International studio (80.1925)

irrcsRnAoonAL

ALTAR C AT COPAN

Negras there is considerable variety in coloring,
with the result that the details of the complex
sculptures have been simplified and rendered
much more decipherable.

The general physiognomy represented on Maya
sculpture differs widely from the accepted Euro-
pean types of beauty. Artificial flattening of the
head was practiced and straightened foreheads
and retreating chins were held to be marks of
beauty.

It is quite doubtful whether any sculptures
were seriously intended as portraits of living
chiefs or priests. We find a number of face types,
variation depending upon form of features and
expression. Usually one type prevails in each
ancient city. On the stela? of Quirigua several
types are to be seen, but the degree of individ-
ualism is slight. Possibly, as was the case in
Egypt, the faces of portrait statues varied little,
while individualism was expressed in dress, orna-
ment or inscription.

There has been widely advocated the theory
that primitive art was purely communal. Of
course the first artists did not sign their works,
but strict regard for ownership of designs is a
principle by no means rare among primitive
peoples. Worthy contributions to the progress of
art are always referable to individuals and the loss
of written records is of no consequence. But the
individual, it must be remembered, lives and
works within the mode of his nation and his time.
The works of the most flagrant individualist of
today will tomorrow fall into an inevitable scheme
of evolution.

It is therefore reasonable to suppose that each

of the various groups into which the stela; of
Copan may be divided was the work of a single
sculptor or of a school working under his supreme
direction. Each group shows a conscious and
typical arrangement of common elements. But
through the whole line of groups runs a thread cf
change and consistent development of which the
artists themselves were probably entirely uncon-
scious, except in its more obvious, features.

The influence of a national religion upon a
national art was never more unmistakable than
in the case of the Maya. All the great monuments
were apparently shrines of some sort and con-
nected with sacerdotal ceremonies and even minor
objects were never too humble to receive decora-
tions with religious significance. Without doubt,
the art reacted strongly upon the religion which
gave it birth, filling that religion with symbolism
and imagery. They progressed hand in hand; the
spreading of the religion meant the spreading of
the art and the graphic representations of the art
rendered the religion intelligible.

The origin of Maya culture has not yet been
solved. It is impossible to deny a certain super-
ficial similarity, often surprising, between the
Maya ruins and those of southeast Asia, but this
disappears, for the most part, upon closer analysis.
Mere similarity of ornament has no meaning when
the ornament in question is found to symbolize
beliefs of an entirely different character. The
evidence possessed at present, in spite of several
ingenious theories such as that of the" Elephants,"
points unmistakably to the undisturbed evolution
of Maya art on American soil and that art may
be regarded as in every sense American.

Jour tbirty-eight

MARCH I925