Unseen Art: Memory, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica

FAIN: FEL-257427-18

Claudia Lozoff Brittenham
University of Chicago (Chicago, IL 60637-5418)

A book analyzing the use and meaning of concealed art among the Maya, Olmec, and Aztec cultures.

My book project, Unseen Art: Memory, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica, examines the conditions under which ancient art was viewed and experienced, focusing on practices diametrically opposed to the modern paradigm of museum display. In a series of case studies drawn from major Mesoamerican civilizations, I suggest that art could operate beyond the realm of the visual, and explore the ways in which concealed images and esoteric knowledge might be used to maintain power and social difference. Unseen art also pushes us to develop creative ways to explore ancient viewing experiences and the reception of ancient works of art. The insights gained demonstrate the value of contextualized ways of looking at all artworks.

Associated Products

Aztec Art and the Fragility of Empire (Public Lecture or Presentation)
Title: Aztec Art and the Fragility of Empire
Abstract: Aztec art drew on the Mesoamerican past, citing works from the ancient cities of Teotihuacan and Tula to lend authority and legitimacy to the new empire. But this engagement with the past also provoked reflection on the inevitable end of empire and the cyclicality of time, themes that resonate as the five hundredth anniversary of the Spanish invasion of Mexico unfolds this year.
Author: Claudia Brittenham
Date: 10/21/1029
Location: Art Institute of Chicago

Imagining a Future Past: Unseen art and Aztec archaism (Public Lecture or Presentation)
Title: Imagining a Future Past: Unseen art and Aztec archaism
Abstract: Many Aztec sculptures were carved on all available surfaces, including their undersides, such that some carvings would be concealed when the sculpture was set in place. This practice raises questions about the meaning of Aztec image-making, the audiences for such concealed works, and how disciplines like art history should incorporate conditions of visibility into the study of ancient objects. Most of the genres of Aztec art with carving on their undersides were archaizing, citing the sculptural traditions of cities like Teotihuacan and Tula, which had been abandoned centuries earlier. In this talk, I consider the links between the Aztec experience of the past and the questions about the visibility of ancient sculpture.
Author: Claudia Brittenham
Date: 9/19/2019
Location: Cornell Institute of Archaeology and Material Studies, Cornell University

Radio CIAMS Podcast (Radio/Audio Broadcast or Recording)
Title: Radio CIAMS Podcast
Abstract: RadioCIAMS is a podcast series produced by the Cornell Institute of Archaeology and Material Studies. In this episode, we discussed my work on Maya carved lintels, the challenges of seeing lintels in their original contexts, and the implications for art history and archaeology.
Date: 9/20/19
Primary URL: https://archaeology.cornell.edu/radio-ciams-archive
Primary URL Description: RadioCIAMS Archive
Access Model: Open access
Format: Web

John Lloyd Stephens and the Lost Lintel of Kabah (Article)
Title: John Lloyd Stephens and the Lost Lintel of Kabah
Author: Brittenham, Claudia
Abstract: “John Lloyd Stephens and the Lost Lintel of Kabah,” in Destroyed – Disappeared – Lost – Never Were, edited by Beate Fricke and Aden Kumler. Viewpoints series, co-published by the International Center of Medieval Art and the Penn State University Press. Under review. This essay considers John Lloyd Stephens' removal of a carved wooden lintel from the Maya city of Kabah and its later destruction in fire as a way of thinking about the colonialist legacy of collecting Mesoamerican art in the 19th century.
Year: 2019
Format: Other
Publisher: the International Center of Medieval Art and the Penn State University Press

Architecture, Vision, and Ritual: Seeing Maya Lintels at Yaxchilan Structure 23 (Article)
Title: Architecture, Vision, and Ritual: Seeing Maya Lintels at Yaxchilan Structure 23
Author: Claudia Brittenham
Abstract: The lintels of Yaxchilan Structure 23 are among the most famous of all Maya monuments. Dedicated by Ix K’abal Xook in 726 CE, while her husband Itzamnaaj Bahlam III was the ruler of Yaxchilan, these sculptures are both a tour de force of carving and a powerful demonstration of ancient women’s agency. Yet in their original context, the lintels were hard to see, raising questions about the nature and dynamics of Maya vision. It emerges that the lintels should be read as a cohesive program, guiding a performative engagement with the building at the moment of its dedication.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00043079.2019.1564175
Secondary URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/00043079.2019.1564175
Access Model: subscription only
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: The Art Bulletin
Publisher: The Art Bulletin/College Art Association

