Penn Museum Presents Art And Ritual Of Amazonia

Vanishing Worlds: Art and Ritual of Amazonia, a traveling exhibition of more than 150 rare and extraordinary objects, offers insight into the cultures and traditions of diverse native peoples of South America's Amazon region. The exhibition is on view at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Philadelphia, Saturday, March 3 through Saturday, June 30, 2007.

Image caption: Kayapó-Mekrãgnoti headdress, roriro ri. Worn by adult men during various ceremonies. Photo © Houston Museum of Natural Science.

Scientists believe that people have inhabited the Amazon region for at least 15,000 years. Prior to European contact, between three and five million people thrived in the Amazon region, an ecologically diverse land of 2.5 million square miles, home to lush rainforests, savannas and an unparalleled array of plants and wildlife. Today, fewer than 100,000 Amazonian native people survive.

This exhibition, organized by the Houston Museum of Natural Science, offers a look into the traditional cultures of diverse peoples located in areas that stretch from the Atlantic coast of Brazil to the foothills of the Andes, south of the Amazon River. The objects in the exhibition come from the Ka'apor, Karajá, Tapirapé, Ticuna, Shipibo-Conibo, Shuar, Kayapó, and Xingu River region peoples. Colorful headdresses, masks, body ornaments, and full body costumes, as well as domestic and utilitarian pieces like basketry, weapons, pottery and textiles, are showcased.

Using the brilliantly colored feathers of parrots, macaws, and herons, among those of about 40 other species, the Amazon peoples create objects that call upon a range of physical and magical forces integral to their conception of the environment around them. The visually dazzling art works on display are directly linked to rituals and ceremonies central to the life of Amazon peoples, and offer insights into the natural, historical and cultural heritage of the Americas.

The carefully crafted objects in the exhibition were used by shamans and other community members in many ceremonies and stage of life rituals, including name giving rituals for the young, initiation rituals into adulthood, and rituals surrounding death and bereavement, harvest, and healing. Visitors can explore these rituals and traditions through photographs, maps, and educational panels. A lavishly illustrated catalog with more than 100 color reproductions accompanies the exhibition, and is available for purchase in the Museum Shop.

Vanishing Worlds was organized and curated by Associate Curator Adam Mekler, who originally collected all the artifacts in the exhibition, with Curator of Anthropology Dirk Van Tuerenhout, Ph.D., both of the Houston Museum of Natural Science.

Exhibition design, text panels and images, edited from the exhibition catalogue, were developed by Penn Museum's Exhibition and Traveling Exhibition departments in consultation with Dr. Clark Erickson, Associate Curator in the American Section.

Vanishing Worlds is a fine complement to Penn Museum fieldwork and collections. Penn Museum archaeologists and anthropologists have worked and collected in South America more than a century, beginning in the 1890s with archaeologist Max Uhle's excavations in Boliva and Peru. Later collections were obtained by William C. Farabee around the Amazon River between 1913-16; anthropologist Vincenzo Petrullo working in Brazil and Venezuela in the 1930s; and more recently, Kenneth Kensinger, then Ph.D. candidate in Anthropology, working in the jungles of southeastern Peru in the 1960s. Today, archaeologist Clark Erickson works in South America; his special interest lies in the ancient landscapes-built, engineered, and sacred-between sites in Bolivia and Peru.

The Museum has its own collection of Amazonian artifacts, including an extraordinary collection of featherwork pieces. In 1991, Penn Museum created a special exhibition, "The Gift of Birds: Featherwork of Native South American Peoples," featuring both archaeological and ethnographic artifacts from the collection.

The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology is dedicated to the study and understanding of human history and diversity. Founded in 1887, the Museum has sent more than 400 archaeological and anthropological expeditions to all the inhabited continents of the world. With an active exhibition schedule and educational programming for children and adults, the Museum offers the public an opportunity to share in the ongoing discovery of humankind's collective heritage. -- www.museum.upenn.edu