Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

This session aims to explore polychromy, multimediality, and other forms of visual complexity in Mesoamerican art. A recent body of scholarship has demonstrated that the choice of certain materials and their subtle assemblage, as well as the manufacture of artworks with particularly complex formal features, convey values and meanings of crucial relevance for the societies that created them, while also providing fresh understanding of Indigenous concepts of artistic creation(s). Most of these studies fruitfully conjoin analysis of artifacts or artistic corpuses with the study of historical documents, especially those written in Indigenous languages, in order to provide an emic approach to Mesoamerican aesthetics. Building on these works thematically and methodologically, this session will discuss individual artworks and widespread artistic traditions that generate insights into artists’ approaches to cultivating visual complexity—encompassing the use of color, multiple materials, and strategies of design—in Mesoamerican art of different genres and historical periods, in order to better understand their purposes and meanings within specific cultural contexts. Broadening the discussion beyond the widespread focus in the existing scholarship on historical Nahua art, this panel will seek to broaden the discussion by including presentations that tackle other cultural traditions or that incorporate ethnographic approaches.

Other Keywords
Iconography and Art • Highland Mesoamerica: Postclassic • Ethnohistory/History • Ceramic Analysis • Maya: Classic • Featherwork • Cultural Transmission • Craft Production • Materiality • senses

Geographic Keywords
United Mexican States (Country) • North America (Continent) • Colima (State / Territory) • Michoacan (State / Territory) • Jalisco (State / Territory) • Nayarit (State / Territory) • Aguascalientes (State / Territory) • Guanajuato (State / Territory) • Hidalgo (State / Territory) • Queretaro (State / Territory)

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-11 of 11)

  • Documents (11)
Documents
  • Art and Experience in Chichen Itza (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Claudia Brittenham.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chichen Itza was a city of unprecedented visual complexity in ancient Mesoamerica, a place where innovations in architecture, mural painting, and sculpture, as well as experiments with new media such as gold and turquoise, created an urban landscape unlike any other. In this paper, I will examine the interactions...

  • Assembling Bodies: Multimediality in Nahua Precious Costumery (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Allison Caplan.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The working of precious materials—greenstones, shells, turquoise, gold, and feathers—represented an arena of artistic specialization and tailored, technological expertise among the Late Postclassic Nahuas. Such specialized productions were almost exclusively destined to serve as components of multimedia costumes,...

  • Chalchihuites*: Jade Histories of Value and Matter in the Early Modern World (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Miruna Achim.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A well-known passage in the Florentine Codex offers a natural history of *chalchihuitl: its revelation to a few “knowledgeable ones” by the vapor it exudes from underground when viewed against the sun’s first rays; its varieties of green, luminosity, and hardness; the lapidary methods that bring out its brightness and...

  • Colors in the Chupicuaro Ceramic Tradition: A Diachronic Perspective during the Late Formative (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Brigitte Faugere.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In Northwestern Mesoamerica, polychromy is a characteristic of Chupicuaro pottery during the Late Formative. It is the case for the hollow figures whose decoration is obtained by overlapping geometric motives painted in white and black on a red background. The figurines were also polychrome, even if the paints...

  • The Polychromatic Painting Strategies of Classic Maya Ceramic Artists (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Alyce De Carteret. Diana Magaloni Kerpel.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Maya polychrome ceramics have long been regarded for the distinctive regional styles that emerged during the Late Classic period (ca. 600–900 CE). These styles, aligned with royal workshops and their patrons, encompass a wide range of aesthetic strategies, particularly with respect to color. Some workshops and their...

  • Polychromy in Nahua Art (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Elodie Dupey.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Through the analysis of several examples of Nahua artistic expression, including the mural paintings of Tlaxcala, the Borgia Group codices, and a wood sculpture encrusted with mosaic, this paper aims to demonstrate that the societies of Late Postclassic central Mexico cultivated a strong interest in polychromy,...

  • Rock Art and Ritual Routes: Visual Complexity in Cerro de la Nariz, Wakiri kitenie (Potosino Highlands, Mexico) (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Olivia Kindl. Alma Noemi Vega Barbosa.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Some features of a rocky site in the Potosino semi-desert of north-central Mexico will be presented, where an ancient rock world and ritual expressions of contemporary ethnic groups, in particular the Wixarika (Huichol Indians), coincide. For the latter, the site is an important step in their ritual journey to...

  • Shimmering Gold and Feathers: Strategies for Making Feathered Objects with Metal Applications (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Laura Filloy. María Olvido Moreno.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Mexica employed feathers to make lightweight objects utilized by elites and gods in various secular, religious, political, and military contexts. The use of feathers is represented in murals, codices, ceramics, sculpture, metalwork, and even some of these objects that have managed to survive more than five...

  • Surface, Texture, and Touch in Ancient Maya Art (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Megan O'Neil.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Examining multiple media, this paper addresses depicted and actual surfaces in ancient Maya art in order to explore artistic engagements with surface, texture, and the sense of touch. It considers, for example, how certain artists rendered bodies, objects, and materials in manners conveying the look and feel of...

  • Tridimensionality, Multimediality, Polychromy, and Other Forms of Visual Complexity in Late Postclassic Mosaic Art (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Davide Domenici.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Building on previous works that led to the definition of various stylistic families within the corpus of Late Postclassic central and southwestern Mexican mosaics, the paper explores the various formal and technological resources that each group of mosaics employed to attain specific forms of visual complexity....

  • Utopia through the Kaleidoscope: The Colors of Silk in Colonial Mexico (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jaime Marroquín. Jamie Ford.

    This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Following the arrival of Europeans to the New World, one of the most fascinating early exchanges of knowledge and technology that ensued was the introduction of the silk industry to Mexico. While in some places this was unsuccessful and/or short-lived, particularly in Oaxaca, it flourished for the better part of a...