Out of Olmec: Continuity and Disjunction in Veracruz Stone Sculpture

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Sculpture of the Ancient Mexican Gulf Coast, Part 1" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Gulf Olmec sculpture is renowned for the cultural, political, and aesthetic precedents it helped to establish in preconquest Mesoamerica. Often its legacy is discussed in relation to the artistic traditions of succeeding civilizations that emerged to the south and west of Olman. However, there has been little recognition of the impact Olmec sculpture had on the later cultures of Veracruz. Many examples of Gulf Coast sculpture outside the Olmec heartland have remained virtually ignored by scholars, likely as a result of cultural biases rooted in Western aesthetic sensibilities and the tendency to elevate certain categories of representation over others. Yet, in overlooking these objects we have neglected to see the patterns of continuity and disjunction in Gulf Coast sculpture that lead us from the monuments of the Olmec to those of their Classic and Postclassic successors. This paper attempts to trace these routes of affect and influence through the sculptural traditions of ancient Veracruz.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Sculpture of the Ancient Mexican Gulf Coast, Part 1   •
• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 29872