Chapter 12 THE AMERICAS, AFRICA AND ASIA

• Around 1500 European knowledge of the rest of the world expanded greatly. • Within thirty years the boundaries of Classical geography were shattered by the explorations of Christopher Columbus, followed by the first circumnavigation of the globe. • Near Eastern and Far Eastern art had been known since Roman times and motifs from Chinese and Islamic art had long been acclimatized in Europe. • But the art of the Americas was regarded in a very different light in that some were preserved as curiosities, yet most were destroyed. • Shortly before the end of the sixteenth century, the belief that Europe ‘was born to rule over Africa, Asia and America’ was fostered.

Key Terms: Aztecs Mesoamerica oba Olmec Teotihuacan iwan Maya ooni

Learning Objectives: • The differences in the use of head sculpture in Ife and Benin. • The similarities in the artwork of Mesoamerican cultures. • The different influences on Islamic art in India and in Spain.

MESOAMERICA AND PERU • At the time of the Spanish invasion in 1519, the Aztecs ruled the area just north of modern Mexico City, south to Guatemala. • Their artistic style incorporated elements from earlier arts of the region which was occupied by groups of people who seem to have been nearly always at war with one another. • The Mesoamericans spoke a related language, used the same 260-day calendar, and had similar forms of governments which their religious beliefs were part of including blood- letting, the ball-game and sacrificial offerings of captives. Page 117 • The Mesoamerican cultures also shared techniques of building with stone, of carving with stone instruments, of modeling pottery, and of painting.

Teotihuacan (fig. 12.1) • Around the first century AD, ceremonial center was developed east of present day Mexico City into a true city at a place the Aztecs would later call Teotihuacan, which means ‘where one becomes a god’. • The residential quarters were laid out on a grid system while the whole city was fixed astronomically to provide an earthly reflection of the heavenly bodies. • At the heart of an avenue were massive stepped platforms which were called ‘pyramids’ but actually resemble ziggurats in shape as well as in function.

Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent (fig. 12.2) • At the southern end of the main avenue was a pyramid covered with elaborate carvings of plumed serpents and menacing heads which were enclosed in circles and squares.

The Maya, Toltecs and Mixtecs • The Maya culture began somewhat earlier than Teotihuacan and reached the height of its development about the same time. • Their civilization, located on the Yucatan peninsula and in present day Belize and Guatemala, lasted a much longer time than that of Teotihuacan. • They developed a system of writing in symbols known as glyphs which have been deciphered to provide dates according to their calendar on which day 0 corresponds with August 13, 3114 BC. • The Maya believed that the gods created humans by a sacrificial act and therefore needed the reciprocal shedding of blood for their sustenance. • The two main rituals were the self-inflicted blood-letting performed by the rulers, human sacrifices of which the victims were the captives obtained through warfare.

Stepped pyramid at Tikal (fig. 12.4) • Tikal, covering some 6 square miles, was one of the largest Maya city. • The buildings were arranged by astronomical observations.

Page 118 • The courts for the ritual ball-games were built in all temple precincts and the rubber ball flying over the players’ head was to represent the sun. • From the beginning of the Maya ‘classical’ period they built with stone and a strong burnt lime cement and had also refined the corbelled arch technique. • The exterior of the temple was more important because all public rituals were performed in the open air. • This steep pyramid topped with a temple whose roof was called a roof comb and rises 230 feet with an unbroken flight of steps.

Blood-Letting Rite (fig. 12.6) • This image is located on a lintel and shows King Shield Jaguar with the shrunken head of a sacrificial victim in his feathered crown. • The king is also shown holding a flaming torch over his principal wife as she kneels, pulling a cord knotted with thorns through her perforated tongue. Blood is seen dripping on to strips of paper that will be burnt and transmitted to the gods. • The figures are rigid in their poses and are set off by the hard-edged clarity of the composition. • This image was originally painted in bright colors of which only a trace remains.

The Observatory, Chichén Itzá (fig. 12.8) • This structure is regarded as one of the most interesting in Mesoamerican architecture. • It is an observatory that encloses two concentric annular passages with high, corbelled vaults and an upper story reached by winding stairs. • From the center of the upper story are shafts that line up directly with the sun and stars.

Chacmool from Chichén Itzá (fig. 12.9) • The statue, which may represent a deity, does not have a precedent in the art of the Maya. • The figure is a reduction of the human body into a geometric form resting on his elbows with his legs up and his hands in his lap. • In his hands is an offering tray but his head is turned away from the offering as if appearing indifferent.

