and the Andean region into economically powerful nations ruled by massive and efficient governments. We invite you to visit our Visible Vault exhibit to view a selection of unique objects displayed from among a collection of hundreds of other treasures produced by the ancient peoples of the Americas.
To give visitors a better sense of the Museum behind the scenes we’ve displayed the exhibit’s objects in a non-traditional way. For example, artifacts are protected for safekeeping as they would be in our actual storeroom. The exhibit hall also features dim, dramatic lighting so that the artifacts, which are largely ceremonial in nature, can be viewed today as they might have been in the past — within the confines of temples for instance.
http://www.nhm.org/site/explore-exhibits/permanent-exhibits/latin-american-art
"Living Traditions: Arts of the Americas"
The Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Permanent Exhibit
This transformation of the art of the Americas galleries features work from diverse Native American peoples and times, new commissions of Northwest Coast art, and important collections of California, Southwest, and Mesoamerican art.
Stanford campus,
off Palm Drive at Museum Way.
Stanford, CA
http://museum.stanford.edu/view/native_america.html
“First Californians”
Bowers Museum Exhibit
Permanent Exhibit
This new installation showcases the Bowers' extensive permanent collection of Native American art and artifacts in stone, shell, plant fiber (through spectacular basketry) and feathers. These primary resources help tell the story of the culture of Native Californians. Although groups from all regions of California are represented in the
The Bowers Museum of Cultural Art
2002 North Main Street
Santa Ana, California
http://www.bowers.org/index.php/exhibitions/current-exhibitions/154-first-californians
“Pre-Columbian Art”
Bowers Museum Exhibit
Permanent Exhibit
Arts from the sophisticated Pre-Columbian cultures of Mexico and Central America are highlighted in a series of galleries.
Pre-Columbian art from Mexico and Central America displayed in a series of galleries communicates the power and sophistication of the cultures that rose and fell in ancient America. Emphasis is placed on the ceramic and stone arts of West Mexico, Costa Rica and Panamá. A gallery devoted to the famous "Limestone Tomb of Lord Pacal" includes a lifesize reproduction of the elaborately decorated and highly symbolic limestone sarcophagus excavated at the pyramid in the Mayan City of Palenque in Chiapas, Mexico. Other works of art from the ancient Mayan civilization complete the exhibit.
The Bowers Museum of Cultural Art
2002 North Main Street
Santa Ana, California
http://www.bowers.org/index.php/exhibitions/current-exhibitions/152-pre-columbian-exhibits
GEORGIA
September 10, 2016 – Sunday, August 26, 2018
Michael C. Carlos Museum Exhibit
Coiling Culture: Basketry Art of Native North America
Baskets were one of the first art forms in the Americas, with basket fragments found in California and the Southwest dating to 9,400 years ago. Over the millennia, native North Americans developed elaborate techniques and intricate designs worked in local materials, from sweetgrass in Florida to black ash in the Northeast and deer grass in California, among many others. These materials were sacred to their makers and those who used these special containers. So too was the way each was made with coiling, especially poignant, symbolizing for many groups the path of human emergence from inside earth and the movement of the spirits between realms. This exhibition explores the intersection between material, making, and meaning in the fragile basketry art of the Southeast to the Southwest and up into the Arctic.
Michael C. Carlos Museum of Emory University
571 South Kilgo Circle
Atlanta, Georgia
http://www.carlos.emory.edu/visit/calendar
ILLINOIS
"The Ancient Americas"
Field Museum, Chicago
Permanent Exhibit
The Field Museum's innovative new exhibition, is an exploration of the challenges that human beings everywhere have faced for millennia. It tells the epic story of human life on the American continents, from the arrival of small
groups of hunter- gatherers, whose way of life survived into the 20th century, to the great but fragile empires of the Aztecs and the Incas - empires that stretched thousands of miles, encompassed as many as 10 million people, and came to sudden, brutal ends. Seven listening posts inside the exhibition offer gallery overviews in Spanish. All exhibition videos are subtitled in Spanish, and a Spanish language gallery guide is also available.
