PCSNY February 9 lecture–Lisa DeLeonardis

Storytelling in the Round:
Architectural Form and Motif in Paracas Sculptural Ceramics

Lisa DeLeonardis, Austen-Stokes Professor in Art of the Ancient Americas in the Department
of the History of Art, Johns Hopkins University

Paracas Cavernas Artist, Ceremonial Vessel, earthenware with incision and post-fired
paint, 5.8 x 6.1 in. (15.0 x 15.6 cm). Museo Nacional de Arqueología, Antropología e História,
Peru (MNAAHP) sp. 1/2660. Photo Daniel Giannoni

Abstract: Architecture and its visual referents are the subject of an exceptional group of  ceramics produced by the Paracas (ca. 800–200 BCE) of south coastal Peru. Masterfully executed in patterned detail, these objects encapsulate a moment in pictorial history that parallels innovation in building design and public acts of display. This talk considers the methods by which architecture was pictured, and demonstrates the significance of the forms in a broader narrative of the built environment and sacred geography. Specific features, such as the step and stepped pyramid are examined, as are ideas about spatial boundaries and scale. The value of the objects in ceremony
is also considered. A narrative is proposed for the interrelated ideas, motifs and monuments that constitute a Paracas architectural and pictorial history.

Bio: Lisa DeLeonardis is Austen-Stokes Professor in Art of the Ancient Americas in the Department of the History of Art, Johns Hopkins University. She has conducted a number of projects in Andean South America centering on Paracas visual culture. She is currently engaged with architectural analysis of Casa Blanca, a ceremonial complex in south coastal Peru. She has held fellowships at Dumbarton Oaks and the John Carter Brown Library, and earlier served as Research Associate at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. Recently, she investigated the transatlantic responses to earthquakes in early modern Peru and Italy as the Charles K. Williams II Fellow in Historic Preservation and Conservation at the American Academy in Rome.

Wednesday, February 9, 2022

6:00 PM EST

Institute of Fine Arts–NYU

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