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Atlantean figures of Pyramid of Quetzalcoatl (fig. 12.10) • These columns are located on the summit of a temple and thought to have supported a wooden roof. • They represented warriors standing rigidly at attention, wearing butterfly pectorals and holding spear throwers in their hands. • The columns are identical. Each is composed of four drums, held together by dowels and originally painted in bright colors.

Page from the Codex Zouche-Nuttall (fig. 12.11) • The Mixtecs became the dominant power in the second millennium AD in the south. • The finest examples of Mesoamerican manuscripts are Mixtec. They were painted on sheets of parchment and joined in long strips that could be folded into booklike form. • The figures are drawn in black outline and filled with bright colors and are shown frontally or in profile gesturing. • The manuscripts are concerned with rituals performed in accordance with the astronomical calendar.

The Aztecs • Around 1370 the Aztecs settled on the island of Tenochtitlan in Lake Texcoco and were the last of a succession of northern tribes to infiltrate the Valley of Mexico. • Their palaces and gardens impressed the Europeans, yet the Aztecs’ practice of human sacrificing appalled the new arrivals. • As with previous cultures the Aztec paid close attention to astronomical events and their practice of sacrificing was tied to these events. • It is thought that the Aztecs sacrificed thousands of their own people with the rumor that the hearts of some 20,000 were torn out on a single occasion.

Goddess Coatlicue (fig. 12.15) • In this statue the goddess is dehumanized, yet presented in a terrifying manner. • She is represented with two rattlesnake heads, serpent fangs at her elbows, a skull hanging from a necklace of human hands, hearts above her breasts, a skirt of entwined snakes, and her feet are feline claws.

Page 120 The Incas • By about 1500 the Incas occupied the whole length of the Andes from modern Ecuador to Bolivia, Argentina and southern Chile.

Portrait vessel (fig. 12.16) • The Incas’ most distinctive artistic products were the well- made pottery vessels with stirrup-shaped spouts. This type was particular to South America. • All of the vessels were probably made to be included in the tombs • This vessel is shaped like a human head, strongly characterized and very realistic. • The faces ponder, frown or sneer in high disdain.

AFRICA • Unlike America, Africa was not cut off from Europe. • The Atlantic coast cities of West Africa were linked to the Mediterranean by trade routes across the Sahara. • Religion followed commerce and before 1100 Islam had spread as far as Mali. • The Portuguese mariners sailed down the Atlantic coast in 1471 and in 1498 rounded the Cape and up the east coast of Africa. • The Europeans were not able to gain more than coastal footholds until the late nineteenth century. • The history of Africa south of the Sahara is difficult to trace due in part to the lack of written records. • The artwork found at Ife is very different from European art and it is believed that the styles found in western Africa were indigenous.

Head of a queen (fig. 12.22) • At Ife, an important religious and political center in present day Nigeria, a predominantly figurative style emerged. • The heads were very naturalistic, as is seen in this one of a queen. • The queen’s headdress is rendered in detail. • She is shown with a high brow and a sensitive mouth, which has a slight ridge at the outer edges. • Her upper eyelids overlap the lower ones at the corners.

Page 121 Head of an ooni (fig. 12.23) • Several other heads are done in the same style as the queen’s, yet are individualized in such a manner to suggest that they were intended to be portraits. • The holes around the mouth were thought to hold a veil of beads during certain ceremonies.

A queen mother, Benin (fig. 12.26) • The sculpted heads found at Benin are much more stylized than those of Ife.

The oba of Benin in divine aspect (fig. 12.28) • The idea for these plaques may have come from European printed book illustrations. • The figures are frontally posed and scaled according to importance. • This plaque shows an oba displaying his power over two leopards. • The oba’s legs are fish, associating him with the sea god.

THE ISLAMIC WORLD • Islamic culture flourished in Spain under the emirs of Granada. • After seven centuries of war between Christians and Muslims, the Muslims were defeated in the late fifteenth century by the armies of the Catholic sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella.

The Court of the Lions (fig. 12.31) • This palace is the finest monument of the ‘Hispano- Mooresque’ style. • It also epitomizes the paradoxical character of Islamic architecture in its appeal to the senses, to the intellect and to the spirit and at the same time in its assimilation of elements from other traditions. • This court is the most elaborate part of the palace. • The columns are not uniformly spaced sometimes single and sometimes coupled in irregular but rhythmical sequence. • The light within the court changes the structural appearance as it varies in intensity and direction throughout the day. • Stucco and tiled panels drape the walls with abstract patterns and is Islamic in its mathematical structure.

