Las artes visuales de los pueblos indígenas de las Américas abarca las prácticas artísticas visuales de los pueblos indígenas de las Américas desde la antigüedad hasta la actualidad. Estos incluyen obras de América del Sur y América del Norte, que incluye Centroamérica y Groenlandia . También se incluyen los yupiit siberianos , que tienen una gran superposición cultural con los yupiit nativos de Alaska .
Las artes visuales indígenas americanas incluyen artes portátiles, como pintura, cestería, textiles o fotografía, así como obras monumentales, como arquitectura, land art , escultura pública o murales. Algunas formas de arte indígena coinciden con formas de arte occidental; sin embargo, algunos, como las púas del puercoespín o las mordeduras de corteza de abedul, son exclusivas de América.
El arte indígena de las Américas ha sido coleccionado por los europeos desde el contacto sostenido en 1492 y se ha unido a colecciones en gabinetes de curiosidades y primeros museos. Los museos de arte occidentales más conservadores han clasificado el arte indígena de las Américas dentro de las artes de África, Oceanía y las Américas, con obras de arte anteriores al contacto clasificadas como arte precolombino , término que a veces se refiere únicamente al arte anterior al contacto de los pueblos indígenas de América Latina. Los eruditos y aliados nativos se esfuerzan por que el arte indígena se comprenda e interprete desde perspectivas indígenas.
La etapa Lítica o período Paleoindio se define aproximadamente entre el 18.000 y el 8.000 a.C. El período comprendido aproximadamente entre el 8000 y el 800 a. C. se denomina generalmente período Arcaico . Si bien la gente de este período trabajaba con una amplia gama de materiales, los materiales perecederos, como fibras vegetales o pieles, rara vez se habían conservado a lo largo de los milenios. Los pueblos indígenas crearon estandartes , puntas de proyectil , estilos de reducción lítica y pinturas rupestres pictográficas, algunas de las cuales han sobrevivido en el presente.
Perteneciente a la etapa lítica, el arte más antiguo conocido en América es un hueso de megafauna fosilizado , posiblemente de un mamut, tallado con un perfil de mamut o mastodonte andante que data del año 11.000 a.C. [1] El hueso fue encontrado a principios del siglo XXI cerca de Vero Beach, Florida , en un área donde se habían encontrado huesos humanos ( hombre Vero ) en asociación con animales extintos del pleistoceno a principios del siglo XX. El hueso está demasiado mineralizado para fecharlo, pero se ha autenticado que la talla se realizó antes de que el hueso se mineralizara. La corrección anatómica del tallado y la fuerte mineralización del hueso indican que el tallado se realizó cuando aún vivían mamuts y/o mastodontes en la zona, hace más de 10.000 años. [2] [3] [4] [5]
El objeto pintado más antiguo conocido en América del Norte es el cráneo de Cooper Bison de aproximadamente 8.050 a. C. [6] [ página necesaria ] El arte de la edad lítica en América del Sur incluye pinturas rupestres de la cultura Monte Alegre creadas en Caverna da Pedra Pintada que datan del 9250 al 8550 a.C. [7] [8] La cueva Guitarrero en Perú tiene los textiles más antiguos conocidos en América del Sur, que datan del 8000 a. C. [9]
El suroeste de Estados Unidos y ciertas regiones de los Andes tienen la mayor concentración de pictografías (imágenes pintadas) y petroglifos (imágenes talladas) de este período. Tanto las pictografías como los petroglifos se conocen como arte rupestre .
Los Yup'ik de Alaska tienen una larga tradición de tallar máscaras para usar en rituales chamánicos . Los pueblos indígenas del ártico canadiense han producido objetos que podrían clasificarse como arte desde la época de la cultura Dorset . Si bien las tallas de marfil de morsa de Dorset eran principalmente chamánicas, el arte del pueblo Thule que las reemplazó alrededor del año 1000 d.C. tenía un carácter más decorativo. Con el contacto europeo comenzó el período histórico del arte inuit. En este período, que alcanzó su apogeo a finales del siglo XIX, los artesanos inuit crearon recuerdos para las tripulaciones de los barcos balleneros y los exploradores. Los ejemplos comunes incluyen tablas de cribbage . El arte moderno inuit comenzó a finales de la década de 1940, cuando, con el apoyo del gobierno canadiense, comenzaron a producir grabados y esculturas serpentinas para la venta en el sur. Los inuit groenlandeses tienen una tradición textil única que integra la costura de pieles, pieles y aplicaciones de pequeños trozos de órganos de mamíferos marinos teñidos de colores brillantes en diseños de mosaico, llamados avittat. Las mujeres crean elaborados collares con cuentas en red. Tienen una fuerte tradición en la fabricación de máscaras y también son conocidos por una forma de arte llamada tupilaq o "objeto de espíritu maligno". Las prácticas tradicionales de creación de arte prosperan en Ammassalik . [10] El marfil de cachalote sigue siendo un medio valioso para tallar. [11]
Las culturas del interior de Alaska y Canadá que viven al sur del Círculo Polar Ártico son pueblos subárticos . Si bien los humanos han vivido en la región durante mucho más tiempo, el arte subártico más antiguo que se conoce es un sitio de petroglifos en el noroeste de Ontario , que data del año 5000 a. C. El caribú y, en menor medida , los alces , son recursos importantes que proporcionan pieles, astas, tendones y otros materiales artísticos. Las plumas de puercoespín embellecen las pieles y la corteza de abedul. Después del contacto europeo con la influencia de las Monjas Grises , los mechones de pelo de alce y los adornos florales de vidrio se hicieron populares en todo el Subártico. [12]
El arte de los Haida , Tlingit , Heiltsuk , Tsimshian y otras tribus más pequeñas que viven en las zonas costeras del estado de Washington , Oregón y Columbia Británica , se caracteriza por un vocabulario estilístico extremadamente complejo expresado principalmente en el medio del tallado en madera. Ejemplos famosos incluyen tótems , máscaras de transformación y canoas. Además de la carpintería, la pintura bidimensional y las joyas grabadas en plata, oro y cobre adquirieron importancia después del contacto con los europeos.
Las culturas de los Bosques del Este , o simplemente bosques, habitaron las regiones de América del Norte al este del río Mississippi al menos desde el año 2500 a.C. Si bien había muchas culturas regionales distintas, el comercio entre ellas era común y compartían la práctica de enterrar a sus muertos en montículos de tierra, lo que ha preservado una gran cantidad de su arte. Debido a este rasgo, las culturas se conocen colectivamente como constructores de montículos .
El período Woodland (1000 a. C.-1000 d. C.) se divide en períodos temprano, medio y tardío, y estuvo formado por culturas que dependían principalmente de la caza y la recolección para su subsistencia. Las cerámicas elaboradas por la cultura Deptford (2500 a. C.-100 d. C.) son la evidencia más antigua de una tradición artística en esta región. La cultura Adena es otro ejemplo bien conocido de una cultura Woodland temprana. Tallaron tablillas de piedra con diseños zoomorfos , crearon cerámica y confeccionaron trajes con pieles de animales y astas para rituales ceremoniales. Los mariscos eran el pilar de su dieta y se han encontrado conchas grabadas en sus túmulos.
El período de Middle Woodland estuvo dominado por culturas de la tradición Hopewell (200–500). Su obra de arte abarcó una amplia variedad de joyas y esculturas en piedra, madera e incluso hueso humano.
El período de los bosques tardíos (500-1000 d. C.) vio una disminución en el comercio y en el tamaño de los asentamientos, y la creación de arte también disminuyó.
