Museum PR Announcements News and Information

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) Announces Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), in partnership with the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH), Mexico, presents Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World, the first exhibition in the United States to examine the significance of indigenous peoples and cultures within the complex social and artistic landscape of colonial Latin America. On view from November 6, 2011 through January 29, 2012.


Folding Screen with Indian Wedding and Flying Pole (detail), Mexico, c. 1690, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

The exhibition offers a comparative view of Mexico and Peru, the two principal viceroyalties of Spanish America, from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries, and includes a selection of approximately 200 works of art, including paintings, sculptures, codices, manuscripts, queros (ceremonial drinking vessels), featherworks, and other extraordinary objects.

“This exhibition, which brings together a remarkable group of artworks from Mexico and Peru (two areas which were much larger than the countries known by those names today), provides a unique opportunity to examine the connection between ancient and colonial artistic traditions,” said Ilona Katzew, exhibition curator and department head of Latin American art.

“By taking into consideration the pre-Columbian (Inca and Aztec) origins of these two regions and their continuities and ruptures over time, Contested Visions greatly enriches our understanding of how art and power intersected in the Spanish colonial world.” lacma.org

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *