Art of the Vessel: Maya and Moche

Vessels bear functional and metaphorical meanings in nearly every culture and society. But situated meanings and social uses of vessels and containers vary as widely as their physical forms and decorative programs range. In this seminar, we will investigate traditions from two preeminent ancient American cultural settings: Maya—in southern Mexico and northern Central America—and Moche—on the north coast of Peru. Despite their contemporaneity during the first millennium CE, and some parallel aspects of their ceramic art traditions, Maya and Moche communities were not in direct contact with each other. The histories and environments of each area are so different, one from the other, that the kinds of research questions and interpretive methods that can be applied to each set of traditions are often inherently divergent. Comparative attention to these works can reveal much about their makers’ worlds and their artistic practices and ideals, as well as modern histories of these works have been regarded, collected, displayed, problematized, and reclaimed. Each student in this research-focused seminar will produce an original essay that makes use of online collections and/or museum collections in the New York area.