Chaco Canyon and Other Early Art in the North American Southwest
- LAST REVIEWED: 01 November 2024
- LAST MODIFIED: 28 June 2016
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199920105-0088
- LAST REVIEWED: 01 November 2024
- LAST MODIFIED: 28 June 2016
- DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199920105-0088
Introduction
For approximately 7000 years, the North American Southwest has been home to a variety of Native American cultures and art styles. By c. 2000 BCE (and probably earlier), several distinct traditions had emerged in different portions of the region, defined today primarily by Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona and including a portion of adjoining northwestern Mexico and far west Texas. The most widespread and longest-lived of these cultures is the Ancient Puebloan tradition (aka Anasazi), with modern-day living descendants in Puebloan communities in northern New Mexico and Arizona. But a number of other contemporary indigenous cultures and styles existed alongside the Puebloan tradition prior to the 16th century, including the Mogollon of southern New Mexico and northern Mexico, the Hohokam of southern Arizona, the Fremont of central and northern Utah, and the Sinagua and Salado of central Arizona. Some of these cultures shared numerous artistic and design elements with Ancient Puebloans, while others exhibit distinctly different art styles. In addition, the period between c. 900 and 1140 CE saw the florescence of the so-called Chaco Phenomenon, centered in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. Although this period is part of the Ancient Puebloan tradition, it has long been recognized by archaeologists and historians alike as arguably the most dynamic and extraordinary period of artistic accomplishment in the entire Puebloan tradition. Yet, rather ironically, its art forms are often distinctly different from the broadly defined traditional Puebloan style, so along with the other non-Puebloan styles, a separate section is included for Chaco Canyon scholarship. A substantial amount of anthropological scholarship exists for these various cultures and styles, but dedicated art historical scholarship is relatively recent and often dominated by anthropological method and theory (see Oxford Bibliographies Native North American Art, Pre-Contact). Archaeological interest in and scholarly research on these cultures emerged only in the 19th century. Though primarily archaeological in nature, many of these early reports are still valuable to art historians for establishing context and providing original descriptions and early photographs and illustrations. Not until the 1970s did distinctly art historical scholarship begin to emerge from a generation of academic art historians. Though closely related (art history is in fact often considered a subdiscipline of the broader field of anthropology), art historical scholarship typically focuses on issues of form, technique and materials, and what art styles and imagery reveal about the symbolic and ideological aspects of culture.
General Overviews
An abundant number of good, comprehensive general overviews exist for Southwestern art, architectural styles, and mediums. Those listed here are considered most valuable for their synthesis of anthropological, archaeological, and art historical approaches. These overviews are primarily archeological in their focus and consider these traditions in a variety of contexts. Well-illustrated volumes with especially strong art historical focus, though limited in number, include Brody 1990 and Bruggmann and Acatos 1990 (both cited under Art Historical Overviews), Cordell 1994, Rohn and Ferguson 2006, and Morgan 1994 (cited under Regional Chaco Canyon Architectural Studies). Comprehensive overviews that consider the Ancient Puebloan tradition within the broader context of the Greater Southwest paradigm include Plog 2008 and Lekson 2009. Each volume includes discussion of primary methods and theory for each area of interest. Excellent recent overviews of Chaco Canyon include Frazier 1986 and Vivian and Hilpert 2002 (both cited under Overviews and Archaeological Histories).
Users without a subscription are not able to see the full content on this page. Please subscribe or login.
How to Subscribe
Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here.
Article
- Activist and Socially Engaged Art
- Adornment, Dress, and African Arts of the Body
- Alessandro Algardi
- Ancient Egyptian Art
- Ancient Pueblo (Anasazi) Art
- Angkor and Environs
- Art and Archaeology of the Bronze Age in China
- Art and Architecture in the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary
- Art and Propaganda
- Art of Medieval Iberia
- Art of the Crusader Period in the Levant
- Art of the Dogon
- Art of the Mamluks
- Art of the Plains Peoples
- Art Restitution
- Artemisia Gentileschi
- Arts of Senegambia
- Arts of the Pacific Islands
- Assyrian Art and Architecture
- Australian Aboriginal Art
- Aztec Empire, Art of the
- Babylonian Art and Architecture
- Bamana Arts and Mande Traditions
- Barbizon Painting
- Bartolomeo Ammannati
- Bernini, Gian Lorenzo
- Bodegones
- Bohemia and Moravia, Renaissance and Rudolphine Art of
- Bonampak
- Borromini, Francesco
- Brazilian Art and Architecture, Post-independence
- Burkina Art and Performance
- Byzantine Art and Architecture
- Caravaggio, Michelangelo Merisi da
- Carracci, Annibale
- Ceremonial Entries in Early Modern Europe
- Chaco Canyon and Other Early Art in the North American Sou...
