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Pre-Columbian America: Art

International Languages Department, Central Library,
Collage of Pre-Columbian art

This is the last segment of our series highlighting interesting things about Pre-Columbian America. This segment is dedicated to the wonderful art and people of Pre-Columbian America.

Pre-Columbian art and architecture are the works of art and structures created in Central and South America before the arrival of Europeans in the Western Hemisphere. For many years the regions that are now Mexico and Guatemala and the Andean region of South America had been the cradle of indigenous civilizations, whose remains bear witness to an exceptional degree of artistic advancement.


Stele

Stele, an upright stone slab

Stele, (plural Stelae), is an upright stone slab carved in relief. Stelae were fashioned by many civilizations as religious and civic monuments, often displaying the portraits and deeds of deities or human rulers. Stelae were a common feature of Mesoamerican plazas.

Fragile Art

fresco of a boy kicking a ball

Fragile Art: Painting, a relatively fragile art, survives in far less abundance than in architecture or sculpture. Nonetheless, Mesoamerican painting has been discovered in the form of murals, pottery decoration, and illuminated manuscripts.

Maya Codices

folding books written by the pre-Columbian Maya civilization

Maya Codices, (singular codex), are folding books written by the Pre-Columbian Maya civilization in Maya hieroglyphic script on Mesoamerican bark cloth. The cloth was made from the inner bark of certain trees, the main being the wild fig tree or amate (Ficus glabrata).

Ancient Maya Graffiti

Ancient Maya graffiti

Ancient Maya graffiti is a poorly studied area of folk art of the Pre-Columbian Maya civilization. Graffiti were incised into the stucco of interior walls, floors, and benches, in a wide variety of buildings, including pyramid-temples, residences, and storerooms. Graffiti has been recorded at over 50 Maya sites, particularly clustered in the Petén Basin and Southern Campeche, and the Chenes region of Northwestern Yucatán. At Tikal, where a great quantity of graffiti have been recorded, the subject matter includes drawings of temples, people, deities, animals, banners, litters, and thrones.

Metalwork

Gold Aztec pendant

Metalwork was a particular skill of the Aztecs, amongst them gold labrets (lip piercings), pendants, rings, earrings and necklaces in gold representing everything from eagles to tortoise shells to gods, which are a testimony to the skills in lost-wax casting and filigree work of the finest artisans or Tolteca.

Featherwork and Mosaics

Central American feather cape

Featherwork and Mosaics, shields, standards, head-dresses and capes for the nobility were often created in ornate and colorful lapidary work, from feathers traded from the tropical rain forests. This craft was particularly prized in Central America.


 

 

 

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