These stories of The Ancient Americas are told through captivating displays and activities, with something for visitors of all ages and all levels of interest. Visitors will step into the world of Ice-Age mammoth hunters - Chicago circa 11,000 B.C. They'll walk through a recreation of an 800-year-old pueblo dwelling, survey the monumental earthworks of mound- building peoples, and explore the great cities of Tenochtitlan and Cuzco, capitals of the Aztec and Inca empires. They'll make new discoveries at interactive maps, dioramas, and computer activities, and watch animated videos created specially for this exhibition. They'll follow the Museum's own archaeologists at work in the field, and have opportunities to begin more intensive investigations of their own.
And the artifacts! The Ancient Americas is built on the Field Museum's unsurpassed archaeological collections. Thousands of objects from these collections bring depth and beauty to the stories of the people who made them, and allow visitors to see for themselves the evidence on which our knowledge of the ancient Americans is based. On display are more than 200 ceramic vessels from the Museum's world-famous Peruvian collections; hundreds of luxury and spiritual items from our comprehensive Hopewell collection; 200 of the scarce gold objects left after conquistadors raided
Colombia of its treasures, and much more.
The Field Museum
Chicago, Illinois
http://www.fieldmuseum.org/at-the-field/exhibitions/ancient-americas
LOUISIANA
Opened April 26
Tulane University Middle American Research Institute Maya Exhibit
"Faces of the Maya: Profiles in Continuity and Resilience"
Inaugural exhibit of the renovated Middle American Research Institute that celebrates the development of the Maya civilization from its beginngings in 1000 BC to the present.
Displaying objects from MARI's collection that have never been seen before, this exhibit attempts to dispel erroneous notions of the Maya civilization that have recently gained currency due to the "2012 frenzy."
(More information to be provided soon)
Tulane
http://mari.tulane.edu/exhibits.html
NEW MEXICO
"Ancient Art of the Americas"
Museo de las Americas
Permanent Exhibit
Santa Fe, New Mexico
http://museo.org/view-art/our-collection/
October 23, 2010–October 25, 2020
"Infinity of Nations: Art and History in the Collections of the National Museum of the American Indian"
George Gustav Heye Center, New York
"Infinity of Nations," opening Saturday, features 700 objects from South, Central and North America from ancient to modern times at the National Museum of the American Indian, New York.
Its hemispheric approach "brings together the depth and range of Native American culture and history," said Philip Deloria, a Native American historian who teaches at the University of Michigan.
Contemporary nations often "set the parameters for thinking about indigenous people and so we often miss the richness, the connections, the overlaps and the distinctions among these people," added Deloria, who wrote the introduction to the exhibition's companion book.
The museum worked with 60 native historians and leaders to interpret many of the objects, which were selected for their aesthetic, cultural and historic importance.
The introductory wall panel tells visitors that "far from a vast and empty wilderness, by 1492 the Americas were home to societies ranging from loose federations of small hunting, fishing and farming villages to empires administered from great cities."
http://nmai.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/item/?id=901
NEW YORK
October 23, 2010–October 25, 2020
"Infinity of Nations: Art and History in the Collections of the National Museum of the American Indian"
George Gustav Heye Center, New York
"Infinity of Nations," opening Saturday, features 700 objects from South, Central and North America from ancient to modern times at the National Museum of the American Indian, New York.
Its hemispheric approach "brings together the depth and range of Native American culture and history," said Philip Deloria, a Native American historian who teaches at the University of Michigan.
Contemporary nations often "set the parameters for thinking about indigenous people and so we often miss the richness, the connections, the overlaps and the distinctions among these people," added Deloria, who wrote the introduction to the exhibition's companion book.
The museum worked with 60 native historians and leaders to interpret many of the objects, which were selected for their aesthetic, cultural and historic importance.
