8.1 Embroidered Mantle, 200BCE- 200 CE, Paracas culture, Peru.

o   Use supplementary weft technique. (put in more horizontal rows creating embroidery) makes really intense colored areas and details.

o   Use up to 19 different colors

o   Dark blues, reds

o   Red is normally cochineal.

o   Blue is from Hematite. (pain to find)

o   9 ft long textiles, a lot of labor & economics going

o   Mainly humans on textiles in ceremonial garb, or shamanic religious complex

o   The ecstatic Shaman is on this textile. His head is all the way back, this is a trope in Indian art. (human / Auto Sacrifice) rib bones showing to prepare for ceremonial. Fasting, etc. transitioning again between life and death. (instead of dying, shamans go on these trips)

o   Colors done mathematically so that each figure is different. Not one figure is the same.

o   Borders really big to represent the outside edge (complimentary opposites again)

All other figures… all ceremonial or ritual.

Trying to get away from the self-patterning of teztiles, using supplementary wefts to create rounds to get awa from geometric.

The paracas' artwork= always detailed, definitive lines, time-consuming.

Favorite vessel shape.

Textiles most important medium, REMEMBER>

o   Making them through upright loom.

o   Textiles do self-patterning.

o   Warp- vertical, weft is horizontal.

8.2 Raimondi Stela, 460-300 BCE, Chavin de Huantar, Peru.

7 ft tall. Raimondi Stela = guy who found it

Staff God (frontal figure, holding staff on either side), Jaguar/human, headdress is huge, visual pun 9if we flip it, his headdress is a row of crocodile heads)

Stela- stone with relief of stone in it

Rectangular or vertical, taken from greek

Talked about as the primary Chavin image (how they conceive the world)

Animals from this area AND animals from the coast, mountains, tropics, and rainforest (always looking at all different areas, but STILL predators and carnivores)

represent this world and the next

Textiles is the most important medium in Andes because its thought that the world is woven together (but also goes away immediately because of difficulty of preservation

8.4 Moche Portrait head vessel, c. 400-500CE, Moche culture, Peru

-teracotta with paint

-mass production with organization of labor

-portrait vessels: only elite males (the earrings)

-idealized portrait

8.8 Gateway of the sun, Tiahuanaco culture, c.500CE, Bolivia

-human/ birds/ stuff god

-single piece of stone

-combination of animals: jaguar and human

-mask and holding a abrilado(spirit thrower)

-formal and stand still, no suggestions of movement

8.12o   View of Machu Picchu, with Huayna Picchu in the background, c. 1500, Inka culture, Peru.

§  Means old mountain

§  Huayna Picchu means new mountain.

§  Built by Pakiuchi.

§  conquers Urobomba/ sacred area and valley

§  Terraced the entire side of the mountain, so that you can plant and have agriculture on.

§  Starts its fame in 1912.

§  Nobody lived here year round except about a dozen who maintained the cite. It was like a royal retreat or Inca Camp David.

§  In area to the east of Andes.

§  Far away from civilization

§  Places engineering features.

§  Living areas and storing houses on the side.

§  Inka terracing (did not invent it, but do it the best)

§  They preserve the food by freeze-drying

§  Didn’t build, but worked with what was already there.

§  Condor Stone is    Shaped like a condor (a big bird), any  thing that can fl can go between worlds.

§  Sacred Stone Mimmicks shape of he mountain behind  (natural outcropping, representing spirit of an Apu (mountan God)

·         Earth (panchu mama) mother. Live n mountain.

·         Each mountan was said to have its own spirit.

·         These are all over the Andes.

·         This would be a Maka.

§  Also using curved walls

·         To denote sacred space.

·         Negative space underneath.

·         Work in a small areas.

·         Curved because of the natural outcropping.

·         Light hits aparts and it becomes a calendar.

§  Sheer drops on side of mountain

§  Pacareevtombo

·         Cave area recreated, closed off for worship to enter into other world.

§  Intihuatana

·         Calendar, sun hits, shadows to tell the time of year and day

·         Also seat for Inka

·         Also place to put mummy bundles
·         Kajamarca

o   Where the emperor was put when he was captured.

o   City.