A partir del siglo XII, los Haudenosaunee y las tribus costeras cercanas fabricaron wampum a partir de conchas y cuerdas; se trataba de dispositivos mnemotécnicos , moneda y registros de tratados.
Los iroqueses tallan máscaras faciales falsas para rituales curativos, pero los representantes tradicionales de las tribus, el Gran Consejo de los Haudenosaunee , tienen claro que estas máscaras no están a la venta ni a la exhibición pública. [13] Lo mismo puede decirse de las máscaras de la Iroquois Corn Husk Society. [14]
Una escultora de bellas artes de mediados del siglo XIX fue Edmonia Lewis (afroamericana/ojibwe). Dos de sus obras se encuentran en el Museo de Newark . [15]
Los pueblos nativos de los bosques del noreste continuaron creando arte visual durante los siglos XX y XXI. Uno de esos artistas es Sharol Graves, cuyas serigrafías se han exhibido en el Museo Nacional del Indio Americano . [16] Graves también es el ilustrador de The People Shall Continue de Lee & Low Books .
La cultura Poverty Point habitó partes del estado de Luisiana desde 2000 hasta 1000 a. C. durante el período Arcaico . [17] Muchos objetos excavados en los sitios de Poverty Point estaban hechos de materiales que se originaron en lugares distantes, incluidas puntas y herramientas de proyectiles de piedra tallada, plomadas, gorgueras y vasijas de piedra molida, y cuentas de concha y piedra. Las herramientas de piedra encontradas en Poverty Point estaban hechas de materias primas que se originaban en las relativamente cercanas montañas Ouachita y Ozark y en los valles de los ríos Ohio y Tennessee, mucho más lejanos . Las vasijas se fabricaban con esteatita procedente de las estribaciones de los Apalaches de Alabama y Georgia . [18] Los objetos de arcilla cocida a baja temperatura modelados a mano se presentan en una variedad de formas, incluidas figuras antropomorfas y bolas de cocina. [17]
La cultura del Misisipio floreció en lo que hoy es el medio oeste , el este y el sureste de los Estados Unidos desde aproximadamente el año 800 d.C. al 1500 d.C., variando según la región. [19] Después de adoptar la agricultura del maíz, la cultura del Mississippi se volvió completamente agraria, a diferencia de la caza y la recolección complementadas con la agricultura a tiempo parcial practicada por las culturas forestales anteriores. Construyeron montículos de plataformas más grandes y complejos que los de sus predecesores, y terminaron y desarrollaron técnicas cerámicas más avanzadas, comúnmente utilizando conchas de mejillón molidas como agente templador . Muchos estaban involucrados con el Complejo Ceremonial del Sureste , una red comercial y religiosa panregional y panlingüística. La mayor parte de la información conocida sobre el SECC se deriva del examen de las elaboradas obras de arte dejadas por sus participantes, incluyendo cerámica , gorgueras y copas de concha, estatuas de piedra , placas de cobre repujadas como el escondite de Wulfing , placas de Rogan y placas de nariz larga. máscaras de dios . En el momento del contacto europeo, las sociedades del Mississippi ya estaban experimentando una grave tensión social, y con los trastornos políticos y las enfermedades introducidas por los europeos, muchas de las sociedades colapsaron y dejaron de practicar un estilo de vida del Mississippi, con excepciones notables como la cultura Plaquemine, Natchez y los Taensa relacionados. pueblos. Otras tribus descendientes de las culturas del Misisipio incluyen a los caddo , los choctaw , los muscogee creek , los wichita y muchos otros pueblos del sureste.
En Florida se ha encontrado una gran cantidad de artefactos de madera precolombinos. Mientras que los artefactos de madera más antiguos tienen hasta 10.000 años de antigüedad, los objetos de madera tallados y pintados sólo se conocen desde hace 2.000 años. Se han encontrado efigies de animales y máscaras faciales en varios sitios de Florida. Se encontraron efigies de animales que datan de entre 200 y 600 en un estanque mortuorio en Fort Center , en el lado oeste del lago Okeechobee . Particularmente impresionante es la talla de un águila de 66 cm de altura. [20]
En 1896 se excavaron más de 1.000 objetos de madera tallados y pintados, entre ellos máscaras, tablillas, placas y efigies, en Key Marco , en el suroeste de Florida . Han sido descritos como uno de los mejores arte prehistórico de los nativos americanos de América del Norte. Los objetos no están bien fechados, pero pueden pertenecer al primer milenio de la era actual. Los misioneros españoles describieron máscaras y efigies similares utilizadas por los Calusa a finales del siglo XVII y en el antiguo sitio de Tequesta en el río Miami en 1743, aunque no ha sobrevivido ningún ejemplo de objetos Calusa del período histórico. Se conoce un estilo de efigie del sur de Florida a partir de tallas de madera y hueso de varios sitios en las áreas culturales de Belle Glade , Caloosahatchee y Glades . [21] [22]
Los Seminoles son más conocidos por sus creaciones textiles, especialmente ropa de retazos. La fabricación de muñecas es otro oficio notable. [23]
Las tribus han vivido en las Grandes Llanuras durante miles de años. Las primeras culturas de las llanuras se dividen comúnmente en cuatro períodos: paleoindia (al menos c. 10 000 a 4000 a. C.), llanuras arcaicas (c. 4000 a 250 a. C.), llanuras boscosas (c. 250 a. C.-950 d. C.), Plains Village (c. 950-1850 d.C.). [24] El objeto pintado más antiguo conocido en América del Norte se encontró en las llanuras del sur, el cráneo de Cooper Bison , encontrado en Oklahoma y fechado entre 10.900 y 10.200 a.C. Está pintado con un zig-zag rojo. [6]
En el período de las aldeas de las llanuras, las culturas de la zona se asentaron en grupos cerrados de casas rectangulares y cultivaron maíz. Surgieron varias diferencias regionales, incluidas las Llanuras del Sur, las Llanuras Centrales, Oneota y el Medio Missouri. Las tribus eran a la vez cazadores nómadas y agricultores seminómadas. Durante el período de coalición de las llanuras (1400-contacto europeo), algunos cambios, posiblemente una sequía, provocaron la migración masiva de la población a la región de los bosques orientales, y las Grandes Llanuras estuvieron escasamente pobladas hasta que la presión de los colonos estadounidenses obligó a las tribus a ingresar al área nuevamente.
La llegada del caballo revolucionó las culturas de muchas tribus históricas de las Llanuras. La cultura del caballo permitió a las tribus vivir una existencia completamente nómada, cazando búfalos. La ropa de piel de búfalo estaba decorada con bordados de plumas de puercoespín y cuentas; las conchas de dentalium y los dientes de alce eran materiales preciados. Posteriormente, las monedas y cuentas de vidrio adquiridas mediante el comercio se incorporaron al arte de las llanuras. El trabajo con abalorios de las llanuras ha florecido hasta la época contemporánea.
El búfalo era el material preferido para pintar pieles de las llanuras . Los hombres pintaban diseños pictóricos narrativos que registraban hazañas o visiones personales. También pintaron calendarios históricos pictográficos conocidos como cuentas de invierno . Las mujeres pintaban diseños geométricos en túnicas bronceadas y parfleches de cuero crudo , que a veces servían como mapas. [25]
Durante la Era de las Reservas de finales del siglo XIX, los cazadores no nativos destruyeron sistemáticamente las manadas de búfalos. Debido a la escasez de pieles, los artistas de las Llanuras adoptaron nuevas superficies para pintar, como la muselina o el papel, dando origen al arte Ledger , llamado así por los omnipresentes libros de contabilidad utilizados por los artistas de las Llanuras.