The introductory wall panel tells visitors that "far from a vast and empty wilderness, by 1492 the Americas were home to societies ranging from loose federations of small hunting, fishing and farming villages to empires administered from great cities."
http://nmai.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/item/?id=901
OHIO
“Following in Ancient Footsteps”
Ohio Historical Center, Columbus, Ohio
Permanent Exhibit
This exhibit invites the visitor to explore over 15,000 years of Ohio’s ancient Native American heritage. At the entry, a widescreen monitor introduces the exhibit with two informational programs. Some of the Society’s most significant archaeological artifacts, such as the Adena Pipe, the mica hand, and the Wray figurine, as well as many animal effigy pipes from Tremper Mound are centrally featured in tower cases. Fiber optic lighting enhances visitors’ almost 360- degree view of these, and other, unique and beautiful artifacts. Visitors can open multiple artifact drawers to see what the ancient people used on a daily basis, as well as for special purposes. Those interested in a more thorough examination of the objects can move to nearby computer stations, where they can locate information on specific items in the online catalog. Here they can also find additional information on Ohio’s ancient cultures by visiting the OHS Archaeology blog and touring the First Ohioans on-line exhibit.
http://www.ohiohistory.org/exhibits/ohio-history-center-exhibits/following-in-ancient-footsteps
OKLAHOMA
June 26-November 6, 2016
Gilcrease Museum Exhibit; Tulsa, Oklahoma
"West Mexico: Ritual and Identity"
"West Mexico: Ritual and Identity”, organized by Gilcrease Museum, will feature a spectacular selection of ceramic figures and vessels from the Gilcrease collection, augmented by items from public and private collections.
Better known today as a sunny vacation destination and the home of tequila, West Mexico’s past is a fascinating story that dates back more than 2,000 years, around the time that Teotihuacán (near present day Mexico City) was emerging as the most important city in the Americas. Due to its sizable population, stature as a religious center and apartment-style dwellings, this city was a cultural center in its day. Meanwhile, another vibrant society, the Teuchitlán (commonly known by social scientists as the “Shaft Tomb” culture), was developing between Guadalajara and the west coast of Mexico in what is now Nayarit and Jalisco. This land of mild climate offered abundant fresh water, rich soils, mineral wealth and access to the resources of the ocean and the mountains.
Large, expressive ceramic figures frequently were part of the ritual items deposited in shaft tombs. Ceramic human figures adorned with brightly colored clothing, tattoos and body paint provide an intimate look at men and women of the culture, along with a variety of animals, birds, fish and reptiles. In the 1940s and ’50s, Thomas Gilcrease amassed a collection of more than 500 ceramic figures and vessels from West Mexico, including two significant human figures, each more than 30 inches in height, and among the finest figures from the region.
This exhibit will examine and interpret the art and artifacts of the shaft tomb culture that flourished in West Mexico 300 BC-500 AD, bringing together the most current research from the field, scientific laboratories and objects to re-create life, death and ritual.
With large scale murals of these settlements complementing the objects on display, the exhibition will examine the various forms of sculpted vessels, paying particular attention to the human forms, which tell a rich story of a culture predating the more widely known Aztecs, but equally as fascinating and arguably more influential.
https://gilcrease.org/exhibitions/westmexico/
TENNESSEE
"Archaeology and the Native Peoples of Tennessee"
McClung Museum
Permanent Exhibit
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, Tenn.
http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/exhibits/native-tennessee/
TEXAS
Houston Museum of Fine Arts Museum Exhibit
“Arts of Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean”
Permanent Exhibit
Works of art from Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean range from ancient cultures to cutting-edge artists of today. Among the highlights are the Glassell Collection of Pre-Columbian Gold and the museum’s growing collection of modern and contemporary art by Latin American and Latino artists.
Museum of Fine Arts Museum
Houston, Texas
http://www.mfah.org/art/collections/arts-of-mexico-central-south-america-caribbean/
"The Glassell Collection of Pre-Columbian Gold"
Houston Museum of Fine Arts
Permanent Exhibit
The Glassell Collection of Pre-Colombian Gold, gift of Alfred C. Glassell, Jr. The peoples of ancient America valued gold for its spiritual power rather than for its worth. Gold was believed to be the flesh of the gods and to possess the energy of the sun.