Pre-Columbian- art of the Americas before the West invades (before Columbian), term that we are defining with western term

Chavin de Huantar, Peru.

7 ft tall. Raimondi Stela = guy who found it

Staff God (frontal figure, holding staff on either side), Jaguar/human, headdress is huge, visual pun 9if we flip it, his headdress is a row of crocodile heads)

Stela- stone with relief of stone in it

Rectangular or vertical, taken from greek

o   Huaca: sacred site or place. (when the mythical finding happened and the people had bad things happen to them, they turn into lakes, rocks, etc.,k which are the sacred places)

·         their form of writing, no paper, every complex. He holds cord and pendant cords coming down from that. (and pendant cords can come down from those). There are knots in each cord. Base 12 system. Different levels of numbers.

o   Think they encoded names, histories, mythologies, etc.

o   Because the different spin of the cord means something, the color of the cord means something. 

8.14 o   Colossal Head, from San Lorenzo, Olmec culture, c. 1200-900 BCE

§ 

made from Basalt

-Known for this, specific powers to people

§  Idealized portraiture

§  Cannons of beauty.

§  Thought to be a ruler (earlier)
social and economic system. (because they have rulers)

·        Depicted in colossal heads

§  Rubber producing area.

·        Used later on for the ball game

·        Rainforest

·        They have man resources.

§  1500 BCE when they began depicting people (wooden figures placed in Bogues.)

§   Pendant on top of the iris.

§  Lips apart and downturned, called t snartle aggressive)

§  The head is the most defining feature of this person (associated with aggression

§  Heads from both San Lorenzo and La Venta (where the upside down mountain is)

§  Carved from Basalt

§  Possibly painted but no one knows because the were all found face down into the ground

§  Idea of seeing, see and be seen as a way to control a person.

§  All male.

§  All full features. They all have headgear (leather helmets that are also textiles)

·        Probably used to play the ball game. (hwih is predicted to have dated back to this period)

§  On the back of 2 of these, seat carved into them, we think it was also used as a throne.

§  model of authority

§  buried arund the edge of the city. We don’t know where they originally were.

8.30 o   Pyramid of the Sun, Teotihuacan. Begun 100 CE.

§  Temple on top of the pyramid

§  Geometric angles

§  Stepped everything on plains.

§  One of the tallest and largest structures

§  Meant to resemble surrounding mountain

§  Animalistic landscape again (spirits

§  Solid, with the ecepetion of the caves built underneath, to go into transition.

§  (and cant see/ cant hear when down there*

§  Allows for communication to the heavens

§  Axis mundi.

§  Probably plastered over with red or white.

§  BUT residential (politics) places had murals.

8.22 The Princeton Vase. 8th century. Painted Ceramic.

- This is a depiction of the Popul Vuh – the Mayan version of the Old Testament (creation stories). This is the story of the Hero twins to avenge their father, the Maize God. And then to avenge their own deaths, because they played the ball game and they lost and so were killed. It also shows the God L, god of Death, hanging out with his Concubines, putting bracelets on them and women making hot cocoa. Off to the side, you see the Rabbit recording what is going on. The rabbit is a trickster connected with the moon goddess, which we later found out from a continuation of the story found later.

- In the continuation, we se the Hero twins and a god being sacrificed. Also, the god L with all of his regalia gone, showing that he is about to be sacrificed. He has paper through his piercings as torture. And at the top, you can see the moon goddess and the Rabbit, conspiring against god L and that’s why he fell.

8.25  Sarcophagus lid, Temple of the Inscriptions. Palenque, Chippas, Mexico. Late Classic Period, c. 680 CE. Limestone.

Relief on the King's (Hanab Pakal) sarcophagus shows him at the moment of his death, falling backward like the setting sun into the skeletal jaws of an earth monster on his way to xibalba.

-how a Maya ruler was entombed and prepared for the otherworld.

- He ascended from a long line of kings and two noble ruling ladies. In his inscriptions, he praises his mother, calling her the "mother of the gods," and double portraits of the women appear on the sides of his sarcophagus.

8.26 Portrait statue of Waxaklahun Ubah K' awil, ruler of Copan. Stela A, Copan, Honduras. Late Classical Period, 731 CE. Andesite, over lifesize.

