- La pasión de Tórtola Valencia -

Museu Egipci de Barcelona - Fundació Arqueològica Clos

December 12, 2009 - May 30, 2010

Barcelona, Spain

Under the title Pre-Columbian Funerary Art, the Egyptian Museum of Barcelona exhibits a series of pieces that are representative of the main cultures present in the areas of Mesoamerica, Centro-America and the Andes, before the arrival of any Europeans and the subsequent as well as abrupt culture upheaval that this entailed.

Most of the objects on show were conceived and used as part of the funerary equipment that accompanied the deceased to their tombs. This protected and privileged space made possible the preservation of very fragile pieces, such as those created in ceramic, that despite the long time passed are still in an impeccable state even nowadays.

At the same time, the exhibition approaches the biographical profile of Carmen Tórtola Valencia: cultured, multifaceted and singular artist whose creative work as a dancer was inspired by her exotic feeling and by the mystery of ancient civilizations.
(Source: website of the Museu Egipci de Barcelona)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.museuegipci.com/index.php?exposicio_actual&item_18%C2%9000

For further inquiries, please contact:
FUNDACIÓ ARQUEOLÒGICA CLOS
MUSEU EGIPCI DE BARCELONA
València, 284. E-08007 Barcelona
Tel: (+34) 93 488 01 88
Fax: (+34) 93 487 80 60
Internet: www.museuegipci.com

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Peabody Essex Museum, Special Exhibition Galleries

March 27 - July 18, 2010

Salem, Massachusetts, USA

Surrounded by the sea in all directions, the ancient Maya viewed their world as inextricably tied to water. More than a necessity to sustain life, water was the vital medium from which the world emerged, gods arose and ancestors communicated. Over 90 works, many never before seen, offer exciting new insights into Maya culture that focus on the sea as a defining feature of the spiritual realm and the inspiration for the finest works of art. Fiery Pool was organized by Daniel Finamore, The Russell W. Knight Curator of Maritime Art and History at the Peabody Essex Museum and Stephen D. Houston, The Dupee Family Professor of Social Science and Professor of Archaeology at Brown University. The exhibition is scheduled to travel to the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, and the St. Louis Art Museum.
(Source: Website of the Peabody Essex Museum)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.pem.org/exhibitions/106-fiery_pool_the_maya_and_the_mythic_sea

For further inquiries, please contact:
Peabody Essex Museum
East India Square
161 Essex Street
Salem, MA 01970-3783
USA

Tel: +1-978-745-9500,
+1-866-745-1876

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Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collections, Museum

October 1, 2009 - February 28, 2010

Washington DC, USA

Flights of Fancy is presented in three segments: natural depictions of fauna, birds as supernatural beings, and birds as demonstrations of power. Birds carried a rich symbolism in ancient American cultures. Certain species were observed and depicted in their native habitat, others were known only as rare specimens acquired by trade from distant places. Some birds were also thought to wield tremendous power as deities or supernatural emissaries. Inka, Aztec, and Maya rulers wore

Bird-related clothing and jewelry, and erected avian effigies made of gold, silver, and precious stone in their royal gardens. The variety of species represented suggests a wide ranging interest in local and exotic fauna.

Over 60 objects are on view, including feather garments, gold and jade pendants and ornaments, woven tapestries, and polychrome vessels, all of which feature various species of birds that captured the imagination of peoples from Mesoamerica to the Andes. In conjunction with this exhibition, A Cross-Cultural Aviary, displayed within the permanent galleries, features additional ornaments and textiles drawn from the Museum’s Andean, Byzantine and Western European collections.
(Source: Mike Ruggeri, Mike Ruggeri's Ancient America Museum Exhibitions, Conferences and Lectures , http://tinyurl.com/c9mlao)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.doaks.org/museum/

For further inquiries, please contact:
Dumbarton Oaks
Research Library and Collection
1703 32nd Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20007
USA

Museum (Byzantine Collection, Pre-Columbian Collection, and House Collection)
Tel: 202-339-6401
Fax: 202-625-0283
Email: museum@doaks.org

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The J. Paul Getty Trust, The Getty Research Institute

November 16, 2010 - March 16, 2011

Los Angeles, California, USA

This exhibition explores representations of Mexican archaeological objects and sites made from the Colonial era to the present. Featuring images of ancient Maya and Aztec ruins by archaeologist explorers such as John Lloyd Stephens, Desiré Charnay, and Augustus and Alice Le Plongeon, the exhibition showcases depictions of the Aztec Calendar Stone and other Mexican antiquities as well as panoramic visions of Mexico—all in the context of the Spanish conquest, the 19th-century French intervention in Mexico, and the lengthy presidency of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1910). Some of the works exhibited are accurate, while others are fanciful; each portrays a distinct vision of Mexico.

