Claudia Brittenham

Biography

Claudia Brittenham's research focuses on the art of ancient Mesoamerica, with particular attention to the ways that the materiality of art and the politics of style contribute to our understanding of the ontology of images. Her most recent book is Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica, which explores problems of visibility and the status of images in Mesoamerica. Ranging from carvings on the undersides of Aztec sculptures, to Maya lintels, and buried Olmec offerings, it examines the distance between ancient experiences of works of art and the modern practice of museum display.  She is also the author of The Murals of Cacaxtla: The Power of Painting in Ancient Mexico (2015); the co-author with Mary Miller of The Spectacle of the Late Maya Court: Reflections on the Murals of Bonampak (2013), and with Stephen Houston and colleagues, a co-author of Veiled Brightness: A History of Ancient Maya Color (2009).

Her current book project, The Interconnected Mesoamerican World, examines the place of art in a world before borders, where people, objects, and ideas moved throughout ancient Mesoamerica and beyond.

Brittenham is active in the Global Ancient Art initiative within the Department of Art History, as well as in the Katz Center for Mexican Studies, the Center for Latin American Studies, and the Institute for the Formation of Knowledge. She is also a member of the Proyecto La Pintura Mural Prehispánica en México of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. She received her PhD and BA from Yale University, and was formerly Assistant Curator for Eastern Hemisphere Collections at the Textile Museum in Washington, D.C.

Publications

Unseen Art: Making, Vision, and Power in Ancient Mesoamerica

University of Texas Press
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2023

The Murals of Cacaxtla: The Power of Painting in Ancient Central Mexico

University of Texas Press
,
2015

The Spectacle of the Late Maya Court: Reflections on the Murals of Bonampak

with Mary Miller, University of Texas Press
,
2013

Veiled Brightness: A History of Ancient Maya Color

with Stephen Houston and colleagues, University of Texas Press
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2009

“John Lloyd Stephens and the Lost Lintel of Kabah.” In Destroyed—Disappeared—Lost—Never Were, ed. Beate Fricke and Aden Kumler, 38-49. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press and International Center of Medieval Art, 2022.

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“The Representation of Taxation in the Codex Mendoza.” In The Codex Mendoza: New Insights, ed. Jorge Gómez Tejada, 133-50. Quito: Universidad San Francisco de Quito, 2022.

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“Locating Landscape in Maya Painting.” In Landscape and Space: Comparative Perspectives from Chinese, Mesoamerican, Ancient Greek, and Roman Art, ed. Jas’ Elsner, 99-132. Center for Global Ancient Art, Visual Conversations series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021.

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“Shifting Scales at La Venta.” In Figurines: Figuration and the Sense of Scale, ed. Jas’ Elsner, 51-87. Center for Global Ancient Art, Visual Conversations series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020.

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“Teotihuacán y el Área Maya: relaciones recíprocas.” In XXXIII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2019: Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología, 15 al 19 de julio de 2019, ed. Bárbara Arroyo, Luis Méndez Salinas, and Gloria Ajú Álvarez, 1: 61-74. Guatemala City: Instituto de Antropología e Historia, Ministerio de Cultura y Deportes, Asociación Tikal, 2020.

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“What Lies Beneath: Carving on the Underside of Aztec Sculpture,” in Conditions of Visibility, edited by Richard Neer. Center for Global Ancient Art, Visual Conversations series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019.

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“Tz’ib: die Malerei der Maya als Kulturtechnik," in Kulturtechnik Malen: Die Welt aus Farbe erschaffen - Zur Grundlegung graphischer und figurativer Operationen, ed. Meret Kupczyk, Ludger Schwarte, and Charlotte Warsen, 47-82. Paderborn: Wilhem Fink Verlag, 2019.

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“Architecture, Vision, and Ritual: Seeing Maya Lintels at Yaxchilan Structure 23.” Art Bulletin 101, no. 3 (September 2019): 8-36.

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“When Pots had Legs: Body Metaphors on Early Classic Maya Vessels,” in Vessels: The Object as Container, ed. Claudia Brittenham, pp. 81-119. Center for Global Ancient Art. Visual Conversations series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019.

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"Architecture, Vision, and Ritual in the Maya City of Yaxchilan: The Structure 23 Lintels,” The Art Bulletin 101(3), forthcoming September 2019

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Profiles

Andrei Pop
Andrei Pop
Modern Art and Aesthetics
Department Chair
CWAC 162 | Tuesdays 1-2pm or by appointment.
773.702.0278
Niall Atkinson
Niall Atkinson
Medieval and Renaissance Architecture and Urban History
CWAC 260
773.702.0270
Wei-Cheng Lin
Wei-Cheng Lin
Chinese Art and Architecture
Architectural Studies Advisor
CWAC 268 | Office Hours: Wednesdays 9-10am and 12-1pm
773.702.0268
2006-07
Iowa State University
Assistant Professor, East Asian Art and Architecture
Potters Wheel
Richard Neer
Ancient Greek Art and Architecture
CWAC 259
773.702.5890
Megan Sullivan
Megan Sullivan
Modern and Contemporary Latin American Art
CWAC 272
773.702.5126