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FRIDAY,
November 20:
 Lecture
–
Performing Rulership during the Late
Preclassic: Landscape, Themes, and Symbols from the Pacific Piedmont
by Julia Guernsey. Department of Art and Art History,
University of Texas, Austin, is Project Iconographer for the La Blanca
Archaeological Project (Project Director, Dr. Michael Love of
California State University, Northridge).7:30-9:30,
Drew Science 118. Hamline University. Members and students free;
visitors $5.00.
This
presentation will focus primarily on the site of Izapa, considering
how space was structured through the erection of stela and altar
monuments, and the implications of the highly narrative imagery found
on these sculptures. I will focus in particular on the images that
feature avian transformation, which referenced a ruler's ability to
communicate with the supernatural realm. Discussion will also turn to
other symbols featured on the monuments that further illustrate
rulers' emphasis on their supernatural powers as a foundation for
claims to political authority.
Suggested reading:
Guernsey, Julia
2006 Ritual
and Power in Stone: The Performance of Rulership in
Mesoamerican Izapan-Style Art. Austin: University of
Texas Press.
2004
Demystifying the Late Preclassic Izapan-Style Stela-Altar
'Cult'. Res: Anthropology and Aesthetics 45: 99-122.
2001 Sacred
Geography at Izapa and the Performance of Rulership."
In Space, Power, and Poetics in Ancient Mesoamerica,
edited by R. Koontz, K. Reese-Taylor, and A. Headrick. pp.
81-111. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Lowe, Gareth W., Thomas
A. Lee, Jr., and Eduardo Martínez Espinosa
1982 Izapa:
An Introduction to the Ruins and Monuments. Papers of the
New World Archaeological Foundation, No. 31. Provo:
Brigham Young University.
SATURDAY,
November 21:
Workshop
–
Stepping Back in Time: Middle Preclassic
Ritual and Power at La Blanca by
Julia Guernsey. 9:00
a.m – 12 noon (9 a.m. gathering for coffee), Giddens Learning Center
6s (the Anthropology Lab), Hamline University. Members and staff $10, visitors
$20, students free.
This
workshop will present recent data from ongoing archaeological
investigations at the Middle Preclassic site of La Blanca,
Guatemala, which is located on the Pacific Coast of Guatemala. La
Blanca flourished between 900-600 BC, and was the major regional
power along the coast and piedmont. Upon its decline, sites such as
Izapa rose to power within the same region. A quatrefoil-shaped
altar found at La Blanca that anticipates images seen at Izapa, San
Bartolo, Takalik Abaj, and other Late Preclassic sites, will form
the basis of discussion and illustrate Middle Preclassic antecedents
for ritual patterns and imagery better known from later periods.
Suggested reading:
Love, Michael and
Julia Guernsey
2007
Monument 3 from La Blanca, Guatemala: A Middle Preclassic
Earthen Sculpture and its Ritual Associations. Antiquity
81:920-932.
Love, Michael and
Julia Guernsey
2006 The
Context and Associations of Monument 3 from La Blanca,
Guatemala." Grantee report submitted to the Foundation
for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies (FAMSI)
June 2006, available online at <http://www.famsi.org/reports/05051/>,
accessed June 28, 2009.
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