Desde el período arcaico, la región de la Meseta, también conocida como Intermontaine y Gran Cuenca superior , había sido un centro de comercio. Los habitantes de la meseta tradicionalmente se asentaron cerca de los principales sistemas fluviales. [26] Debido a esto, su arte tiene influencias de otras regiones, de las costas del noroeste del Pacífico y las Grandes Llanuras. Las mujeres Nez Perce , Yakama , Umatilla y Cayuse tejen hojas de maíz planas y rectangulares o bolsas de cáñamo , que están decoradas con "diseños geométricos audaces" en falsos bordados. [27] Los trabajadores de abalorios de Plateau son conocidos por sus abalorios de estilo de contorno y sus elaboradas insignias de caballo.
Las tribus de la Gran Cuenca tienen una sofisticada tradición de fabricación de cestas, como lo ejemplifican Dat So La Lee /Louisa Keyser ( Washoe ), Lucy Telles , Carrie Bethel y Nellie Charlie . Después de ser desplazado de sus tierras por colonos no nativos, Washoe tejió cestas para el mercado de productos básicos, especialmente entre 1895 y 1935. [28] Los cesteros paiute , shoshone y washoe son conocidos por sus cestas que incorporan cuentas de semillas en la superficie y por sus cestas impermeables. . [29]
Los nativos americanos de California han utilizado diferentes medios y formas para sus diseños tradicionales que se encuentran en artefactos que expresan su historia y cultura. Algunas formas de arte tradicionales y evidencia arqueológica incluyen cestería, pictografías pintadas y petroglifos encontrados en las paredes de las cuevas y estatuillas de efigies.
Los nativos americanos de California tienen una tradición de tejido de cestas exquisitamente detalladas . A finales del siglo XIX, las cestas californianas de artistas de las tribus Cahuilla , Chumash , Pomo , Miwok , Hupa y muchas otras tribus se hicieron populares entre coleccionistas, museos y turistas. Esto resultó en una gran innovación en la forma de las cestas. Muchas piezas de tejedores de cestas nativos americanos de todas partes de California se encuentran en colecciones de museos, como el Museo Peabody de Arqueología y Etnología de la Universidad de Harvard , el Museo del Suroeste y el Museo Nacional del Indio Americano de la Institución Smithsonian .
California tiene una gran cantidad de pictografías y petroglifos de arte rupestre . Una de las mayores densidades de petroglifos en América del Norte, obra del pueblo Coso , se encuentra en los Cañones de Petroglifos Grandes y Pequeños en el Distrito de Arte Rupestre de Coso en el norte del desierto de Mojave en California.
Se considera que las pictografías más elaboradas de EE. UU. son el arte rupestre del pueblo Chumash , que se encuentra en pinturas rupestres en los actuales condados de Santa Bárbara , Ventura y San Luis Obispo . La pintura rupestre de Chumash incluye ejemplos en el Parque Histórico Estatal Chumash Painted Cave y en la Cueva Pintada de Burro Flats .
Una práctica artística utilizada por las tribus nativas americanas de California, como los Chumash, es tallar y dar forma a estatuillas en forma de efigie. A partir de múltiples estudios arqueológicos realizados en varios sitios históricos (las Islas del Canal , Malibú , Santa Bárbara y más), se descubrieron muchas figuras en efigies que representaban varias formas zoomorfas, como peces, ballenas, ranas y pájaros. [30] [31] Como resultado del análisis de estas figuras de efigie en estos estudios, se sacaron varias conclusiones sólidas que proporcionaron contexto a los nativos americanos de California, como los atributos sociales entre los Chumash y otras tribus, la importancia económica y el posible uso. en rituales. [30] [31] [32] Algunas estatuillas de efigie se encontraron en entierros, y otras se encontraron en relación con características estilísticas similares con fechas que sugieren esferas de interacción social en el Holoceno Medio y Tardío entre tribus. [30] [31]
En el suroeste de Estados Unidos se crearon numerosas pictografías y petroglifos. La cultura Fremont y las creaciones de los habitantes ancestrales y de las tribus posteriores, en el estilo Barrier Canyon y otros, se ven en la actualidad en Buckhorn Draw Pictograph Panel y Horseshoe Canyon , entre otros sitios. Los petroglifos de estos y los artistas de la cultura Mogollón están representados en el Monumento Nacional Dinosaurio y en Newspaper Rock .
Los ancestrales pueblo , o anasazi, (1000 a. C.-700 d. C.) son los antepasados de las tribus pueblo actuales . Su cultura se formó en el suroeste de Estados Unidos, después de que se introdujera el cultivo de maíz desde México alrededor del año 1200 a. C. La gente de esta región desarrolló un estilo de vida agrario, cultivando alimentos, calabazas de almacenamiento y algodón con técnicas de riego o xerojardinería . Vivían en ciudades sedentarias, por lo que la cerámica, utilizada para almacenar agua y cereales, era omnipresente.
Durante cientos de años, Ancestral Pueblo creó cerámica gris utilitaria y cerámica negra sobre blanca y ocasionalmente cerámica naranja o roja. En tiempos históricos, los Hopi crearon ollas , cuencos de masa y cuencos de comida de diferentes tamaños para uso diario, pero también fabricaron tazas ceremoniales, jarras, cucharones, tarros de semillas y aquellos recipientes para uso ritual más elaborados, y estos generalmente estaban terminados con pulido. superficies y decoradas con diseños pintados de negro. A principios del siglo XX, el famoso alfarero hopi Nampeyo revivió la cerámica de estilo Sikyátki , originada en la Primera Mesa entre los siglos XIV y XVII. [33]
La arquitectura del suroeste incluye viviendas en acantilados , asentamientos de varios pisos tallados en roca viva ; casas de pozo ; y pueblos de adobe y arenisca . Uno de los asentamientos antiguos más grandes y elaborados es Chaco Canyon en Nuevo México , que incluye 15 complejos importantes de arenisca y madera. Estos están conectados por una red de carreteras. La construcción del mayor de estos asentamientos, Pueblo Bonito , comenzó 1080 años antes del presente . Pueblo Bonito contiene más de 800 habitaciones. [34]
La turquesa , el azabache y la concha de ostra espinosa han sido utilizados tradicionalmente por los Pueblo Ancestral para joyería, y desarrollaron sofisticadas técnicas de incrustación hace siglos.
Alrededor del año 200 d.C., la cultura Hohokam se desarrolló en Arizona. Son los antepasados de las tribus Tohono O'odham y Akimel O'odham o Pima. Los Mimbres , un subgrupo de la cultura Mogollón , destacan especialmente por las pinturas narrativas de su cerámica.
En el último milenio, los pueblos athabaskan emigraron desde el norte de Canadá hacia el suroeste. Estos incluyen a los navajos y apaches . La pintura con arena es un aspecto de las ceremonias curativas navajo que inspiró una forma de arte. Los navajos aprendieron a tejer en telares verticales de los Pueblos y tejieron mantas que fueron recolectadas con entusiasmo por las tribus de la Gran Cuenca y las Llanuras en los siglos XVIII y XIX. Después de la introducción del ferrocarril en la década de 1880, las mantas importadas se volvieron abundantes y económicas, por lo que los tejedores navajos pasaron a producir alfombras para el comercio.
En la década de 1850, los navajos adoptaron la platería de los mexicanos. Atsidi Sani (Old Smith) fue el primer platero navajo, pero tuvo muchos estudiantes y la tecnología se extendió rápidamente a las tribus circundantes. Hoy en día miles de artistas producen joyas de plata con turquesa. Los hopi son famosos por sus trabajos en plata superpuestos y tallas de álamo. Los artistas zuñi son admirados por sus joyas en racimo, que muestran diseños de turquesa, así como por sus elaboradas incrustaciones pictóricas de piedras en plata.