- Chicana/o Art
- Chimú Art and Architecture
- Colonial Art of New Granada (Colombia)
- Conceptual Art and Conceptualism
- Contemporary Art
- Courbet, Gustave
- Czech Modern and Contemporary Art
- Daumier, Honoré
- David, Jacques-Louis
- Delacroix, Eugène
- Design, Garden and Landscape
- Destruction in Art
- Destruction in Art Symposium (DIAS)
- Dürer, Albrecht
- Early Christian Art
- Early Medieval Architecture in Western Europe
- Early Modern European Engravings and Etchings, 1400–1700
- Eighteenth-Century Europe
- Ephemeral Art and Performance in Africa
- Ethiopia, Art History of
- European Art, Historiography of
- European Medieval Art, Otherness in
- Expressionism
- Eyck, Jan van
- Feminism and 19th-century Art History
- Festivals in West Africa
- Francisco de Zurbarán
- French Impressionism
- Gender and Art in the Middle Ages
- Gender and Art in the Renaissance
- Gender and Art in the 17th Century
- Giorgione
- Giotto di Bondone
- Gothic Architecture
- Gothic Art in Italy
- Goya y Lucientes, Francisco José
- Graffiti
- Great Zimbabwe and its Legacy
- Greek Art and Architecture
- Greenberg, Clement
- Géricault, Théodore
- Iconography in the Western World
- Installation Art
- Islamic Art and Architecture in North Africa and the Iberi...
- Japanese Architecture
- Japanese Buddhist Painting
- Japanese Buddhist Sculpture
- Japanese Ceramics
- Japanese Literati Painting and Calligraphy
- Jewish Art, Ancient
- Jewish Art, Medieval to Early Modern
- Jewish Art, Modern and Contemporary
- Jones, Inigo
- Josefa de Óbidos
- Jusepe de Ribera
- Kahlo, Frida
- Katsushika Hokusai
- Lastman, Pieter
- Leonardo da Vinci
- Luca della Robbia (or the Della Robbia Family)
- Luisa Roldán
- Markets and Auctions, Art
- Marxism and Art
- Maya Art
- Medieval Art and Liturgy (recent approaches)
- Medieval Art and the Cult of Saints
- Medieval Art in Scandinavia, 400-800
- Medieval Textiles
- Meiji Painting
- Merovingian Period Art
- Mingei
- Moche Art
- Modern Sculpture
- Monet, Claude
- Māori Art and Architecture
- Museums in Australia
- Museums of Art in the West
- Nasca Art
- Native North American Art, Pre-Contact
- Nazi Looting of Art
- New Media Art
- New Spain, Art and Architecture
- Olmec Art
- Pacific Art, Contemporary
- Palladio, Andrea
- Parthenon, The
- Paul Gauguin
- Performance Art
- Perspective from the Renaissance to Post-Modernism, Histor...
- Peter Paul Rubens
- Philip II and El Escorial
- Photography, History of
- Pollock, Jackson
- Polychrome Sculpture in Early Modern Spain
- Postmodern Architecture
- Pre-Hispanic Art of Columbia
- Psychoanalysis, Art and
- Qing Dynasty Painting
- Rembrandt van Rijn
- Renaissance and Renascences
- Renaissance Art and Architecture in Spain
- Rimpa School
- Rivera, Diego
- Rodin, Auguste
- Roman Art
- Romanesque
- Romanticism
- Science and Conteporary Art
- Sculpture: Method, Practice, Theory
- South Asia and Allied Textile Traditions, Wall Painting of
- South Asia, Modern and Contemporary Art of
- South Asia, Photography in
- South Asian Architecture and Sculpture, 13th to 18th Centu...
- South Asian Art, Historiography of
- The Art of Medieval Sicily and Southern Italy through the ...
- The Art of Southern Italy and Sicily under Angevin and Cat...
- Theory in Europe to 1800, Art
- Timurid Art and Architecture
- Turner, Joseph Mallord William
- Turquerie
- van Gogh, Vincent
- Viking Art
- Visigoths
- Warburg, Aby
- Warhol, Andy
- Wari (Huari) Art and Architecture
- Wittelsbach Patronage from the late Middle Ages to the Thi...
- Women, Art, and Art History: Gender and Feminist Analyses
- Yuan Dynasty Art