ART : Land Lovers : The ‘Ancient Americas’ exhibition reveals a sophisticated Latin American society fully integrated into the world around it

When “Mexico: Splendors of Thirty Centuries” burst upon the art scene in 1990, the blockbuster exhibition attracted almost as much critical static as popular approval.

The compendium of 365 artworks--which arrived at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1991 on a national tour--was accused of being a shameless public relations ploy, bankrolled by Mexican media mogul Emilio Azcarraga and propelled by the Mexican government to burnish the country’s tarnished image and improve economic relations with the United States.

Furthermore, the very notion of squeezing 30 centuries of art history into a single exhibition was cited as proof of North Americans’ ignorance of Mexico’s cultural heritage.

Today, another big Latin American exhibition opens at the County Museum, but no brouhaha has preceded it. “The Ancient Americas: Art From Sacred Landscapes” is being greeted as a scholarly presentation of spectacular objects that are expected to educate and please the public.

What’s the difference? Certainly not the scope of the show. “Ancient Americas” contains more than 250 objects--considerably fewer than “Splendors”--but it covers the same 30 centuries and a far wider geographic sweep, from the Southwestern United States to central Chile.

Neither does the exhibition lack governmental blessings. The last of a spate of 1992 exhibitions celebrating the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ voyage, the show called for the cooperation of 65 institutions in 11 countries. Though not sponsored by a foreign government, the show consists largely of loans from national museums.

The key to the quiet anticipation of “Ancient Americas” is probably multifaceted--and in no small way due to the expertise and diplomacy of Richard F. Townsend, exhibition organizer and curator of the department of Africa, Oceania and the Americas at the Art Institute of Chicago. But the essence of “Ancient Americas”--and what distinguishes it from “Splendors”--is a theme that goes well beyond appreciation for the Americas’ cultural heritage.

Townsend and his collaborators propose that we look at pre-Columbian artworks as an extension of landscapes that surrounded them. “This is not art for art’s sake, but art as an expression of a world view that is still vital to indigenous cultures,” Townsend said in an interview.

According to this far-reaching theory, all the ancient American arts--and, indeed, the entire structure of society--correspond to natural processes and forms. Architecture is an abstraction of landscape that can be as obvious as Aztec temples’ emulation of mountains and plateaus. Cities are laid out and monuments are placed in relation to features of the landscape or the equinox, while functional and ritual objects symbolize a belief system that ties human existence to natural phenomena. Each culture represented in the exhibition put its own stamp on that world view, but they all adhered to the principle of a sacred landscape, Townsend said.

Mountain peaks, caves and oceans were objects of special veneration, but the entire landscape was considered sacred because it was alive. Nature was a force to be reckoned with--not an adversary to be dominated. Ancient Americans saw nature as part of themselves, Townsend said. Their society was fully integrated into natural phenomena and processes, and their artworks were shaped by perceptions of the landscape.

This philosophical basis of pre-Columbian cultures is widely recognized among scholars, but “Ancient Americas” is the first exhibition to address the theme in depth, according to LACMA curator Virginia Fields, who coordi nated the Los Angeles version of the show. “That’s why the exhibition is so important,” she said. The notion of landscape should not be taken too literally, however, because it includes the heavens and the underworld as well as the world that can be seen. In the broadest sense, the overarching philosophy of the show “articulates humankind’s place in the cosmos,” Fields said.

The exhibition also poses trenchant questions about humankind’s attitude toward the environment. “Are we going to adjust to the land? Are we going to be here in 200 years at our present rate of consumption?” Townsend asked.

Ancient Americans also damaged the environment, but their rulers were held responsible for maintaining a balance between nature and society, he said. It is this kind of universal issue that makes “Ancient Americas” more than just another pre-Columbian art exhibition.

It opened last fall in Chicago and traveled to the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, making its last stand in Los Angeles, where it runs through Aug. 15. About 20 objects, including a massive stone Olmec head, have been deleted from the Los Angeles show because of a shortage of space, Fields said. Editing was done with an eye on avoiding any appearance of duplicating “Splendors,” she said. Although she would have preferred to present all the objects selected by Townsend, and none of the works actually were in the earlier show, the necessary shrinkage was accomplished by eliminating similar pieces.

The installation divides the artworks into four large categories: the Southwestern United States; Mesoamerica, including Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and adjacent parts of El Salvador and Honduras; Central America and the Northern Andes, and the Central Andes. Photomurals of great archeological sites, such as Mexico’s Teotihuacan and Guatemala’s Tikal, help to give the objects a sense of place, while labels explain the symbolism of spectacular gold work, intricately woven and embroidered textiles, imaginative sculpture and elaborately decorated ceramic vessels.

Visitors learn, for example, that a Mimbres bowl depicting a man wearing an antler headdress illustrates a ceremonial dance that was thought to ensure hunting success.

Severed heads and hearts of slain Indians, on another bowl, are symbols of fertility used as offerings to the Earth or the sun. Recognizable animals--frogs, serpents, birds and crocodiles--proliferate, but natural forms also take on supernatural qualities.

Among pieces that emphasize the integration of human and animal life are an Olmec sculpture of a kneeling man with a jaguar face and an Aztec incense burner depicting an Earth goddess whose head emerges from the beak of bird. “I hope this exhibition disabuses people of any notion of primitive art,” Fields said, noting the high level of technical and conceptual sophistication in the artworks.

