Volume CXXXI, Number 21 April 12, 2002 f

Art lecture highlighted by rabbits, dwarves
KATE LACKEMANN
CONTRIBUTOR

On Tuesday and Wednesday night, Mary Ellen Miller, an art history professor at Yale University, spoke to the Bowdoin community about Maya art. Sponsored by the Lehman lecture series, Ms. Miller's Tuesday night lecture was entitled "Men, Women, and Rabbits: The Human Form In Maya Art" and was accompanied by slides of Maya sculptures, architecture and paintings. Wednesday night she spoke about the wonderfully preserved paintings of Bonampak.

Art History professor Susan Wegner, who teaches a class on Mayan art, speaks to Mary Ellen Miller, who lectured on the subject. (Karsten Moran, Bowdoin Orient)

Ms. Miller has extensively studied the Maya, who flourished between 250 and 900 A.D. in southern Mexico and Guatemala. She has published books on Maya art, including The Art of Mesoamerica (Thames and Hudson), which is one of the texts for Introduction to Mexican and Peruvian Art here at Bowdoin.

Tracing the evolution of the human form through the Maya existence, the forms become more complex and the concept of space becomes more realistic. While talking about her passionate interest in Maya art, Ms. Miller revealed some of the more amusing aspects of the Maya culture. For example, Maya rulers often surrounded themselves with dwarves and hunchbacks because they were thought to be smarter than average people. Another oddity, in comparison to our culture, is the ideal beauty: a flat forehead leading directly into a flat-bridged nose, cross-eyes, and filed down teeth filled with jade for a "spinach continuously stuck in teeth" look, as described by Miller.

Finally, the rabbits: in Maya tradition, the rabbit was seen as a trickster, who, although not inherently bad, misbehaved quite often. It was also believed that the face of the moon depicted a rabbit and that in fact 400 drunken and fertile rabbits inhabited the moon.

Mary Miller's firsthand experience in studying Maya art made her lectures incredibly informative, but her strong presence and sense of humor made them enjoyable as well.