El desarrollo cultural de la antigua Mesoamérica estuvo generalmente dividido entre oriente y occidente. "Los arqueólogos han fechado la presencia humana en Mesoamérica posiblemente ya en el año 21.000 a. C." (Jeff Wallenfeldt ) [35] . La cultura maya estable fue más dominante en el este, especialmente en la península de Yucatán, mientras que en el oeste se produjeron desarrollos más variados en subregiones. Estos incluyeron el oeste de México (1000-1), Teotihuacán (1-500), mixteco (1000-1200) y azteca (1200-1521).
Las civilizaciones centroamericanas generalmente vivieron en las regiones al sur del actual México, aunque hubo cierta superposición entre los lugares.
Mesoamérica fue hogar de las siguientes culturas, entre otras:
Los olmecas (1500-400 a. C.), que vivieron en la costa del golfo, fueron la primera civilización que se desarrolló plenamente en Mesoamérica. Su cultura fue la primera en desarrollar muchos rasgos que permanecieron constantes en Mesoamérica hasta los últimos días de los aztecas: un calendario astronómico complejo, la práctica ritual de un juego de pelota y la erección de estelas para conmemorar victorias u otros eventos importantes.
Las creaciones artísticas más famosas de los olmecas son las colosales cabezas de basalto , que se cree que son retratos de gobernantes que fueron erigidos para anunciar su gran poder. Los olmecas también esculpieron figuras votivas que enterraron bajo el piso de sus casas por razones desconocidas. Estos fueron modelados con mayor frecuencia en terracota, pero ocasionalmente también fueron tallados en jade o serpentina .
Teotihuacán fue una ciudad construida en el Valle de México , que contiene algunas de las estructuras piramidales más grandes construidas en la América precolombina . Establecida alrededor del año 200 a. C., la ciudad cayó entre los siglos VII y VIII d. C. Teotihuacán cuenta con numerosos murales bien conservados .
En su libro de 1957 sobre arte mesoamericano, Miguel Covarrubias habla de las "magníficas figuras huecas de Remojadas con rostros expresivos, en posturas majestuosas y vistiendo parafernalia elaborada indicada por elementos de arcilla agregados". [37]
"El Dios Murciélago era una de las deidades importantes de los mayas, muchos elementos de cuya religión también eran compartidos por los zapotecas . Se sabe que el Dios Murciélago en particular fue venerado también por los zapotecas... Estaba especialmente asociado... . con el inframundo." [ atribución necesaria ] [38] Un importante centro zapoteca fue Monte Albán , en la actual Oaxaca , México. Los períodos Monte Albán se dividen en I, II y III, que van desde el 200 a.C. hasta el 600 d.C.
La civilización maya ocupó el sur de México, toda Guatemala y Belice , y la parte occidental de Honduras y El Salvador .
![Piedra del calendario azteca; 1502-1521; basalto; diámetro: 358 cm (141 pulg.); espesor: 98 cm (39 pulg.); descubierto el 17 de diciembre de 1790 durante las reparaciones de la Catedral de la Ciudad de México; Museo Nacional de Antropología (Ciudad de México). El propósito y significado exactos de la Piedra del Calendario no están claros. Arqueólogos e historiadores han propuesto numerosas teorías, y es probable que existan varios aspectos para su interpretación[40].](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b1/1479_Stein_der_f%C3%BCnften_Sonne,_sog._Aztekenkalender,_Ollin_Tonatiuh_anagoria.JPG/1280px-1479_Stein_der_f%C3%BCnften_Sonne,_sog._Aztekenkalender,_Ollin_Tonatiuh_anagoria.JPG)
Gran Chiriquí
Gran Nicoya Los antiguos pueblos de la Península de Nicoya en la actual Costa Rica esculpían tradicionalmente pájaros en jade , que se utilizaban como adornos funerarios. [41] Alrededor del año 500 d.C., los adornos de oro reemplazaron al jade, posiblemente debido al agotamiento de los recursos de jade. [42]
Las civilizaciones nativas se desarrollaron más en la región andina , donde se dividen aproximadamente en civilizaciones de los Andes del norte de los actuales Colombia y Ecuador y civilizaciones de los Andes del sur de los actuales Perú y Chile.
Las tribus de cazadores-recolectores de la selva amazónica de Brasil también han desarrollado tradiciones artísticas que incluyen tatuajes y pintura corporal. Debido a su lejanía, estas tribus y su arte no han sido estudiados tan a fondo como las culturas andinas, y muchas incluso permanecen aisladas .
El Área Istmocolombiana incluye algunos países centroamericanos (como Costa Rica y Panamá ) y algunos países sudamericanos cercanos a ellos (como Colombia ).
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Traditionally limited in access to stone and metals, Amazonian indigenous peoples excel at featherwork, painting, textiles, and ceramics. Caverna da Pedra Pintada (Cave of the Painted Rock) in the Pará state of Brazil houses the oldest firmly dated art in the Americas – rock paintings dating back 11,000 years. The cave is also the site of the oldest ceramics in the Americas, from 5000 BCE.[44]
The Island of Marajó, at the mouth of the Amazon River was a major center of ceramic traditions as early as 1000 CE[44] and continues to produce ceramics today, characterized by cream-colored bases painted with linear, geometric designs of red, black, and white slips.
With access to a wide range of native bird species, Amazonian indigenous peoples excel at feather work, creating brilliant colored headdresses, jewelry, clothing, and fans. Iridescent beetle wings are incorporated into earrings and other jewelry. Weaving and basketry also thrive in the Amazon, as noted among the Urarina of Peru.[45]
Pinpointing the exact time of emergence of "modern" and contemporary Native art is problematic. In the past, Western art historians have considered use of Western art media or exhibiting in international art arena as criteria for "modern" Native American art history.[46] Native American art history is a new and highly contested academic discipline, and these Eurocentric benchmarks are followed less and less today. Many media considered appropriate for easel art were employed by Native artists for centuries, such as stone and wood sculpture and mural painting. Ancestral Pueblo artists painted with tempera on woven cotton fabric, at least 800 years ago.[47] Certain Native artists used non-Indian art materials as soon as they became available. For example, Texcocan artist Fernando de Alva Cortés Ixtlilxóchitl painted with ink and watercolor on paper in the late 16th century. Bound together in the Codex Ixtlilxóchitl, these portraits of historical Texcocan leaders are rendered with shading, modeling and anatomic accuracy.[48] The Cuzco School of Peru featured Quechua easel painters in the 17th and 18th centuries. The first cabinets of curiosities in the 16th century, precursors to modern museums, featured Native American art.