-Waxaklahun Ubah K'awil is portrayed on Stela A in full ceremonial regalia, wearing sandals, garters, a jadeite-studded loincloths, ear plugs, necklaces, and a multilayered plumed headdress.

- In the crooks of his arms, he holds a bar with serpent heads on either end, representing Itzamma, the serpent god of the sky, whose body symbolizes the dome of the sky and the Maya cosmos.

- In his hands, the serpent-bar symbolizes the universality of his god Itzamna and his rule as a regent of the gods.

- the round masses of his feet, long legs, hands, arms, and face illustrate the basis of his authority and kinship with the gods.

8.37 Pyramid B, Tula, Hidalgo. Early Postclassic Toltec Period, c. 900-1200.

- basic features of the Toltec-Maya style:

- visitors enter through a collade of rectangular piers that represent Toltec warriors and women bearing offerings.

8.38 Atlantean figures, Pyramid B, Tula, Hidalgo.

One of the only things that survived from the Pyramid B Temple.

-set of 4 columns representing Toltec warriors and supporting the ceiling.

They carry atatls (spear-throwers) and stare staraight ahead and over the people standing or sitting on the temple floor.

originally painted with bright colors.

don't look like Maya figures, they were carved with figures in Maya dress in Tula, and some that resemble the Toltec works at Chichen Itza, indicating that the two cities had close ties.

8.40 The Founding of Tenochtitlan. Frontispiece to the Codex Mendoza, c. 1541-42

• Painted by an Aztec artist after the Spanish conquest
• An inscription below the shield and spears and the heiroglyphic sign at the base of the cactus indicate that this is Tenochtitlan, the capital of Mexico and symbolic center of the Aztec cosmos.
• The hub of the cities is surrounded by 4 canals and men seated on mats with heiroglyphic signs that are place-signs and may represent municipalities or regions subject  to the Aztecs.
• The warriors below, with shields and clubs, as well as the platformed temples in the background, with tilting roofs spouting smoke and flames (damaged buildings burned), represent Aztec conquests.

8.41 Stone of Five Suns of Aztec Calendar Stone, Tenochtitlan, Mexico. 1502-20. Stone.

1 of the 2 large sculptures that holds the Aztec Creation stories (illustrated)

Discovered in the late eighteenth century near the former site of the Templo Mayor where the Cathedral of Mexico City now stands.

Not a calendar as such, but a diagram of creation.

• The sign in the center of the stone (four arms surrounding the face of a creature with claws and a tongue in the shape of a sacrificial knife) is Ollin (the day on which creation took place.
• The small signs between the arms stand for the first four suns. The band around them illustrates the 20 days in the Aztec calendar that combine with the thirteen Gods. The outermost band is formed by the bodies of two fire gods with their tails at the top of the stone and heads at the bottom.
• Between the god's tails, a date-glyph (13 Reed) represents the year 1427, the birthdate of the present sun and the year in which the Aztec ruler (Izcoatl) came to power, a conjunction that gave him divine authority.

17th century book ("Book of Council") from the Guatemala highlands preserves some of the storylines that inspired the vessel painters.

In the book: the gods in Xibalba invite 2 mortal brothers to join them in a so-called ball game.

Mesoamerican Ball game.

athletic young men competed with one another, hitting a large rubber ball back and forth from one end of the court to another.

8.45 Serpent Mound, southern Ohio. Hopewell of Fort Ancient Culture. Woodland Period, c. 1070 CE.

The hopewell constructed many mounds in the shapes of animals called effigy mounds (which may represent clan lineage signs or images of animals that were important in shamanistic rituals).

This is one of the best known effigies, and it represents a very long serpent with a coiled tail and open jaws.

Effigies can be best seen from the air, suggesting that it was built for the "eyes" of celestial spirit powers

Perhaps was not a burial site, but a place of gathering to celebrate such astronomical events as the solstice.

8.52 Tlingit blanket. Alaska. 1870-90. Cedar bast and wild goat hair. National Museum of the American Indian, New York.

To prove that he was wealthy and successful, a man of the Chilkat division of the Tlingits would pay his wife or daughter to weave a special ceremonial blanket for him. 

It might take the entire winter or longer to spin the mountain-goat wool, dye it (black, yellow, and blue-green), and weave the blanket.