All these objects communicate sacred ideas, though the degree of veneration they inspired among ancient peoples would have varied according to their symbolism and use, Townsend said. As remnants of archeological cultures--long since excavated and confined to museums--they have no direct connection to religious practices of today’s Americans, however. “These objects have taken on a national or transnational significance, even to indigenous people,” he said.

Townsend’s interest in the subject of sacred landscapes stems from growing up in Mexico in the 1940s and ‘50s, he said. The 54-year-old curator moved from North Carolina to a small town near Guadalajara at the age of 10 with his mother, who wrote children’s books, and his father, who photographed landscape and architecture.

Townsend lived in Mexico until he completed high school, often traveling with his parents to colonial towns and archeological sites. He returned to the United States for college, and pursued the study of pre-Columbian art at the University of New Mexico and Harvard University, where he earned his doctorate.

“The genesis of the exhibition is in field work I did at Aztec archeological sites,” he said. Noting pervasive relationships between architecture and the land, he came to characterize this bond as a dialogue between natural and handmade elements. And as his awareness of the phenomenon grew, he realized that it was not exclusive to a single culture or locale.

The organization of the complex exhibition began about five years ago when Townsend traveled throughout Latin America, taking his idea to directors of museums, cultural officers and bureaucrats. With the help of the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Art Institute of Chicago in 1988 held a planning conference attended by 35 or 40 representatives of participating countries.

Latin American museums later were besieged with requests for loans to other quincentenary exhibitions, but Townsend’s early groundwork paid off. “I didn’t get everything I wanted, as is usual in life,” he said. But the show includes many unique objects that have never before been seen in the United States and demonstrates a high level of artistic achievement, he said.

One strategy for winning support was to start from the ground up, with museum directors and community cultural leaders--although in turbulent countries such as Peru, Townsend had to repeat his sales pitch every time a new leader came to power. Another factor that has fostered goodwill toward the show is that copies of a Spanish edition of the catalogue will be given to lending institutions and made available for sale in Latin America.

Also, teachers’ kits including 40 poster-size reproductions of artworks and explanatory booklets will be distributed free of charge to schools in participating countries, Townsend said. “These are inexpensively produced, portable materials that can be used in schools with no electricity,” he said, noting that the educational component may be a model for future exhibitions.

“Ancient Americas” has no shortage of extraordinary objects, including a giant stone mask that served as the entrance to an Olmec cave and an exquisite jade portrait vessel found in a Maya tomb. The Mimbres people’s enchanting pottery and ritual figures represent New Mexico; from Ecuador comes a gold sunburst mask; from Bolivia, an incense burner in the shape of a fierce llama; from Peru, startlingly realistic ceramic portraiture.

But the exhibition is unlikely to be mistaken for one more “treasures” show. As Townsend emphasizes, “Ancient Americas” is only a synopsis of a vast subject, but it seems likely to inspire other scholars to explore smaller areas of the terrain in greater depth.

Townsend hopes the show will engender heightened awareness of a shared cultural heritage among all Americans.

“We all have this in our history. It’s a vital component of what it means to be an inhabitant of this hemisphere,” he said. “Creative incorporation of cultural history into institutions and education can help multicultural societies to understand what’s at stake here. Patrimony belongs to indigenous American peoples, but there’s a large, collective application too. We are an evolving civilization.”

‘Ancient Americas’: The Events

The following special events at the L.A. County Museum of Art have been planned in conjunction with “The Ancient Americas: Art From Sacred Landscapes”: LECTURES

“In Search of a Creation Myth at the Aztec Site of Mt. Tlaloc,” by Richard F. Townsend, exhibition curator and curator of Africa, Oceania and the Americas at the Art Institute of Chicago. June 27, 1 p.m., Leo S. Bing Theater.

“Space in the Andes: Inca Royal Rituals,” by Colin McEwan, exhibition coordinator for the Art Institute of Chicago. July 11, 1 p.m., Bing Theater.

“Monumental Architecture of the American Southwest,” by Stephan H. Lekson, president, Crow Canyon Archeological Center, Denver. July 18, 3:30 p.m., Dorothy Collins Brown Auditorium.

“The Royal Tombs of the Moche,” by Christopher Donnan, director, Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA. July 25, 1 p.m., Bing Theater. FAMILY DAY

A program for children 5-12 and their parents celebrates traditional arts of Mexico, Central America, South America and the Southwestern United States. June 13, 11:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Registration begins 11 a.m. SYMPOSIUM

“The Ancient Americas”--a daylong symposium on the relationship of the natural, spiritual and artistic worlds of ancient American cultures, sponsored by UCLA Extension--features a guided tour of the exhibition and talks by leading scholars, including Townsend, UCLA anthropologist Johannes Wilbert and LAMCA curator Virginia Fields. June 26, 9 a.m.-5 p.m., Bing Theater.

Admission to the lectures and family day is free to museum members and included in the general admission fee for others. Information: (213) 857-6139. Enrollment in the symposium costs $45 (non-credit, paid in advance); $55 (non-credit, paid at the door); $90 (credit), plus a $6 exhibition admission fee for non-members. Information: (310) 825-2272.