The notion that fine art cannot be functional has not gained widespread acceptance in the Native American art world, as evidenced by the high esteem and value placed upon rugs, blankets, basketry, weapons, and other utilitarian items in Native American art shows. A dichotomy between fine art and craft is not commonly found in contemporary Native art. For example, the Cherokee Nation honors its greatest artists as Living Treasures, including frog- and fish-gig makers, flint knappers, and basket weavers, alongside sculptors, painters, and textile artists.[49] Art historian Dawn Ades writes, "Far from being inferior, or purely decorative, crafts like textiles or ceramics, have always had the possibility of being the bearers of vital knowledge, beliefs and myths."[50]
Recognizable art markets between Natives and non-Natives emerged upon contact, but the 1820–1840s were a highly prolific time. In the Pacific Northwest and the Great Lakes region, tribes dependent upon the rapidly diminishing fur trade adopted art production a means of financial support. A painting movement known as the Iroquois Realist School emerged among the Haudenosaunee in New York in the 1820s, spearheaded by the brothers David and Dennis Cusick.[51]
African-Ojibwe sculptor, Edmonia Lewis maintained a studio in Rome, Italy and carved Neoclassicist marble sculptors from the 1860s–1880s. Her mother belonged to the Mississauga band of the Credit River Indian Reserve. Lewis exhibited widely, and a testament to her popularity during her own time was that President Ulysses S. Grant commissioned her to carve his portrait in 1877.[52]
Ho-Chunk artist, Angel De Cora was the best known Native American artist before World War I.[53] She was taken from her reservation and family to the Hampton Institute, where she began her lengthy formal art training.[54] Active in the Arts and Crafts movement, De Cora exhibited her paintings and design widely and illustrated books by Native authors. She strove to be tribally specific in her work and was revolutionary for portraying Indians in contemporary clothing of the early 20th century. She taught art to young Native students at Carlisle Indian Industrial School and was an outspoken advocate of art as a means for Native Americans to maintain cultural pride, while finding a place in mainstream society.[55]
The Kiowa Six, a group of Kiowa painters from Oklahoma, met with international success when their mentor, Oscar Jacobson, showed their paintings in First International Art Exposition in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1928.[56] They also participated in the 1932 Venice Biennale, where their art display, according to Dorothy Dunn, "was acclaimed the most popular exhibit among all the rich and varied displays assembled."[57]
The Santa Fe Indian Market began in 1922. John Collier became Commissioner of Indian Affairs in 1933 and temporarily reversed the BIA's assimilationist policies by encouraging Native American arts and culture. By this time, Native American art exhibits and the art market increased, gaining wider audiences. In the 1920s and 1930s, Indigenist art movements flourished in Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Mexico, most famously with the Mexican Muralist movements.
Basket weaving is one of the ancient and most-widespread art forms in the Americas. From coiled sea lyme grass baskets in Nunavut to bark baskets in Tierra del Fuego, Native artists weave baskets from a wide range of materials. Typically baskets are made of vegetable fibers, but Tohono O'odham are known for their horsehair baskets and Inupiaq artists weave baskets from baleen, filtering plates of certain whales.[58] Grand Traverse Band Kelly Church, Wasco-Wishram Pat Gold, and Eastern Band Cherokee Joel Queen all weave baskets from copper sheets or wire, and Mi'kmaq-Onondaga conceptual artist Gail Tremblay weaves baskets in the traditional fancywork patterns of her tribes from exposed film. Basketry can take many forms. Haida artist Lisa Telford uses cedar bark to weave both traditional functional baskets and impractical but beautiful cedar evening gowns and high-heeled shoes.[59]
A range of native grasses provides material for Arctic baskets, as does baleen, which is a 20th-century development. Baleen baskets are typically embellished with walrus ivory carvings.[58] Cedar bark is often used in northwest coastal baskets. Throughout the Great Lakes and northeast, black ash and sweetgrass are woven into fancy work, featuring "porcupine" points, or decorated as strawberries. Bark baskets are traditional for gathering berries. Rivercane is the preferred material in the Southeast, and Chitimachas are regarded as the finest rivercane weavers. In Oklahoma, rivercane is prized but rare so baskets are typically made of honeysuckle or buckbrush runners. Coiled baskets are popular in the southwest and the Hopi and Apache in particular are known for pictorial coiled basketry plaques. The Tohono O'odham are well known for their basket-weaving prowess, and evidenced by the success of Annie Antone and Terrol Dew Johnson.
California and Great Basin tribes are considered some of the finest basket weavers in the world. Juncus is a common material in southern California, while sedge, willow, redbud, and devil's claw are also used. Pomo basket weavers are known to weave 60–100 stitches per inch and their rounded, coiled baskets adorned with quail's topknots, feathers, abalone, and clamshell discs are known as "treasure baskets". Three of the most celebrated Californian basket weavers were Elsie Allen (Pomo), Laura Somersal (Wappo), and the late Pomo-Patwin medicine woman, Mabel McKay,[60] known for her biography, Weaving the Dream. Louisa Keyser was a highly influential Washoe basket weaver.
A complex technique called "doubleweave," which involves continuously weaving both an inside and outside surface is shared by the Choctaw, Cherokee, Chitimacha, Tarahumara, and Venezuelan tribes. Mike Dart, Cherokee Nation, is a contemporary practitioner of this technique. The Tarahumara, or Raramuri, of Copper Canyon, Mexico typically weave with pine needles and sotol. In Panama, Embera-Wounaan peoples are renowned for their pictorial chunga palm baskets, known as hösig di, colored in vivid full-spectrum of natural dyes.
Yanomamo basket weavers of the Venezuelan Amazon paint their woven tray and burden baskets with geometric designs in charcoal and onto, a red berry.[61] While in most tribes the basket weavers are often women, among the Waura tribe in Brazil, men weave baskets. They weave a wide range of styles, but the largest are called mayaku, which can be two feet wide and feature tight weaves with an impressive array of designs.[62]
Today basket weaving often leads to environmental activism. Indiscriminate pesticide spraying endangers basket weavers' health. The black ash tree, used by basket weavers from Michigan to Maine, is threatened by the emerald ash borer. Basket weaver Kelly Church has organized two conferences about the threat and teaches children how to harvest black ash seeds.[63] Many native plants that basket weavers use are endangered. Rivercane only grows in 2% of its original territory. Cherokee basket weaver and ethnobotanist, Shawna Cain is working with her tribe to form the Cherokee Nation Native Plant Society.[64] Tohono O'odham basket weaver Terrol Dew Johnson, known for his experimental use of gourds, beargrass, and other desert plants, took his interest in native plants and founded Tohono O'odham Community Action, which provides traditional wild desert foods for his tribe.[65]
Beadwork is a quintessentially Native American art form, but ironically uses beads imported from Europe and Asia. Glass beads have been in use for almost five centuries in the Americas. Today a wide range of beading styles flourish.
In the Great Lakes, Ursuline nuns introduced floral patterns to tribes, who quickly applied them to beadwork.[66] Great Lakes tribes are known for their bandolier bags, that might take an entire year to complete.[67] During the 20th century the Plateau tribes, such as the Nez Perce perfected contour-style beadwork, in which the lines of beads are stitch to emphasize the pictorial imagery. Plains tribes are master beaders, and today dance regalia for man and women feature a variety of beadwork styles. While Plains and Plateau tribes are renowned for their beaded horse trappings, Subarctic tribes such as the Dene bead lavish floral dog blankets.[68] Eastern tribes have a completely different beadwork aesthetic, and Innu, Mi'kmaq, Penobscot, and Haudenosaunee tribes are known for symmetrical scroll motifs in white beads, called the "double curve."[69] Iroquois are also known for "embossed" beading in which strings pulled taut force beads to pop up from the surface, creating a bas-relief. Tammy Rahr (Cayuga) is a contemporary practitioner of this style. Zuni artists have developed a tradition of three-dimensional beaded sculptures.
Huichol Indians of Jalisco and Nayarit, Mexico have a unique approach to beadwork. They adhere beads, one by one, to a surface, such as wood or a gourd, with a mixture of resin and beeswax.[70]
Most Native beadwork is created for tribal use but beadworkers also create conceptual work for the art world. Richard Aitson (Kiowa-Apache) has both an Indian and non-Indian audience for his work and is known for his fully beaded cradleboards. Another Kiowa beadworker, Teri Greeves has won top honors for her beadwork, which consciously integrates both traditional and contemporary motifs, such as beaded dancers on Converse high-tops. Greeves also beads on buckskin and explores such issues as warfare or Native American voting rights.[71]
Marcus Amerman, Choctaw, one of today's most celebrated bead artists, pioneered a movement of highly realistic beaded portraits.[72] His imagery ranges from 19th century Native leaders to pop icons such as Janet Jackson and Brooke Shields.