Please, visit the official website:
/http://www.getty.edu/research/exhibitions/

For further inquiries, please contact:
The Getty Research Institute
1200 Getty Center Drive
Suite 1100
Los Angeles, CA 90049-1688
USA

Tel: +1 - 310 - 440-7335
E-mail: griweb@getty.edu

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Los Angeles County Museum of Art

September 26, 2010 - January 9, 2011

Los Angeles, California, USA

Olmec civilization, which began sometime around 1400 BC, was centered in the Gulf Coast states of Veracruz and Tabasco. Olmec architects and artists produced the earliest monumental structures and sculptures in Mexico, including enormous basalt portrait heads—weighing up to twenty-four tons—of their rulers. This exhibition will be the first presentation on the West Coast of the colossal works and precious small-scale sculptures produced by Mexico's earliest civilization. The exhibition is co-organized by Mexico's Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, LACMA, and the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
(Source. Website of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.lacma.org/art/ExhibOlmec.aspx

For further inquiries, please contact:
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
5905 Wilshire Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90036
USA

Tel: +1-323-857-6000
E-mail: publicinfo@lacma.org

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Teotihuacan – Mexikos geheimnisvolle Pyramidenstadt

Martin-Gropius-Bau

July 1 - October 10, 2010

Berlin, Germany

“Teotihuacan – Mexico’s Mysterious Pyramid City” is the name of an exhibition to be presented by the Martin-Gropius-Bau from 1 July to 10 October 2010. More than 450 outstanding objects giving a comprehensive insight into the art, everyday life and religion of this enigmatic culture will be on view in Europe for the first time. They include specimens of monumental architecture, filigree vessels and figures, costly stone carvings, masks, statues of gods and representations of animals as well as examples of highly symbolic murals which have retained their brilliant colours since their creation some 2,000 years ago. Permission has been given for the first (and probably the last) time for the 15 large-format fragments of murals to be sent abroad. Numerous exhibits were only discovered in the latest excavations.

Treasures from leading Mexican museums have been brought together for this exhibition. Most of the exhibits come from the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City and the two museums in Teotihuacan itself. In addition, the Anahuacalli Museum – built by Diego Rivera for his collection of pre-Spanish sculptures – has for the first time lent valuable items.

The exhibition is divided into nine sections. The first item to welcome the visitor is the Great Jaguar of Xalla, one of the more recent finds from a palace complex and a characteristic example of decorative monumental architecture. An introduction to the development of the city and its archaeological history is followed by a section on architecture and town planning as represented by sculptures, friezes and murals. The social themes of politics, hierarchies, economy, war and commerce are represented by a multitude of objects, including stone sculptures, clay vessels and jade jewellery. Obsidian, for example, was the material from which weapons were made, Teotihuacan being a great manufactory of weapons. There is a spectacular reconstruction of a tomb found under the Pyramid of the Moon in the course of an excavation campaign in 1998-2004. Original objects are shown in glass cases. A special category may be seen in the “innkeeper figures”, which house inside them tiny, elaborately shaped figurines arranged as in a seedling box. Religion, gods and rituals, urban and social life, art, crafts and workshops as well as cultural exchange are further themes of this unique show, which displays a wealth of new findings.
(Source: Website of the Martin-Gropius-Bau)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.berlinerfestspiele.de/en/aktuell/festivals/11_gropiusbau/mgb_04_programm/mgb_04_kommende_ausstellungen/mgb_04_komm_Ausstell_ProgrammlisteDetailSeite_14082.php

For further inquiries, please contact:
Martin-Gropius-Bau Berlin
Niederkirchnerstraße 7 | Corner Stresemannstr. 110
D-10963 Berlin
GERMANY

Tel: +49 (0)30 254 86-0
Fax: +49 (0)30 254 86-107
E-mail: post@gropiusbau.de
URL: www.gropiusbau.de

