Arts & Entertainment
National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago Facilitates Repatriation of Ancient Mayan Frieze Back to Mexico
The limestone frieze is estimated to be from between 500 to 900 C.E., overlapping with the Classic Period of the Mayan civilization in Mexico. The National Museum of Mexican Art is working in collaboration with the Mexican National Institute of Anthropology and History to facilitate the repatriation. (Courtesy of National Museum of Mexican Art)
The National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago is helping bring an ancient Mayan frieze that was donated to the museum back to its origin in Mexico, the museum announced Friday.
The National Museum of Mexican Art is working in collaboration with the Mexican National Institute of Anthropology and History to facilitate the repatriation.
The frieze had recently been donated by the family of Jeanne and Joseph Sullivan, based in the Chicago area, who National Museum of Mexican Art Visual Arts Director and Chief Curator Cesáreo Moreno described as being “very happy” the piece is being returned to Mexico.
“I really have high hopes that people find out that repatriation can be a really good thing because sometimes when you read about it in the news, it’s a legal battle,” Moreno said. “It’s an ugly story, oftentimes.”
The limestone frieze is estimated to be from between 500 to 900 C.E., overlapping with the Classic Period of the Mayan civilization in Mexico, according to the museum. The carved ancient artifact (47” x 21” x 4”) shows a figure with extended hands, wearing regalia with a headdress.
The frieze originally showed two figures facing one another, according to a news release.
Exterior of the National Museum of Mexican Art located at 1852 W. 19th Street in the Lower West Side. (Courtesy of National Museum of Mexican Art)
From the 1960s through present day, the piece has been in the hands of the Brooklyn Museum, the Snite Museum of Art at Notre Dame University, the Art Institute of Chicago and private collectors, according to the National Museum of Mexican Art’s provenance.
Moreno said that while the frieze is legal to own and is not considered stolen under a U.S. agreement with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, the museum is “taking an ethical stance” in deciding to facilitate its return to Mexico.
“We have a small, modest collection of ancient Mesoamerican pieces from west Mexico, and honestly, I don’t think we need to be collecting any more of those pieces,” Moreno said.
“I would like to think that there is a new generation of curators and museum directors who truly understand what’s at heart here,” Moreno continued. “Museums have been evolving since the ‘80s. They’ve been changing from places that collect pieces for scholarship and for research, which is all good, there’s nothing bad with that, but they’ve been changing to places that really reflect communities and really try to embrace ideas of social justice.”
Moreno said he hopes that the piece, which has to undergo a standard examination and condition report, will be able to be displayed at the museum before being returned to Mexico to teach visitors, including school groups, about the act of repatriation.
The Mexican National Institute of Anthropology and History will be in charge of where the frieze will ultimately end up, according to Moreno, but he hopes it will go back to the Campeche area in Mexico, where archaeologists believe the frieze was originally created.
The National Museum of Mexican Art is holding a news conference Friday morning about the artifact’s repatriation. Diego Prieto Hernández, director general of Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History, is expected to be present to accept the artifact. Antonio Saborit, director of the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, is also expected to join.
Contact Eunice Alpasan: [email protected]