Roger Amerman, Marcus' brother, and Martha Berry, Cherokee, have effectively revived Southeastern beadwork, a style that had been lost because of forced removal from tribes to Indian Territory. Their beadwork commonly features white bead outlines, an echo of the shell beads or pearls Southeastern tribes used before contact.[73]
Jamie Okuma (Luiseño-Shoshone-Bannock) was won top awards with her beaded dolls, which can include entire families or horses and riders, all with fully beaded regalia. The antique Venetian beads she uses can as small as size 22°, about the size of a grain of salt.[74] Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty, Rhonda Holy Bear, and Charlene Holy Bear are also prominent beaded dollmakers.
The widespread popularity of glass beads does not mean aboriginal bead making is dead. Perhaps the most famous Native bead is wampum, a cylindrical tube of quahog or whelk shell. Both shells produce white beads, but only parts of the quahog produce purple. These are ceremonially and politically important to a range of Northeastern Woodland tribes.[75] Elizabeth James Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag-Eastern Band Cherokee) creates wampum jewelry today, including wampum belts.[76]
Ceramics have been created in the Americas for the last 8000 years, as evidenced by pottery found in Caverna da Pedra Pintada in the heart of the Brazilian Amazon.[77] The Island of Marajó in Brazil remains a major center of ceramic art today.[78] In Mexico, Mata Ortiz pottery continues the ancient Casas Grandes tradition of polychrome pottery. Juan Quezada is one of the leading potters from Mata Ortiz.[79]
In the Southeast, the Catawba tribe is known for its tan-and-black mottled pottery. Eastern Band Cherokees' pottery has Catawba influences.[80] In Oklahoma, Cherokees lost their pottery traditions until revived by Anna Belle Sixkiller Mitchell. The Caddo tribe's centuries-long pottery tradition had died out in the early 20th century, but has been effectively revived by Jereldine Redcorn.
Pueblo people are particularly known for their ceramic traditions. Nampeyo (c. 1860 – 1942) was a Hopi potter who collaborated with anthropologists to revive traditional pottery forms and designs, and many of her relatives are successful potters today. Maria and Julian Martinez, both San Ildefonso Pueblo revived their tribe's blackware tradition in the early 20th century. Julian invented a gloss-matte blackware style for which his tribe is still known today. Lucy Lewis (1898–1992) of Acoma Pueblo gained recognition for her black-on-white ceramics in the mid-20th century. Cochiti Pueblo was known for its grotesque figurines at the turn-of-the-20th century, and these have been revived by Virgil Ortiz. Cochiti potter Helen Cordero (1915–1994) invented storyteller figures, which feature a large, single figure of a seated elder telling stories to groups of smaller figures.[81]
While northern potters are not as well known as their southern counterparts, ceramic arts extend as far north as the Arctic. Inuit potter, Makituk Pingwartok of Cape Dorset uses a pottery wheel to create her prizewinning ceramics.[82]
Today contemporary Native potters create a wide range of ceramics from functional pottery to monumental ceramic sculpture. Roxanne Swentzell of Santa Clara Pueblo is one of the leading ceramic artists in the Americas. She creates coil-built, emotionally charged figures that comment on contemporary society. Nora Naranjo-Morse, also of Santa Clara Pueblo is world-renowned for her individual figures as well as conceptual installations featuring ceramics.[83] Diego Romero of Cochiti Pueblo is known for his ceramic bowls, painted with satirical scenes that combine Ancestral Pueblo, Greek, and pop culture imagery. Hundreds more Native contemporary ceramic artists are taking pottery in new directions.
Performance art is a new art form, emerging in the 1960s, and so does not carry the cultural baggage of many other art genres. Performance art can draw upon storytelling traditions, as well as music and dance, and often includes elements of installation, video, film, and textile design. Rebecca Belmore, a Canadian Ojibway performance artist, has represented her country in the prestigious Venice Biennale. James Luna, a Luiseño-Mexican performance artist, also participated in the Venice Biennale in 2005,[84] representing the National Museum of the American Indian.
Performance allows artists to confront their audience directly, challenge long held stereotypes, and bring up current issues, often in an emotionally charged manner. "[P]eople just howl in their seats, and there's ranting and booing or hissing, carrying on in the audience," says Rebecca Belmore of the response to her work.[85] She has created performances to call attention to violence against and many unsolved murders of First Nations women. Both Belmore and Luna create elaborate, often outlandish outfits and props for their performances and move through a range of characters. For instance, a repeating character of Luna's is Uncle Jimmy,[86] a disabled veteran who criticizes greed and apathy on his reservation.
On the other hand, Marcus Amerman, a Choctaw performance artist, maintains a consistent role of the Buffalo Man, whose irony and social commentary arise from the odd situations in which he finds himself, for instance a James Bond movie or lost in a desert labyrinth.[87] Jeff Marley, Cherokee, pulls from the tradition of the "booger dance" to create subversive, yet humorous, interventions that take history and place into account.[88]
Erica Lord, Inupiaq-Athabaskan, explores her mixed-race identity and conflicts about the ideas of home through her performance art. In her words, "In order to sustain a genuine self, I create a world in which I shift to become one or all of my multiple visions of self."[89] She has suntanned phrases into her skin, donned cross-cultural and cross-gender disguises, and incorporated songs, ranging from Inupiaq throat singing to racist children's rhymes into her work.
A Bolivian anarcha-feminist cooperative, Mujeres Creando or "Women Creating" features many indigenous artists. They create public performances or street theater to bring attention to issues of women's, indigenous people's, and lesbian's rights, as well as anti-poverty issues. Julieta Paredes, María Galindo and Mónica Mendoza are founding members.
Performance art has allowed Native Americans access to the international art world, and Rebecca Belmore mentions that her audiences are non-Native;[85] however, Native American audiences also respond to this genre. Bringing It All Back Home, a 1997 film collaboration between James Luna and Chris Eyre, documents Luna's first performance at his own home, the La Jolla Indian Reservation. Luna describes the experience as "probably the scariest moment of my life as an artist ... performing for the members of my reservation in the tribal hall."[90]
Native Americans embraced photography in the 19th century. Some even owned their own photography studios, such as Benjamin Haldane (1874–1941), Tsimshian of Metlakatla Village on Annette Island, Alaska,[91] Jennie Ross Cobb (Cherokee Nation, 1881–1959) of Park Hill, Oklahoma, and Richard Throssel (Cree, 1882–1933) of Montana. Their early photographs stand in stark contrast to the romanticized images of Edward Curtis and other contemporaries. Scholarship by Mique’l Askren (Tsimshian/Tlingit) on the photographs of B.A. Haldane has analyzed the functions that Haldane's photographs served for his community: as markers of success by having Anglo-style formal portraits taken, and as markers of the continuity of potlatching and traditional ceremonials by having photographs taken in ceremonial regalia. This second category is particularly significant because the use of the ceremonial regalia was against the law in Canada between 1885 and 1951.[92]
Martín Chambi (Quechua, 1891–1973), a photographer from Peru, was one of the pioneering Indigenous photographers of South America. Peter Pitseolak (Inuk, 1902–1973), from Cape Dorset, Nunavut, documented Inuit life in the mid-20th century while dealing with challenges presented by the harsh climate and extreme light conditions of the Canadian Arctic. He developed his film himself in his igloo, and some of his photos were shot by oil lamps. Following in the footsteps of early Kiowa amateur photographers Parker McKenzie(1897–1999) and Nettie Odlety McKenzie (1897–1978), Horace Poolaw (Kiowa, 1906–1984) shot over 2000 images of his neighbors and relatives in Western Oklahoma from the 1920s onward. Jean Fredericks (Hopi, 1906–1990) carefully negotiated Hopi cultural views toward photography and did not offer his portraits of Hopi people for sale to the public.[93]
Today innumerable Native people are professional art photographers; however, acceptance to the genre has met with challenges. Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie (Navajo/Muscogee/Seminole) has not only established a successful career with her own work, she has also been an advocate for the entire field of Native American photography. She has curated shows and organized conferences at the C.N. Gorman Museum at UC Davis featuring Native American photographers. Tsinhnahjinnie wrote the book, Our People, Our Land, Our Images: International Indigenous Photographers. Native photographers have taken their skills into the fields of art videography, photocollage, digital photography, and digital art.