Page 122 • The 12 lions surrounding the fountain were to become ‘lions of the Holy War’ which perhaps alludes to the last Islamic triumph on Spanish soil.

The Friday Mosque (fig. 12.33) • Though the defeat of the Muslims in Spain was a setback, Islam made great strides in other parts of the world. • Islam was re-established as the state religion of Iran in 1295. Iran became a major center for Islamic art and culture. • The iwan here is extremely tall and is crowned by minarets. It also provides the entrance to the court of the mosque. • The iwan was erected with a complicated system of buttressing to support the height.

Ottoman Architecture • The Ottoman clan from central Asia had crossed the Dardanelles into Europe in 1354 drawing a noose around Constantinople, which fell to them in 1453. • By 1520, the Ottoman empire had spread east to Greece and south covering Syria and Egypt. • At one time the Ottoman empire had their sights set on the Americas. • The Ottoman sultans ruled until 1922, making it the longest dynasty in the history of Islam. • A new and explicitly Ottoman style reached maturity in the late fifteenth century by the architect Sinan. • Sinan began his career as a soldier and in 1538 was appointed architect to the Sultan Suleyman the Magnificent. • He is credited with 81 Friday mosques for communal worship, 50 small mosques, 34 palaces, 33 public baths and 19 mausoleums. • He was able to realize, on the grandest scale, the idea of a free-standing centrally planned place of worship.

Sinan, The Selimiye Mosque (fig. 12.36) • The functional demands of a mosque are much simpler than those of a church in that basically what is needed is a large hall. • Sinan regarded this mosque as his finest achievement as it was his desire to rival the dome of Hagia Sophia. • The dome is slightly wider than that of Hagia Sophia and rests on eight piers of pinkish sandstone.

Page 123 Safavid Art and Architecture • The Safavid ruled the most powerful state on the eastern Ottoman frontier. • This dynasty claimed descent from the Prophet Muhammad’s son-in-law and successor and were defenders of the Shi’ite faith which they made the state religion. • The Safavid also saw themselves as the successors of the rulers of ancient Persia. • The Koran put a ban on idols, but the representation of human beings outside religious context was left open to interpretation. • The blending of the abstract ornamentation of the Koran with Chinese Buddhist art created the Iranian miniature painting style.

The Court of Gayumarth (fig. 12.28) • Gayumarth was the legendary first shah of Iran and is illustrated here as being warned by an angle that the idyllic age in which the shah lived was coming to an end. • Influence from China can be seen in the pose of Gayumarth, the clouds and the branches. • The general effect of the colors and the fluid rhythm of the composition are essentially Iranian in style. • The curves of the design and the vividness of the smallest details were meant to delight the eye.

Mihrab from Iran (fig. 12.40) • This is one of the finest early sixteenth-century mihrabs showing the closely integrated floral patterns which surround verses of the Koran. • These walls helped to concentrate the worshipper’s attention beyond the wall with the lack of a focal point and the desire to convey no sense of space or time.

The Lutfullah Mosque, Iran (fig. 12.41) • This mosque is distinctly Safavid but is lighter in appearance and decorated with a delicate refinement. • This building probably served as a private oratory for the shah and was later named after Shaykh Lutfullah, an eminent scholar and religious leader.

Mughal Art and Architecture • Miniature painting was introduced from Iran to India.

Page 124 • By the beginning of the sixteenth century, most of the subcontinent was ruled by Muslim sultans. • The sultan Akbar was an active patron of the arts and brought into his court artists from all parts of India, including many Hindus, causing Islamic art to undergo a radical change. • It is thought that because the sultan was illiterate that his passion for painting included those with a strong and clearly expressive narrative content. • Under Akba,r painting was largely confined to illustrations of history and chronicles and were sometimes intended to be displayed at public readings.

Basawan, Akbar restrains Hawa’i (fig. 12.47) • Basawan created the classic Mughal narrative style and here recorded a youthful exploit of Akbar. • Technically the painting follows the Iranian practice of drawing in outline and filling in with color. • The bold contrasts of red, blue, green and yellow owe much to Hindu art and the use of scale was probably learned from Europeans.

