Calling all art historians! The Isthmo-Colombian Area, the Amazon, and the Antilles in Ancient American Art

Out of the 71 dissertations completed between 2002 and 2021 listed in CAA.reviews under "Pre-Columbian Art" and "Ancient American Art," only five relate to topics concerning the Antilles, Isthmo-Colombian, and Amazonia-Orinokia (AIAO). The remaining 93 percent concentrate on Mesoamerica and the Andes, the two regions that have traditionally dominated art historical scholarship of pre-Conquest and colonial Latin America.

Initially conceived in Western archaeological discourses as passive recipients of influences from the more complex societies to the north (i.e., the Aztecs, Mayas, and their predecessors) and the south (i.e., the Incas and their predecessors), AIAO was previously described as a “counterfeit paradise” and “the Intermediate Area”—intermediate both in its geographic location but also in its social and cultural development.

In recent decades, archaeologists have conducted extensive research in these areas that are reshaping scholarly perceptions. But where are the art historians at?

This panel seeks to bring together art historians of ancient American art focusing on AIAO. How can art history contribute to the interpretation of archaeological data or provide methodological pathways in its absence? How does AIAO art history critically engage notions of provenance and repatriation? How does it challenge Western concepts and categories such as monumentality, durability, sculpture, and architecture that have remained mostly unquestioned in Mesoamerican and Andean pre-Columbian art history?

We invite papers focusing on the pre-Conquest or early colonial periods. Of particular interest are papers that historicize their research in the context of the development of pre-Columbian art history and its connection with anthropology and archaeology.