Although it is widely speculated that the ancient Adena stone tablets were used for printmaking, not much is known about aboriginal American printmaking. 20th-century Native artists have borrowed techniques from Japan and Europe, such as woodcut, linocut, serigraphy, monotyping, and other practices.
Printmaking has flourished among Inuit communities in particular. European-Canadian James Houston created a graphic art program in Cape Dorset, Nunavut in 1957.[94] Houston taught local Inuit stone carvers how to create prints from stone-blocks and stencils. He asked local artists to draw pictures and the shop generated limited edition prints, based on the ukiyo-e workshop system of Japan. Cooperative print shops were also established in nearby communities, including Baker Lake, Puvirnituq, Holman, and Pangnirtung. These shops have experimented with etching, engraving, lithography, and silkscreen. Shops produced annual catalogs advertising their collections. Local birds and animals, spirit beings, and hunting scenes are the most popular subject matter,[94] but are allegorical in nature.[95] Backgrounds tend to be minimal and perspective is mixed.[96] One of the most prominent of Cape Dorset artists is Kenojuak Ashevak (born 1927), who has received many public commissions and two honorary doctorate degrees.[96] Other prominent Inuit printmakers and graphic artists include Parr, Osuitok Ipeelee, Germaine Arnaktauyok, Pitseolak Ashoona, Tivi Etok, Helen Kalvak, Jessie Oonark, Kananginak Pootoogook, Pudlo Pudlat, Irene Avaalaaqiaq Tiktaalaaq, and Simon Tookoome. Inuit printmaker Andrew Qappik designed the coat of arms of Nunavut.
Many Native painters transformed their paintings into fine art prints. Potawatomi artist Woody Crumbo created bold, screen prints and etchings in the mid-20th century that blended traditional, flat Bacone Style with Art Deco influences. Kiowa-Caddo-Choctaw painter, T.C. Cannon traveled to Japan to study wood block printing from master printers.
In Chile, Mapuche printmaker Santos Chávez (1934–2001) was one of the most celebrated artists of his country – with over 85 solo exhibitions during his lifetime.[97]
Melanie Yazzie (Navajo), Linda Lomahaftewa (Hopi-Choctaw), Fritz Scholder and Debora Iyall (Cowlitz) have all built successful careers with their print and have gone on to teach the next generation of printers. Walla Walla artist, James Lavadour founded Crow's Shadow Institute of the Arts on the Umatilla Reservation in Oregon in 1992. Crow's Shadow features a state-of-the-art printmaking studio and offers workshops, exhibition space, and printmaking residencies for Native artists, in which they pair visiting artists with master printers.[98]
Native Americans have created sculpture, both monumental and small, for millennia. Stone sculptures are ubiquitous through the Americas, in the forms of stelae, inuksuit, and statues. Alabaster stone carving is popular among Western tribes, where catlinite carving is traditional in the Northern Plains and fetish-carving is traditional in the Southwest, particularly among the Zuni. The Taíno of Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic are known for their zemis– sacred, three-pointed stone sculptures.
Inuit artists sculpt with walrus ivory, caribou antlers, bones, soapstone, serpentinite, and argillite. They often represent local fauna and humans engaged in hunting or ceremonial activities.
Edmonia Lewis paved the way for Native American artists to sculpt in mainstream traditions using non-Native materials. Allan Houser (Warms Springs Chiricahua Apache) became one of the most prominent Native sculptors of the 20th century. Though he worked in wood and stone, Houser is most known for his monumental bronze sculptors, both representational and abstract. Houser influenced a generation of Native sculptors by teaching at the Institute of American Indian Arts. His two sons, Phillip and Bob Haozous are sculptors today. Roxanne Swentzell (Santa Clara Pueblo) is known for her expressive, figurative, ceramic sculptures but has also branched into bronze casting, and her work is permanently displayed at the National Museum of the American Indian.
The Northwest Coastal tribes are known for their woodcarving – most famously their monumental totem poles that display clan crests. During the 19th century and early 20th century, this art form was threatened but was effectively revived. Kwakwaka'wakw totem pole carvers such as Charlie James, Mungo Martin, Ellen Neel, and Willie Seaweed kept the art alive and also carved masks, furniture, bentwood boxes, and jewelry. Haida carvers include Charles Edenshaw, Bill Reid, and Robert Davidson. Besides working in wood, Haida also work with argillite. Traditional formline designs translate well into glass sculpture, which is increasingly popular thanks to efforts by contemporary glass artists such as Preston Singletary (Tlingit), Susan Point (Coast Salish) and Marvin Oliver (Quinault/Isleta Pueblo).[99]
In the Southeast, woodcarving dominates sculpture. Willard Stone, of Cherokee descent, exhibited internationally in the mid-20th century. Amanda Crowe (Eastern Band Cherokee) studied sculpture at the Art Institute of Chicago and returned to her reservation to teach over 2000 students woodcarving over a period of 40 years, ensuring that sculpture thrives as an art form on the Qualla Boundary.[100]
Fiberwork dating back 10,000 years has been unearthed from Guitarrero Cave in Peru.[101] Cotton and wool from alpaca, llamas, and vicuñas have been woven into elaborate textiles for thousands of years in the Andes and are still important parts of Quechua and Aymara culture today. Coroma in Antonio Quijarro Province, Bolivia is a major center for ceremonial textile production.[102] An Aymara elder from Coroma said, "In our sacred weavings are expressions of our philosophy, and the basis for our social organization... The sacred weavings are also important in differentiating one community, or ethnic group, from a neighboring group..."[103]
Kuna tribal members of Panama and Colombia are famous for their molas, cotton panels with elaborate geometric designs created by a reverse appliqué technique. Designs originated from traditional skin painting designs but today exhibit a wide range of influences, including pop culture. Two mola panels form a blouse, but when a Kuna woman is tired of a blouse, she can disassemble it and sell the molas to art collectors.[104]
Mayan women have woven cotton with backstrap looms for centuries, creating items such as huipils or traditional blouses. Elaborate Maya textiles featured representations of animals, plants, and figures from oral history.[105] Organizing into weaving collectives have helped Mayan women earn better money for their work and greatly expand the reach of Mayan textiles in the world.