This rare collection of Pre-Columbian gold, donated by Alfred C. Glassell, Jr., Chairman Emeritus and Life Trustee of the MFAH, includes gold objects that were created as personal ornaments to adorn the face and body, as well as ritual objects, like drinking cups for ceremonies and masks for burials.
http://www.mfah.org/art/collections/Glassell-Gold-Collections/
WASHINGTON DC
June 26, 2015–June 1, 2018
Museum of the American Indian Exhibit, Washington DC
“The Great Inca Road"
Construction of the Inka Road stands as one of the monumental engineering achievements in history. A network more than 20,000 miles long, crossing mountains and tropical lowlands, rivers and deserts, the Great Inka Road linked Cusco, the administrative capital and spiritual center of the Inka world, to the farthest reaches of its empire. The road continues to serve contemporary Andean communities across Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile as a sacred space and symbol of cultural continuity. In 2014, the United Nations cultural agency, UNESCO, recognized the Inka Road as a World Heritage site.
The Great Inka Road: Engineering an Empire explores the foundations of the Inka Road in earlier Andean cultures, technologies that made building the road possible, the cosmology and political organization of the Inka world, and the legacy of the Inka Empire during the colonial period and in the present day.
The Inka Road project is organized by the National Museum of the American Indian and is made possible by federal support from the Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the Smithsonian Latino Center, and internal Smithsonian Institution funds from the Consortium for World Cultures. Generous support for the exhibition is provided by the National Council of the National Museum of the American Indian and the ESA Foundation.
http://nmai.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/item/?id=945
FRANCE
November 16, 2016-January 29, 2017
Musée du quai Branly Exhibition, Paris, France
"Feathers, Visions of the Pre-Colombian America"
From the beginning of the evangelization of Mexico, the religious have reused the art of Aztec feather workers to produce unique artworks that remain one of the symbols of New Spain. Amongst all the treasures and wealths brought back from Mexico, feather works certainly were the most appreciated items in Europe. This exhibition will consist of two parts : the first section will be dedicated to pre-Columbian feather works and to the importance of this material in mesoamerican cosmogony. The second space will feature the 6 scene mad of feathers kept in France, reunited for the first time. The installation will also describe the techniques used and the sometimes puzzling representations of the Americas in Europe. Finally, the exhibition will end on a more contemporary note with some artworks of the feather worker Nelly Saunier.
FRANCE
"Precolumbian Gold"
November 16, 2016-January 29, 2017
Musée du quai Branly Exhibition, Paris, France
"Feathers, Visions of the Pre-Colombian America"
From the beginning of the evangelization of Mexico, the religious have reused the art of Aztec feather workers to produce unique artworks that remain one of the symbols of New Spain. Amongst all the treasures and wealths brought back from Mexico, feather works certainly were the most appreciated items in Europe. This exhibition will consist of two parts : the first section will be dedicated to pre-Columbian feather works and to the importance of this material in mesoamerican cosmogony. The second space will feature the 6 scene mad of feathers kept in France, reunited for the first time. The installation will also describe the techniques used and the sometimes puzzling representations of the Americas in Europe. Finally, the exhibition will end on a more contemporary note with some artworks of the feather worker Nelly Saunier.
GERMANY
"Precolumbian Gold"
The Fabergé Museum in Baden-Baden, Germany
Permanent Exhibit
The Fabergé Museum opened a special exhibition of his collection of gold objects from Central and South America pre-Columbian times.
We provide the unique gold objects from different American cultures of the Incas, Mayans and Aztecs from the period of 400 years before Christ until the time of the conquest of America by the Conquest in 1500.
Besides 45 gold artefacts, we present 44 objects from semiprecious stones - jade and nephrite.
http://www.faberge-museum.de/show.php?news&nid=31
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