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Teotihuacan: Geheimnisvolle Pyramidenstadt

Museum Rietberg

February 21 - May 30, 2010

Zürich, Switzerland

Teotihuacan was once the largest city in Pre-Columbian America – a cosmopolitan metropolis with unique monumental buildings. Between 100 and 650 AD – that is, about one thousand years before the Aztecs – the city was a powerful economic and cultural centre which influenced the whole of Mesoamerica.
The city was laid out like a chessboard, with a wide processional avenue forming its main axis. The avenue linked the two most monumental structures in Central America: the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon. The pyramids are flanked by numerous temple platforms and palace complexes. Brightly coloured murals, rich in symbolism, adorned their walls, their pigments applied to the plaster when it was still damp. The city was divided into residential and artisans’ districts, and also had distinct quarters for people from different regions of Mexico, who retained much of their own original culture.
Teotihuacan flourished for more than five hundred years until a devastating fire in the 7th century marked the beginning of the pyramid city’s decline.
At the time of the Aztecs in the 15th and 16th centuries, the city had been lying in ruins for almost a thousand years. It was the Aztecs who gave this mysterious place its name: Teotihuacan, ‘ where men become gods’. According to their myth of origin it was here that the world was created.
The exhibition presents some 450 artefacts from Mexico: colourful murals, precious clay vessels, stone sculptures, figures cut from obsidian, and wonderful jewellery. Also, visitors will be among the first to see some recently discovered, spectacular finds, including the magnificent sacrificial offerings from the Sun and Moon Pyramids and the Temple of the Feathered Serpent.
(Sorce: Website of the Rietberg Museum)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.stadt-zuerich.ch/kultur/en/index/institutionen/museum_rietberg/exhibitions/mexico_teotihuacan.html

For further inquiries, please contact:
Museum Rietberg
Gablerstrasse 15
CH-8002 Zürich
SWITZERLAND

Tel: +41 (0)44 206 31 31
Fax: +41 (0)44 206 31 32
E-mail: museum.rietberg@zuerich.ch

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Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin

February 2 - August 1, 2010

Austin, Texas, USA

The Harry Ransom Center, a humanities research library and museum at The University of Texas at Austin, will present the exhibition "¡Viva! Mexico's Independence," showcasing items from the center's holdings that relate to the history of Spain's original conquest of Mexico, Mexico's independence from Spain and subsequent revolutionary activities within Mexico.

The exhibition will be on view in 2010, a year that marks the 200th anniversary of Mexico's independence from Spain and the 100th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution, pivotal events in Mexico's struggle for self-governance.

Running February 2 to August 1, the exhibition will feature such rarities as the original 1529 document appointing Hernán Cortés captain general of New Spain; unpublished letters exchanged between the ill-fated Ferdinand Maximilian, emperor of Mexico, and his wife Carlotta; original documentary photographs of the Mexican Revolution along with period broadsides illustrated by José Guadalupe Posada; and artistic responses to the long history of Mexico's conquest and revolt.

"The exhibition isn't a comprehensive historical overview, but instead highlights items from the Ransom Center's collections," said Cathy Henderson, exhibition curator and associate director at the Ransom Center. "Of greater interest to visitors, perhaps, will be various artistic responses to these historical events ranging from Miguel Covarrubias's illustrations for an edition of Bernal Díaz Del Castillo's 'The Discovery and Conquest of Mexico, 1517-1521' to cinematic interpretations of Mexico's history."

The exhibition, which will feature about 50 items, is in collaboration with the university's Graduate School and the Consulado General de México en Austin.

"¡Viva! Mexico's Independence" can be seen at the Ransom Center on Tuesdays through Fridays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with extended Thursday hours to 7 p.m. On Saturdays and Sundays the galleries are open from noon to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed on Mondays.
(Source: website of the Ransom Center)

Please, visit the official website:
http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/2010/mexico/

For further inquiries, please contact:
Harry Ransom Center
The University of Texas at Austin
300 West 21st Street
Austin, Texas 78712
USA

Harry Ransom Center
The University of Texas at Austin
P.O. Box 7219
Austin TX 78713-7219
USA

Tel: +1-512-471-8944
Fax: +1-512-471-9646
E-mail: contact form on: http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/contact/

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