The world of the Visual Arts...: Pre-Hispanic Art

Las formas de lo sagrado at La Abadía... (Part II)

07/21/16 - We post today the second part of our tour around the exhibition excellently curated by María Alba Bovisio, in which all the texts in the rooms properly introduce visitors into the subject. The display of the pieces, in small windows, allows a 360° view thanks to the use of strategically-placed mirrors. Plus, the simple architecture of the venue plays a key role in the overall experience: the rooms shift from total whiteness to absolute darkness.

Among the many pieces, there's a small anthropomorphic figure in stone (perhaps once a mortar) that stands out from among the others. Apparently, in the Andean period, ancestors could incarnate as sculptures, masks or mortars, that were placed together with the funerary bundles. Another outstanding piece shows a wrapped body, as a mummy. It was most probably placed in the tomb as a "stone double" of the dead.

Anthropomorphic figure. Aguada. Integración regional 450 – 900 DC

Stone - Argentine Chancery Collection

Condorhuasi Anthropomorphic figure. Formativo 500 AC – 450 AC

Stone - Argentine Chancery Collection

Alamitos masks. Formativo 500 AC – 450 DC

Stone - Argentine Chancery Collection

The pipes were used to smoke cebil (anadenanthera colubrina), a tree that grows between 315 and 2200 mts above sea level. The black beans in its pods were toasted till they bursted, and then crushed into a powder that could be inhaled or smoked.

Ceramic pipes. Integración Regional 450 – 900 DC

Ceramic - Argentine Chancery Collection

The following sculpture, according to the curator, must have been a ritual vessel and represents the "sacrificer", with an ax in one hand and a trophy-head in the other.

Sacrificer figure. Aguada. Integración regional 450 – 900 DC

Stone - Argentine Chancery Collection

Because of the quality of the pieces on display, this exhibition is a great chance to witness, first hand, the progress of Argentina's Northern cultures. The MNBA has many Pre-Hispanic pieces in its permanent collection, which used to belong to the Di Tella collection, although unfortunately they are not currently on display.

11:58 a.m.
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Las Formas de lo Sagrado, at La Abadía...

Pre-Hispanic Art

1:32 p.m.
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Of how pre-Hispanic worship objects become artistic pieces...

Pre-Hispanic Art

Mask, Olmec, Mexico (X-VI b.C.)

Materials: jadeite / Measures: 17.1 x 16.5 cm

Metropolitan Museum, New York (360° view)

The mask we post here belongs to one of the first civilisations that lived in the actual Mexico. You might say that it could belong to modernity because of the simplicity of its features.

This mystical object, probably meant for adoration, went through a long way to become a piece of art worthy of being in a museum.

Let's see... By the 16th century, in the Colonial period, it was considered a "curiosity/idol": Cortés, in 1519, sent King Charles V different pieces from these lands as tokens. The delight and wonder was such that they were recognised not only because of their aesthetic but also as a curiosity: objects made by men of those strange lands. Their condition as worship pieces was not denied: "bad things where the Devil mingles".

By the end of the 18th century and during the 19th century, there's a shift in the interpretation. These objects get a new classification based in their age and origin. This is the result of the development of Archeology: they become "historical & archeological documents".

Finally, during the first half of the 20th Century, pre-Hispanic objects gain a new meaning to European eyes, thanks to the many artists that become interested in primitivism. There's a new dimension to judge them by: the "aesthetic" one. Pre-Hispanic objects are so incorporated to museum collections as part of the "Primitive Art" section.

Suplicante tallado en piedra (ca. 300 b. C.-600 a. C.)

Materials: carved and polished stone / Measures: 27 x 14.5 x 10.5 cm.

MNBA

Vaso zoomorfo, Cultura Ciénaga (ca. 300 b. C.-600 a. C.)

Technique: Ceramic / Measures: 23 x 29 x 16.5 cm.

MNBA

Keep reading... "El periplo del objeto mitológico: itinerarios simbólicos del arte prehispánico entre los siglos XVI y XX", by M.A. Bovisio, published in the Journal de Ciencias Sociales/Year 1 N°2, Universidad de Palermo, Facultad de Ciencias Sociales, July 2014.