Seminole seamstresses, upon gaining access to sewing machines in the late 19th century and early 20th centuries, invented an elaborate appliqué patchwork tradition. Seminole patchwork, for which the tribe is known today, came into full flower in the 1920s.[106]
Great Lakes and Prairie tribes are known for their ribbonwork, found on clothing and blankets. Strips of silk ribbons are cut and appliquéd in layers, creating designs defined by negative space. The colors and designs might reflect the clan or gender of the wearer. Powwow and other dance regalia from these tribes often feature ribbonwork. These tribes are also known for their fingerwoven sashes.
Pueblo men weave with cotton on upright looms. Their mantas and sashes are typically made for ceremonial use for the community, not for outside collectors.
Navajo rugs are woven by Navajo women today from Navajo-Churro sheep or commercial wool. Designs can be pictorial or abstract, based on traditional Navajo, Spanish, Oriental, or Persian designs. 20th-century Navajo weavers include Clara Sherman and Hosteen Klah, who co-founded the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian.
In 1973, the Navajo Studies Department of the Diné College in Many Farms, Arizona, wanted to determine how long it took a Navajo weaver to create a rug or blanket from sheep shearing to market. The study determined the total amount of time was 345 hours. Out of these 345 hours, the expert Navajo weaver needed: 45 hours to shear the sheep and process the wool; 24 hours to spin the wool; 60 hours to prepare the dye and to dye the wool; 215 hours to weave the piece; and only one hour to sell the item in their shop.[107]
Customary textiles of Northwest Coast peoples using non-Western materials and techniques are enjoying a dramatic revival. Chilkat weaving and Ravenstail weaving are regarded as some of the most difficult weaving techniques in the world. A single Chilkat blanket can take an entire year to weave. In both techniques, dog, mountain goat, or sheep wool and shredded cedar bark are combined to create textiles featuring curvilinear formline designs. Tlingit weaver Jennie Thlunaut (1982–1986) was instrumental in this revival.
Experimental 21st-century textile artists include Lorena Lemunguier Quezada, a Mapuche weaver from Chile, and Martha Gradolf (Winnebago), whose work is overtly political in nature.[108] Valencia, Joseph and Ramona Sakiestewa (Hopi)[109] and Melissa Cody (Navajo) explore non-representational abstraction and use experimental materials in their weaving.
As in most cultures, Native peoples create some works that are to be used only in sacred, private ceremonies. Many sacred objects or items that contain medicine are to be seen or touched by certain individuals with specialized knowledge. Many Pueblo and Hopi katsina figures (tihü in Hopi and kokko in Zuni) and katsinam regalia are not meant to be seen by individuals who have not received instruction about that particular katsina. Many institutions do not display these publicly out of respect for tribal taboos.[110]
Midewiwin birch bark scrolls are deemed too culturally sensitive for public display,[111] as are medicine bundles, certain sacred pipes and pipe bags, and other tools of medicine people.[112]
Navajo sandpainting is a component for healing ceremonies, but sandpaintings can be made into permanent art that is acceptable to sell to non-Natives as long as Holy People are not portrayed.[113] Various tribes prohibit photography of many sacred ceremonies, as used to be the case in many Western cultures. As several early photographers broke local laws, photographs of sensitive ceremonies are in circulation, but tribes prefer that they not be displayed. The same can be said for photographs or sketches of medicine bundle contents.
Two Mohawk leaders sued a museum, trying to remove a False Face Society mask or Ga:goh:sah from an exhibit because "it was a medicine object intended to be seen only by community members and that its public display would cause irreparable harm to the Mohawk."[114] The Grand Council of the Haudenosaunee has ruled that such masks are not for sale or public display,[13] nor are Corn Husk Society masks.[14]
Tribes and individuals within tribes do not always agree about what is or is not appropriate to display to the public. Many institutions do not exhibit Ghost Dance regalia. At the request of tribal leaders, the Brooklyn Museum is among those that does not exhibit Plains warrior's shields or "artifacts imbued with a warrior's power".[115] Many tribes do not want grave goods or items associated with burials, such as funerary urns, in museums, and many would like associated grave goods reinterred. The process is often facilitated within the United States under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA).[116] In Canada, repatriation is negotiated between the tribes and museums or through Land Claims laws.[117] In international situations, institutions are not always legally required to repatriate indigenous cultural items to their place of origin; some museums do so voluntarily, as with Yale University's decision to return 5,000 artifacts and human remains to Cusco, Peru.[118]
Fraud has been a challenge facing Indigenous artists of the Americas for decades. In 1935, the United States passed the Indian Arts and Crafts Act which established the Indian Arts and Crafts Board and outlawed "willfully offer[ing] for sale any goods, with or without any Government trade mark, as Indian products or Indian products of a particular Indian tribe or group, resident within the United States or the Territory of Alaska, when such person knows such goods are not Indian products or are not Indian products of the particular Indian tribe or group."[119] In response to widespread Indigenous identity fraud, New Mexico passed the Indian Arts and Crafts Sales Act in 1959, which has been amended many times including in 1978 and 2023.[120] Oklahoma passed its American Indian Arts and Crafts Sales Act of 1974.[121] Native American activists fought to strengthen protections against fraud which resulted in the 1990 Indian Arts and Crafts Act (IACA), which makes it "illegal to offer or display for sale, or sell, any art or craft product in a manner that falsely suggests it is Indian produced, an Indian product, or the product of a particular Indian or Indian tribe or Indian arts and crafts organization, resident within the United States."[122][123] The penalties for the violation of IACA can include fines up to $250,000 and/or sentences up to five years in prison.[122]
Some tribes face so much fraud that they have had to enact their own laws to address the problem. The Cherokee Nation passed its own Cherokee Nation Truth in Advertising for Native Art in 2008.[124] This law states that only citizens of the three federally recognized Cherokee tribes can sell their artwork, books, or other creative works as being "Cherokee."[124]
Indigenous artists of Mexico and Guatemala have fought to protect their designs through intellectual property laws. Maya textile artists have lobbied for Guatemala to amend the nation's copyright laws to protect their collective intellectual property.[125] Non-Native fashion designers have misappropriated Indigenous designs and artwork.[125]
Indigenous American arts have had a long and complicated relationship with museum representation since the early 1900s. In 1931, The Exposition of Indian Tribal Arts was the first large scale show that held Indigenous art on display. Their portrayal in museums grew more common later in the 1900s as a reaction to the Civil Rights Movement. With the rising trend of representation in the political atmosphere, minority voices gained more representation in museums as well.[126]
Although Indigenous art was being displayed, the curatorial choices on how to display their work were not always made with the best of intentions. For instance, Native American art pieces and artifacts would often be shown alongside dinosaur bones, implying that they are a people of the past and non-existent or irrelevant in today's world.[127] Native American remains were on display in museums up until the 1960s.[128]
Though many did not yet view Native American art as a part of the mainstream as of the year 1992, there has since then been a great increase in volume and quality of both Native art and artists, as well as exhibitions and venues, and individual curators. Such leaders as the director of the National Museum of the American Indian insist that Native American representation be done from a first-hand perspective.[129] The establishment of such museums as the Heard Museum and the National Museum of the American Indian, both of which trained spotlights specifically upon Native American arts, enabled a great number of Native artists to display and develop their work.[130] For five months starting in October 2017, three Native American works of art selected from the Charles and Valerie Diker Collection to be exhibited in the American Wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.[131]
Museum representation for Indigenous artists calls for great responsibility from curators and museum institutions. The Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 prohibits non-Indigenous artists from exhibiting as Native American artists. Institutions and curators work discussing whom to represent, why are they being chosen, what Indigenous art looks like, and what its purpose is. Museums, as educational institutions, give light to cultures and narratives that would otherwise go unseen; they provide a necessary spotlight and who they choose to represent is pivotal to the history of the represented artists and culture.
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