The Taj Mahal (fig. 12.51) • The early Mughal emperors were no less active patrons of architecture than of paintings. • The Taj Mahal is one of the most famous buildings in the world. It was commissioned by Shah Jahan as a mausoleum for his favorite wife. • A tomb of this scale was without precedent in Islam. It is thought that the Taj was meant to be a symbolic replica of the throne of God. • The four intersecting water channels and the garden from which the building is approached were meant to represent Paradise with its four flowing rivers as described in the Koran.

CHINA The Yuan Dynasty • The Mongol conquest of China was begun by Genghis Khan and completed by his grandson Kubilai. It brought most of Asia under the rule of a single family. • China was briefly accessible to Europeans; silk and Asian motifs were imitated by European artists and craftsmen.

Page 125 • The Mongols promoted a kind of international Asian style in the decorative arts. • The major Chinese art form, landscape painting, remained largely unknown to the rest of the world. • Chinese painters were profoundly concerned for arts’ inner meaning.

Zhao Mengfu, A Sheep and Goat (fig. 12.62) • Zhao Mengfu was one of the leaders of a return to the styles of painting which was practiced during the Tang and Song dynasties • This horizontal scroll illustrates the Yuan scholar-painters dependence on the past recalling early Song realism. • The goat’s movements are brilliantly caught and the texture of its hair is well represented.

The Ming Dynasty • The blue and white color scheme associated with Chinese porcelain evolved during the Mongol rule. • This color scheme was a marriage of Chinese and Iranian processes and materials. • The first Ming emperor was against foreign oppressors and a return to ancient national traditions was the order of the day.

Meiping Vase (fig. 12.66) • During the Ming period, the color scheme persisted, but all traces of foreign influence was removed from the design. Vases like this one were regarded as purely Chinese in decoration as well as in form.

Hall of the Preservation of Harmony, Imperial Palace (fig. 12.69) • The Imperial Palace was raised on the site of Kubilai’s palace using some of the old foundations. • This is one of the three main halls which are elevated above the outer gate on a triple tiered white marble platform. • The final part of the highest civil service examination was held in this building.

Dong Qichang, Autumn Mountains (fig. 12.78) • Dong Qichang summarized a belief that had become prevalent among the scholar painters and tended to remove art ever further from the direct representation of nature.

Page 126 • Conventional elements of the landscape were pulled apart and rearranged in such a manner as to exclude atmospheric effects and appeal to sentiment. • The emphasis is placed on the brush stroke and how the ink has been applied to the surface.

JAPAN Kamakura to Edo • In spite of the failed attempts by the Mongols to invade the island, the national style of Japan continued to flourish in isolation. • During the Kamkura period, a tendency towards naturalism was seen more in secular work than in religious images.

Uesugi Shigefusa (fig. 12.79) • Uesugi Shigefusa was a military lord. This statue of him was commissioned by his descendants. • His body is completely engulfed in the billowing drapery of court dress, which is an indication of his status in the Japanese feudal society. • This statue is a speaking likeness of the individual and is presented in a formal, frontal pose.

The Influence of Zen Buddhism • Japanese attitudes towards China were similar to those Europeans had towards ancient Greece and Rome. • Chinese art also had a kind of classical status. • The Chan sect in China declared that there was no Buddha except for that which was in man’s own nature and they felt that all rituals, acts of worship, and the studying of texts were worthless. • They believed in meditation for communion with the Absolute of First Principle and that the transcendental experience could never be described in words. • The Chan form of Buddhism was strongly influenced by Daoist ideas of nature. • In Japan the Chan sect had so many features peculiarly acceptable to the Japanese at this time that it was soon naturalized as Zen. • Zen is probably best understood as a lifelong process of education of the mind and body.

Page 127 Sesshu, Winter Landscape (fig. 12.82) • Sesshu was regarded as the greatest Japanese master of ink painting and was trained in Zen monasteries. • He traveled to China and studied their art, which became a permanent source of inspiration. • Sesshu’s work is not as delicate in the brushwork as Chinese painting; instead he uses bold, jagged linear designs. • He incorporates some traditional Chinese elements, including the gnarled trees, the temple and the lack of importance given to the human.

Tawayar Sotatsu, Zen Priest Choka (fig. 12.87) • Edo was a more peaceful time during which Zen Buddhism still retained its hold on Japanese life. • The Edo period got its name from its capital city, which was renamed Tokyo in 1868. • During this period a new decorative element appeared in Zen paintings. • This hanging scroll displays some commonplace grotesque caricatures of patriarchs and masters of the sect. • Sotatsu represents the figure with a very soft touch and he barely indicates the trunk of the tree and by doing so leaves the rest up to the imagination of the viewer.

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