Here is our amazing group in front of one of the preserved mounds at Miraflores. Despite centuries of erasure, this ruin of ‘Kaminaljuyu’ has endured countless opportunities to be destroyed. The location of the museum was powerful alone, as it elucidated Maya resilience through the preservation of both architecture and artifacts.
Today, our group once again drove to Guatemala City, to engage with the incredible collections of pre-Hispanic Maya art at the Miraflores Museum and the the National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (MUNAE). Beginning with the Miraflores Museum, we delved further into our exploration of the Maya, deepening our understanding of their complex material culture. The museum was carefully planned and organized, with meticulous attention to detail in each exhibit. Each exhibit had its own means of interaction and immersion, like drawing one’s Nahual on a board of sand, or matching the location of various resources with their provenance on a map. It was starkly different from other museums we had been to as a group thus far, as it is privately funded and maintained, unlike the MUNAE or the site museum at Iximche. The collection was incredible, with amazing examples of artifacts ranging from finely carved eccentrics, detailed ceramic vessels, to sculpted jade of some of the best quality workmanship. I thoroughly enjoyed the journey through Xibalba, stepping through each trial the Hero Twins faced as they traversed through the underworld. I really appreciated being allowed inside of the lab, as it allowed my peers and I to make more personal connections with the artifacts in front of us, compared to being enclosed in glass or roped off for security.
Here are my friends, engaging with one of the museum’s numerous chances to connect with the art that we were seeing.
Following the Miraflores Museum, we visited the National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (MUNAE). This museum has one of the singular best collections of Maya art in the world, although the recently reopened museum’s orientation and layout left much to be desired. I was especially fond of the sketches and outlines of certain sections of monuments and artworks, that allowed the untrained eye to more easily decipher what one was looking at. Dr. Runggaldier led a fantastic tour of the museum, providing extensive information about the various artifacts. As someone focused on beginning a career in Maya archaeology and art history, I feel like this was an invaluable experience. I feel so much more knowledgeable about the meaning and purpose of what the Maya were conveying through their incredibly detailed artworks. This museum holds some true masterpieces, collected from all corners of the country. In contrast to the Miraflores Museum, MUNAE exhibited a tremendous amount of monumental architecture like massive stelae and altars. Some of these works included humongous stela that portrayed significant historical events, like the defeat of Calakmul by Jasaw Chan K’awiil I, the lord of Tikal in 695. I appreciated the carefully positioned lighting that appropriately showed each piece’s depth and range.
Adrian and I were really impressed by the size of this ceramic pot, it was monumental in its own right!