Prizes

Arthur Kingsley Porter Prize
Date: 2/15/2020
Organization: College Art Association

Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica (Book)
Title: Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica
Author: Claudia Brittenham
Abstract: In Unseen Art, Claudia Brittenham unravels one of the most puzzling phenomena in Mesoamerican art history: why many of the objects that we view in museums today were once so difficult to see. She examines the importance that ancient Mesoamerican people assigned to the process of making and enlivening the things we now call art, as well as Mesoamerican understandings of sight as an especially godlike and elite power, in order to trace a gradual evolution in the uses of secrecy and concealment, from a communal practice that fostered social memory to a tool of imperial power. Addressing some of the most charismatic of all Mesoamerican sculptures, such as Olmec buried offerings, Maya lintels, and carvings on the undersides of Aztec sculptures, Brittenham shows that the creation of unseen art has important implications both for understanding status in ancient Mesoamerica and for analyzing art in the present. Spanning nearly three thousand years of the Indigenous art of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and Belize, Unseen Art connects the dots between vision, power, and inequality, providing a critical perspective on our own way of looking.
Year: 2023
Primary URL: https://utpress.utexas.edu/9781477325964/
Primary URL Description: University of Texas Press Website
Access Model: print book for sale; hope to re-open discussion of open access once it's in print; thank you for the open access program, so exciting!
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Type: Single author monograph
ISBN: 9781477325964
Copy sent to NEH?: No

What Lies Beneath: Carving on the Underside of Aztec Sculpture (Article)
Title: What Lies Beneath: Carving on the Underside of Aztec Sculpture
Author: Claudia Brittenham
Abstract: Not all ancient art was made to be seen. Consider, for example, a sculpture of a rattlesnake, today in the British Museum. Its visible body is smooth and simple, coiled into three highly polished circuits. The mouth is daubed with red paint, open to reveal fierce fangs and an elongated forked tongue; the body terminates in thirteen rounded rattles. In between, the only decoration is the varied coloration of the gleaming stone. On the underside, the carving is far more elaborate. The rattles and then the ventral scales of the serpent are lavishly detailed as they spiral upwards. At regular intervals, dots of red pigment have been added to these hidden coils, ornamenting the rattlesnake’s belly. The three-dimensionality of this sculpture challenges display; photographs, casts, or ingeniously rigged mirrors can simultaneously make both the top and bottom of the sculpture visible for modern audiences, but it is likely that in Aztec times the serpent’s coils were invisible, only hinted at by the rounded forms at the base of the sculpture. One of over one hundred Aztec sculptures with documented carving on its underside, this coiled serpent was not an isolated caprice but part of a coherent and meaningful practice.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://academic.oup.com/book/40281/chapter-abstract/346853632?redirectedFrom=fulltext
Primary URL Description: Oxford University Press website
Secondary URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198845560.003.0008
Access Model: print and subscription
Format: Other
Periodical Title: Conditions of Visibility, ed. Richard Neer
Publisher: Oxford University Press

Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica (Book)
Title: Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica
Author: Claudia Lozoff Brittenham
Year: 2023
Primary URL: https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=1477325964
Primary URL Description: WorldCat entry (1477325964)
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Type: Single author monograph
ISBN: 1477325964

New Books Network Podcast: Unseen Art (Radio/Audio Broadcast or Recording)
Title: New Books Network Podcast: Unseen Art
Abstract: Conversation with Sarah Newman about Unseen Art book for New Books Network podcast
Date: 03/01/2023
Primary URL: https://newbooksnetwork.com/unseen-art
Format: Web

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