They did not use frame looms, the warps were suspended from ahorizontal rod and their untrimmed ends became the lower fringe of the finished piece.

• They called these blankets nakheen ("fringe about the body") because the long fringe would emphasize the movement of the owner as he danced in the winter rituals.
• The internal organization of the composition emphasizes the shape of the blanket. The blankets, 

8.55 George Catlin, The Last Race, Part of Okipa Ceremony (Mandan). 1832. Oil on canvas. Smithsonian Art Museum, Washington D.C. 

• before photography was developed, artists like Catlin made 5 extensive trips along the Missouri, creating a collection of paintings and drawings.
• He was particularly interested in the Mandan (who lived in earth lodges in permanent villages along the upper Missouri River in the Dakotas.
• The shrine to Lone Man, the Mandan's culture hero, who saved them from a flood in ancient times.
• The ceremony celebrated creation, the flood, and the coming of the buffalo.
• He said that the Native Americans "are doomed and must perish", so he painted them to rescue their looks and the can "live again upon canvas and stand forth for centuries yet to come".
• the lodges in the painting are now gone because they were killed with the smallpox, but the indians other places actually did not "vanish".

8.60 reconstruction view of Pueblo Bonito, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Great Pueblo period, 13th century.

The largest of the building complexes at Chaco Canon.

• Name means "Beautiful House".
• walls were made with thin, well-fitted stones, and the roofs were mad of beams suporting sapplings and twigs sealed by layers of mud plaster.
• Lots of cliffdwelling figures.

8.61 Cliff Palace, Mesa Verde. Four Corners area, Colorado. 13th century

The most surviving of the surviving pueblos from this period are these, or "Green Table". 

this was one of the individual homes and pueblos built in the large niche.

This was completed then abandoned shortly thereafter during droughts.

8.67 Navajo "eyedazzler" blanket. 1875-90. Wool, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Navajo women may have learned their weaving techniues fro mPueblo weavers working in styles influenced by Hispanic Art.

they incorporated more more Hispanic-Mexican motifs.

repeated patterns of diagonal and zigzag motifs appear to move and vibrate like pieces of Western Op Art from the 1960s. 

This was called the Rug period (1895-presentday) because many blankets woven using durable yarns have been marketed as rugs to Anglo-American Patrons.

Some of the northwest Pacific Coast families that erected totem poles carried this idea of display their treasures to display to an extreme and sponsored gatherings called potlatches. 

They gave away or destroyed enormous quantities of art and other luxury items in order to demonstrate their wealth and power.

A tepee (tipi, teepee) is a Plains Indian home. It is made of buffalo hide fastened around very long wooden poles, designed in a cone shape. Tepees were warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Some were quite large. They could hold 30 or 40 people comfortably.

Tepee Poles: The 15-foot poles were sometimes hard to find. Some people became really good at making sturdy poles. They used them for trade. A typical trade would be one horse for five poles.

The Rising Sun: A tepee used a hide flap as a doorway. Weather permitting, the entrance faced east, towards the rising sun.

If the weather was miserable or a storm was brewing, the people positioned the flap opening in whatever way would best serve the comfort of the occupants.

Sometimes, the people arranged their tepees in a circle, with all the opening flaps facing the center open space created by the circle of tepees. The younger kids could play in this open space, under the watchful eyes of their mothers.

Women were in charge of the teepees:  It was up to the women where to place a tepee. The tepee was their castle, and they were in charge of anything to do with it, including building it, erecting it, breaking it down for transports. 

subterranean ceremonial and social enclosures built by the Pueblo Indians (at Mesa Verde)

Where they placed their most important and sacred structures (round enclosures)

in the Cliff Palace, which faced the front and center of the community. (Hopi indians)

the most important spiritual beings in their region (the pueblos)

term applies to the spirits, masked dancers who impersonate them in ritual dances and small doll-like figures Hopi parents give their daughters to teach them about the hundreds of spirits that embody the aspects of nature.

Since the Navajo indians lack pueblos and community gathering places, many of their most important rituals are performed in their (hogans), which were polygonal log structure homes .

production of large, floor, "sand paintings", made by pouring thin streams of colored sands, vegetable, pollen. etc.