Graphic and Photographic Documentation - Reed College

Uxmal, including the two-page panorama of the Governor’s Palace. Charnay’s preface
and Viollet-le-Duc’s essay, from Charnay’s 1863 Cités et Ruines Americaines, are
reproduced in the original French with side-by-side Spanish translation. The
introduction by Tovar de Teresa briefly summarizes the 18 th and 19 th European
rediscovery of the ancient Americas. The author praises the epoch of French
romanticism, represented by Charnay and Viollet-le-Duc, with no mention of the
resulting misinterpretations in Viollet-le-Duc’s essay.
Clancy, Flora S.
“Art History”. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures: The Civilizations of
Mexico and Central America. Vol. 1: 54-59. Ed. David Carrasco. 3 vols. Oxford University
Press, 2001.
A valuable survey of the development of the art historical study of Mesoamerica,
describing major figures, evolving concepts of what art history is, and its changing
relationship to archaeology.
Clancey is unusual in describing in some detail the different types of information
recorded by various forms of graphic documentation and the ways in which these
reveal the intentions of the artists. About Seler she writes: “most iconographical
studied produced since his time . . . are direct inheritors of his method of comparative
analysis and his manner of representing his material. . . . In his article on Xochiacalo .
. . [the four photographs he includes] do not illustrate the information he gathers and
presents in his text; his drawings do this. His drawings are usually done as outlines,
and only on occasion does he render any suggestion of three dimensions when
drawing from sculpture or relief-carved pieces. . . . He has little use for relative scale,
as comparable images from various objects tend to be drawn at the same scale. What
is important to Seler, clearly, is the icon, not the medium in which it was rendered, nor
its scale, not its context . . .” (p. 55). About Proskouriakoff’s 1950 Study of Classic
Maya Sculpture, Clancy writes: “Using the graphic outline of images as an index of
stylistic change . . . Proskouiakoff was able to produce a reliable stylistic seriation and
history for Maya sculpture” (p. 55).
Cline, Howard F.
“The Apocryphal Early Career of J. F. Waldeck, Pioneer Americanist”. Acta Americana, Vol.
5., No. 4 (1947): 278-300.
Coe, Michael D.
Lords of the Underworld: Masterpieces of Classic Maya Ceramics. Photographs by Justin
Kerr. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978.
There are only minor remains of painted ceramics from the Puuc region, thus not
included in this book. The book is listed here because it includes an illustration and
description by Justin Kerr of his discovery of the photographic rollout technique, which
has been so instrumental in the study of Maya imagery (pp. 138-139).
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